Facing the Post-Pandemic Challenges: The Role of Leadership Effectiveness in Shaping the Affective Well-Being of Healthcare Providers Working in a Hybrid Work Mode

Abstract

The COVID-19 pandemic has brought new challenges to the medical industry, including hybrid work, in which specialists can perform some of their duties remotely, in addition to physical contact with patients and their teams. Hybrid work provides opportunities, but also generates difficulties (e.g., accurate long-distance diagnosis); therefore, there is a need to ensure the well-being of healthcare workers, especially in the context of leadership strategies. As there is little research on leadership practices in remote and hybrid medical worker management, this study analyses the relationship between certain behavioural strategies and competencies of leaders and the affective well-being of hybrid employees. The research was conducted among a group of employees (N = 135) from seven countries who provide healthcare in a hybrid model. The correlations between the variables showed the statistical significance of all leadership strategies introduced into the model and focused on building involvement (employee empowerment and team orientation), creating a shared vision, defining clear goals and strategies, promoting adaptability (change management, promotion of organisational learning and patient focus), managing consistency through shared values, agreement and effective coordination, as well as competencies such as communicativeness, credibility, self-development and digital readiness. Despite the significance of all the relationships, the linear regression showed that the variability of affective well-being was explained mainly by the adaptability leadership strategy. The results of the study expand the knowledge on the competencies of healthcare leaders, and shed new light on the management of medical employees performing remote and hybrid work. Because such research into well-being has not been published to date, the analysis begins an important discussion on redefining leadership in the healthcare sector, taking into account the digital transformation.

Predictors of Post-Traumatic Growth in a Sample of United Kingdom Mental and Community Healthcare Workers during the COVID-19 Pandemic

“…Conversely, where employees were equipped by their employees to use these new experiences to gain new knowledge and learn new skills, we and others have found that such experiences provide an opportunity for positive personal growth [ 44 , 95 ]. This complements previous research showing that, post-pandemic, the wellbeing of workers providing hybrid healthcare is optimized by leadership that promotes employee adaptability and personal growth [ 96 ]. Similarly, guidance for promoting the mental health of healthcare workers post-pandemic has emphasized that a commitment to continuing professional development, including maintaining at least a basic programme during extended periods of pressure, gives staff a sense of hope and progression and can promote mental health resilience [ 65 ].…”

Embracing relational competencies in applying the LEADS framework for health-care leaders in transformational change and the COVID-19 pandemic

“…According to the Canadian Federation of Nurses Union (2022) survey, 94% of nurses are suffering from symptoms of burnout (characterized by emotional exhaustion, depersonalization and diminished professional achievement (Leiter and Maslach, 2016), and 45% are experiencing severe burnout. Studies show that leader competencies and behavioral strategies such as team development and empowerment (sharing leadership) are important for the well-being of employees (Oleksa-Marewska and Tokar, 2022).…”

Criteria and Guidelines for Human-Centered Work Design in a Digitally Transformed World of Work: Findings from a Formal Consensus Process

“…Four of these criteria are at the level of organizational–social and technical subsystems. The aspect of human-centered flexibility with its opportunities and challenges appears in a wide variety of studies [ 120 , 121 , 122 , 123 ]. Regarding the criterion of fair evaluation processes, current research on chatbots, for example, indicate that they can facilitate recruitment processes.…”