Conflicts among public health nurses managers in Japan

The reality of conflicts and influencing factors

Abstract

Objectives: The purpose of this study was to determine the actual situation of conflicts as perceived by public health nurses (PHN's) managers working in Japanese local governments, it's effect on the performance of their managerial duties, and the factors that contribute to these conflicts.

Methods: We conducted a mail survey using a self-administered questionnaire on 384 PHN's managers in 14 prefectures selected by stratified random sampling. The questionnaire items covered the basic characteristics of respondents, conflict awareness, and conflict-handling style of PHN's managers. The analysis included descriptive statistics and a test of the difference in average scores A stepwise multiple regression analysis was conducted using the basic characteristics of respondents, conflict-handling styles as explanatory variables, and conflict awareness frequency as dependent variables. The study data were analyzed using IBM SPSS Ver. 25 statistical analysis software with a two-tailed significance level of <5%.

Results: Of 242 (63.0%) responses to the questionnaire received 223 (61.5%) were valid. A total of 51 respondents (21.6%) were aware of the high frequency of conflicts, while the mean proportion of all work occupied by the conflict-handling fraction was 24.3%. The most common style of dealing with conflicts was “understanding each other's ideas; integrating ” at 69 (29.2%), followed by “avoiding arguments; avoiding ” at 63 (26.7%), and “respecting each other's goals; integrating” at 48 (20.3%). Multiple regression analysis was used to examine the factors influencing the frequency of perceived conflict. The results showed a positive association with the percentage of work “managerial work fraction,” and a negative association with “the number of subordinate occupations,” ““integrating” of coping styles,” “superiors' occupation,” and “population size”.

Conclusion: Approximately 20% of PHN's managers frequently perceived conflicts in their job performance and 1/4 of their workload comprised dealing with them. The “integrating” style is considered a method that leads to a solution that is fully satisfactory to both parties in a cooperative manner.

It was suggested that the choice of a desirable coping style by PHN's managers may help in the performance of their duties.