How and when organization identification promotes safety voice among healthcare professionals

The aim of this study is to examine the effect of organizational identification on safety voice behaviour, focusing on the mediating role of safety motivation and the moderating role of management commitment to safety and psychological safety.

The study used a cross-sectional questionnaire and a convenience sampling method.

Data were collected online during November 2019 from 165 staff members from a disability healthcare organization in Australia that employs over 800 staff. Nearly 80% of the study sample were healthcare workers without supervisory responsibilities, and the remainder were senior staff with some operational duties. Measures of organizational identification, safety motivation, perceived management commitment to safety, psychological safety and safety voice were collected. Data were analysed using a moderated mediation model available with the SPSS PROCESS macro.

Findings show that organizational identification interacted with management commitment to safety to predict safety motivation, such that only healthcare employees who identified with their organization and perceived that their management cares about safety would feel that safety was personally important to them. In turn, safety motivation predicted safety voice. However, the effect of safety motivation on safety voice was only significant when psychological safety was low.

These findings offer initial evidence for the important role of organizational identification in prompting safety voice, how the relationship is contingent on management commitment to safety and psychological safety.

Healthcare professionals' discretionary sharing of ideas and suggestions are crucial to organizational performance and both staff and patient safety. However, safety voice involves inherent social risks because speaking up might not always be perceived positively by co-workers and leaders. We recommend that managers implement specific strategies to cultivate employee identification with the organization and demonstrate a genuine and visible commitment to safety so that employees will be motivated to raise safety concerns.