The lack of discrete motivation strategies to improve the consistency of employees' performances was the problem that instigated this research. The purpose of this single-case study was to explore the motivation strategies live-entertainment artistic directors (ADs) use to improve consistency in the artists' performances. Data were collected within an international live-entertainment company to uncover whether artists self-determined the approach to improving consistency in performance or whether consistency occurred from strategies developed by the ADs. Data were collected from face-to-face interviews with ADs and senior ADs and performance evaluations of employees, and then analyzed using Miles, Huberman, and Saldana's data analysis method. The 2 emergent themes indicated that the ADs achieved consistency from performers through strategies supporting well-being and technical proficiency. Analysis of employee evaluations indicated the use of alternative motivational strategies for achieving and improving consistency at the show level. Some ADs rely on artists to self-determine consistency when working in environments perceived as conducive to consistent behavior. These findings might result in a mutual understanding between employers and employees of the role of consistency in employees' live performances, which may also improve employer-to-employee relationships in the live-entertainment sector. Such understanding might lead to positive social change by improving cultural output to the community and improving employees' economic viability and ability to contribute to society.

Nonprofit organizational leaders (NOLs) face laws that require increased transparency and more oversight on funding allocations. Grounded by a conceptual framework of Hersey and Blanchard's situational leadership theory, Burns's transformational leadership theory, and Greenleaf's servant leadership theory, this multiple case study was developed to explore the leadership strategies of NOLs who implemented requirements of New York's Non-Profit Revitalization Act to increase funding allocations to support fulfillment of the organizational mission and achieve sustainability. The study population comprised NOLs from the Northeastern United States, who implemented requirements of the Non-Profit Revitalization Act requirements. Face-to-face semistructured interviews with 5 NOLs, a review of organizational documents, and member-checking were used to collect data for the study. Data were analyzed using a framework method to determine themes, visualization to code the data, and methodological triangulation to validate themes. Three main themes emerged from the data analysis: strategies for building and maintaining relationships increased funding allocations and sustainability, trust and accountability strategies improved organizational mission achievement and funding allocations, and strategies for higher standards and expectations improved sustainability. The findings from this study may contribute to positive social change by providing insight to NOLs about the need to create leadership strategies to build relationships and trust with stakeholders while operating a more responsible nonprofit organization, thereby creating a better connection between organizational systems and increasing service effectiveness.

Individual donors are an important source of revenue for nonprofit organizations. However, there is limited information on the attraction and retention of individual donors in nonprofit organizations. This single-case study addressed strategies 3 nonprofit leaders in the Northeast United States use to attract and retain individual donors. The conceptual framework was Kaplan and Norton's strategy map and the 2015-2016 Baldrige Excellence Framework used to evaluate organizational performance. Data collection included semistructured interviews; review of company documents; analysis of data available via GuideStar, an online provider of information on U.S. nonprofit organizations; analysis of data available about U.S. agencies; and review of data and information from other publicly available sources with information on nonprofit organizations. Data analysis included coding of collected data and use of thematic analysis. Four themes emerged from the study: strength in fundraising processes, operational alignment of strategy, opportunities in documentation of processes, and systematic evaluation of programs' effectiveness and organizational learning. Findings may assist nonprofit leaders in aligning organizational strategies with key processes and focusing efforts on the achievement of organizational goals. Nonprofit leaders may use the results to improve access to funds from individual donors and to create valuable community services such as increased access to schools and affordable housing in underserved urban areas.

Nurse leaders are essential to the advancement of healthcare because of their ability to bridge the gap of knowledge between clinical practice and the business of healthcare. Developing nurse managers is imperative to the future of nursing given their influential role in healthcare. The central topic of exploration in the project was how nurse managers use the American Organization of Nurse Executives (AONE) Nurse Manger Inventory Tool to assess their management skills after exposure to the leadership development program currently available to them. In this project, the novice to expert theory was used to evaluate the existing leadership development program at a tertiary care academic medical center with Magnet accreditation within the Midwest. Secondary data from the AONE Nurse Manager Inventory was analyzed with focus on three professional domains: the art, science and leader within. The analysis was used to identify the current program's strengths and weaknesses, and make recommendations to increase education for nurse managers in the science domain; specifically in the subcategories of financial and strategic management. Enhanced educational opportunities in financial and strategic management will support the progression of nurse managers' development along the continuum of novice to expert. The implications for social change from this project exist through the creation of new leadership outcome measures supporting Magnet redesignation for this facility and as an example to other organization on their journey of meeting Magnet requirements in nursing leadership development.

Unplanned and frequent employee turnover can result in significant costs to an organization. Grounded in Herzberg's two-factor theory, the purpose of this correlational study was to examine the relationship between employees' job satisfaction and their degree of job embeddedness, and their intent to leave the organization. In this study, 63 full-time Southeastern U.S. manufacturing employees completed surveys that included the Andrews and Withey's job satisfaction questionnaire, Crossley, Bennett, Jex, and Burnfield's global measurement of job embeddedness, and Mobley, Horner, and Hollingsworth's intent to stay scale. The results of the multiple regression analysis indicated the model was able to significantly predict employee turnover intention, F(2, 95) = 71.822, p < .001, R2 = .705. Both employee job satisfaction (t = -.703, p < .001) and employee job embeddedness (t = -.501, p < .001), were statistically significant predictors of turnover intent. These results indicate that satisfied and committed employees are less likely to plan to leave their employment. This research adds to the body of knowledge concerning what contributes to why people leave their jobs. Reduced employee turnover can financially benefit an organization and that in turn can have a positive social benefit on the community. More secure employees and companies with improved financial security can result in improved financial support to communities and help increase economic stability.

Servant leadership (SL), a universal, ethical leadership style, consistently produces high performance and employee engagement. For the last two decades, lack of business ethics in decision making by senior leaders has resulted in many negative outcomes, such as the WorldCom scandal. The purpose of this descriptive phenomenological study was to identify and report the lived experiences of senior leaders in relation to decision making in SL organizations in the southwestern United States. The study's theoretical/conceptual foundations encompassed Maslow's motivation theories, decision theory, spirituality, spiritual intelligence, Cicero's virtue theory of ethics, and Greenleaf's SL. Data collection involved the use of semistructured interviews with a purposive sample of 18 participants who were senior leaders of SL organizations. Data analysis employed Giorgi's method whereby phenomenological reduction revealed meaning units, and psychological reduction reached descriptive psychological structures of experiences by hand coding and integrative data analysis software. Findings confirmed senior leaders' ethical decision making in SL organizations. Recommendations include addressing ethical decision making in team leadership at the board and operational levels and examining the interrelation of CEO ethical leadership and firm performance. Conclusions reached confirm a prevailing structure of experiences as collaborative, interdependent, egalitarian teamwork, a family metaphor. Application of the findings of this study may result in positive social change by fostering a more ethical, kinder capitalism in everyday life and in building community with more servant leaders and SL organizations.

Research does not sufficiently address how fire lieutenants in the central United States experience leadership development. Leadership development training, coaching, and mentoring are important processes that prepare followers to become effective leaders in public safety organizations. The intent of this qualitative research study was to explore the lived experiences and stories of fire lieutenants to obtain a clear understanding of how transformational leadership training was perceived to affect their careers. Face-to-face interviews from a purposeful sample of 7 fire suppression lieutenants queried 3 relevant areas derived from the literature, comprising of transformational leadership, critical success factors, and mentoring and coaching. Open hand and axial coding extracted data to identify the emergent themes regarding fire lieutenants' comprehension of leadership development training and was validated with member checking as described in the literature. Findings show that transformational leadership equips leaders to motivate followers to be more creative in their job, influences transparency in decision-making, and affects the transition from lower-level to mid-level management. This research contributes to positive social change by adding to the existing knowledge throughout the United States where fire services can establish mentoring and coaching training programs for their future leaders and establish continuous ongoing training in transformational leadership to increase the overall effectiveness of the organization. The more public safety organizations apply transformational leadership training as part of the development of officers; the better prepared fire lieutenants are to lead their followers, thus helping to build a better and safer society.

Employee engagement is a significant problem for leaders in most organizations today. Though many reasons are given for the growing number of disengaged employees, little is understood about what role spirituality in the workplace may play into employee engagement. Humanocracy theory guided the study on three aspects of workplace spirituality, employee engagement, and meaningfulness of work. An online survey combining elements of a Spiritual Well-being Scale, the Work and Meaning Inventory, and the Utrecht Work Engagement Scale was administered to 325 human resource managers. Linear multiple regression results showed a strong negative correlation between spiritual well-being and job engagement, and no significant correlation between spiritual well-being and workplace meaningfulness, which contradicted findings in the literature. Results indicated the need for future research and to further refine a working definition of spirituality as it applies to the workplace and to identify or redefine traditional variables to better assess engagement and meaningfulness within a new workplace landscape. The findings may also be indicative of how the landscape of traditional workplace culture is shifting with the values and motivations of a workforce of newer generations. The findings of this study make apparent the urgency to rethink the definition of spirituality and its application to the workplace and employee engagement. The workplace today is often a barometer of societal norms and values. Understanding the need for new ways to view engagement, spirituality, and meaning has the potential to extend beyond the organization to the communities and society the organizations exist within and serve.

Leadership in small and medium enterprises (SMEs) has remained an under-researched area in the management literature, especially in developing countries such as Nigeria. SME owner-managers in Nigeria lacked in-depth understanding of their leadership style to objectively evaluate its implication on long-term performance and growth of their enterprise. The purpose of this qualitative multiple-case study was to explore the experiences of SME owner-managers in Nigeria to gain an in-depth understanding of their leadership style and its implication for long-term performance and growth of their enterprise. The conceptual framework for this study was anchored in two key concepts; leadership styles and leadership in SMEs, with the full range leadership model as the theoretical foundation. The research question sought to explore the role of SMEs owners and managers leadership styles in the long-term success of their enterprise. Interview data were collected from 6 SME owner-managers who employ less than 200 employees within the manufacturing, education, and trading sectors. The cross-case synthesis technique was used for data analysis which allowed for within-case analysis and cross-case comparisons. Findings from this study showed that Nigerian SME owner-managers do not follow any specific leadership style. They exhibited few characteristics of transformational and transactional leadership behaviors, leaning more to transactional leadership. This study has significance for positive social change by providing insights on how leadership styles can improve the performance and sustainability of Nigerian SMEs, thus increasing their capacity to create employment.

The purpose of this experimental research was to determine whether using delta-MELD as a criterion for the liver transplant patient selection process could improve the U.S. liver allocation system. This research closed a gap in current literature on the utility of delta-MELD for liver transplant patient selection. The frameworks of systems theory, the analytic hierarchy process, and the Kalman filter contributed to the development of 2 simulation models of the liver allocation system: one that used delta-MELD and one that did not use delta-MELD. The research question examined whether using delta-MELD could improve the liver allocation system by reducing the number of patients dropping off the wait list and lowering the average MELD score. Statistical t tests of 2 independent scenarios (allocation with and without delta-MELD), each with 70 runs of 180 simulated days on the liver allocation wait list, did not indicate a significant improvement to the liver allocation system by using delta-MELD for liver allocation. However, observations made from the simulation experiment, such as the median patient wait time being 11 months and delta-MELD being more variable at the end-stage of liver diseases, provided insights into how to improve the model of the liver allocation process. In addition, observations made from the status 1 patient subgroup (patients in ICU with about 7 days to live), which were excluded from this research, suggested including status 1 patients and expanding the simulation timespan from 180 to 360 days to better capture the delta-MELD variability from patients at the end-stage of liver disease. This research provides empirical evidence on the applicability of the delta-MELD criterion for non-status 1 patients, and yields recommendations to include status 1 patients in an improved simulation of the donor liver system while using delta-MELD as criterion.