Impact of humble leadership on attitudes to error disclosure: the mediating role of psychological safety and safety climate in Australian veterinary practices.
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Abstract
Background: Medical errors, while prominent in healthcare as one of the leading causes of mortality, remain a relatively unexplored area in veterinary medicine. The nature and frequency of such errors in this field are rarely reported or discussed, presenting a significant gap in understanding and improvement of veterinary practices. It is in this context that the importance of leadership styles emerge. Humble leadership involves acknowledging one's own limitations, actively seeking feedback and learning from it, and appreciating others' strengths and contributions. Such a leadership style has been linked to increased openness and error disclosure in various fields - a crucial step in mitigating medical errors.
Purpose: This study investigates the association between humble leadership and error disclosure in veterinary medicine, with a particular focus on the mediating role of psychological safety and safety climate.
Methods: A total of 669 responses were collected from veterinary staff across Australia to analyse the impact of leadership style on error disclosure. Model 4 of Hayes' PROCESS macro in SPSS was employed to analyse the effect of humble leadership on staff's attitudes towards error disclosure and the mediating effects of psychological safety and safety climate.
Results: Humble leadership had a positive influence on psychological safety (β 0.66, p<0.001) and safety climate (β 0.48, p<0.001). Furthermore, both psychological safety and safety climate significantly impacted staff's attitudes towards error disclosure (β 0.07, p<0.001; β 0.22, p<0.001, respectively). The study showed that humble leadership did not influence staff's attitudes towards error disclosure directly. Rather, the influence of humble leadership appears to be channelled through its positive effects on psychological safety and the safety climate.
Conclusion: Humble leadership fosters a safe environment and encourages a mindset of psychological safety among staff, which in turn leads to more positive attitudes towards error disclosure.
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