Nurse managers' work life quality and their participation in knowledge management: a correlational study.

Background: The association between quality of work life and participation in knowledge management is unknown.

Objectives: This study aimed to discover the association between quality of work life of nurse managers and their participation in implementing knowledge management.

Materials and methods: This was a correlational study. All nurse managers (71 people) from 11 hospitals affiliated with the Social Security Organization in Tehran, Iran, were included. They were asked to rate their participation in knowledge management and their quality of work life. Data was gathered by a researcher-made questionnaire (May-June 2012). The questionnaire was validated by content and construct validity approaches. Cronbach's alpha was used to evaluate reliability. Finally, 50 questionnaires were analyzed. The answers were scored and analyzed using mean of scores, T-test, ANOVA (or nonparametric test, if appropriate), Pearson's correlation coefficient and linear regression.

Results: Nurse managers' performance to implement knowledge management strategies was moderate. A significant correlation was found between quality of work life of nurse managers and their participation in implementing knowledge management strategies (r = 0.82; P < 0.001). The strongest correlations were found between implementation of knowledge management and participation of nurse managers in decision making (r = 0.82; P < 0.001).

Conclusions: Improvement of nurse managers' work life quality, especially in decision-making, may increase their participation in implementing knowledge management.