Deep learning reveals a neurocomputational mechanism predicting depression risk in adolescents.

The global shortage of nurse managers poses significant challenges to healthcare systems. Nurse managers are crucial in ensuring the smooth operation of healthcare facilities, mentoring staff, and maintaining high standards of patient care []. Nurse managers not only play a critical role in healthcare by preventing adverse patient outcomes, support patient recovery, and enhancing overall satisfaction with medical services [], they are vital to achieving Sustainable Development Goals pertaining to health (Sustainable Development Goal 3), as well as Sustainable Development Goals pertaining to gender equality (Sustainable Development Goal 5), education (Sustainable Development Goal 4), and the pursuit of decent employment and economic growth (Sustainable Development Goal 8) []. However, the global nursing sector faces significant staffing shortages, estimated to be at 4.5 million [], which includes a sizable shortage of nursing managers [,]. The shortage of nurse managers is mainly owing to the fact that current nurse managers, who are in the baby boomers generation, are retiring [], and career aspirations among nurses to managerial roles can be low [,]. The literature also reports that few staff nurses are interested in seeking a future in nurse manager roles [,]. Within an Irish context, while international nurses are heavily relied upon to combat current nurse shortages, Humphries et al [] highlight that only a few international nurses had advanced into managerial grades, noting that perhaps this had stemmed from their reluctance to apply for such roles. These trends are worrying given the crucial role career aspirations can play as antecedents for developing a sustainable workforce []. Policy documents, such as the International Council of Nurses’ “Charter for Change” [] emphasize strategies to recruit, retain, and develop nurses to help overcome the current shortage of nurses. The key points within this document which are relevant to this study include creating growth opportunities, retaining current staff, and supporting career progression. While a significant amount of work has been done on developing career pathways for the nursing profession, both professionally [,] and within the literature [,], there is a lack of information on what influences nurses career aspirations to become managers [,]. The limited research that is available has identified personal factors as being more strongly associated with career aspirations than situational factors, however, very few studies conducted within the nursing profession have specifically examined factors influencing career aspirations to management roles []. Furthermore, previous studies have overlooked the relationship between the individual nurse, their job, and the broader organizational contexts, focusing primarily on personal factors []. As a result, little is known about how individual and intrinsic factors arising from the job and workplace influence career aspirations. To address this gap, we apply a multi-factor perspective to the examination of predictors of career aspirations among nurses and seek to answer the following question: “What variables relating to the individual, job or organization predict career aspirations among nurses?” Drawing from studies across the nursing literature, and wider management literature, we have identified personal factors influencing career aspirations, as well as intrinsic related factors arising from the job itself (job related variables and organizational factors) that can influence career aspirations. Hereafter we summarize what is currently known about individual, job related, and organizational factors and their relationship with career aspirations.