TEACHER'S PERCEPTIONS OF SCHOOL LEADER'S EMPOWERING BEHAVIORS, PSYCHOLOGICAL EMPOWERMENT AND CAREER SATISFACTION: EVIDENCE FROM A SLOVENIAN SAMPLE

School leader influence on teachers in many different ways. Empowering school leader is capable of fostering work conditions that increase teacher's psychological empowerment and their career satisfaction. Main aim of our research was to empirically test the relations between teacher's perceptions of school leader's empowering behaviors, psychological empowerment and career satisfaction. We tested two hypotheses in one structural model by using structural equation modeling (SEM). The quantitative data was collected through an online survey on a sample of 525 primary school teachers in Slovenia. Findings show that teacher's perceptions of school leader's empowering behaviors are positively and statistically significantly related to psychological empowerment and career satisfaction. Our study shows that teacher's perceptions of school leader's empowering behaviors affect teacher's psychological empowerment together with their career satisfaction. Therefore, it is essential for school leaders to enhance awareness and capacity in exercising empowering behaviors towards their teachers to maximize teacher's work potential. Research in the area of school leader's leadership is relatively new; based on our research, we can add to these studies the effect on psychological empowerment together with career satisfaction. Our research also contributes to understanding of leadership in primary education, organizational behavior and work psychology.