Texas teacher retention based on principal use of influence tactics

Due to the continuous decrease in teacher retention rates in the state of Texas, it is important to understand principals’ use of influence tactics and its effects on teacher retention. The purpose of this quantitative, nonexperimental, cross-sectional, descriptive design (Creswell & Creswell, 2018; O’Dwyer & Bernauer, 2013) study was to examine principals’ use of influence tactics on teacher retention, as well as identify differences found in gender and the total number of years within teacher retention rates. The theoretical framework used in this research was Yukle and Falbe’s influence tactic theory. The sample consisted of 50 teachers from five school districts in the greater Corpus Christi, TX area with a 784 zip code. Participants completed four demographic questions, along with the Influence Behavior Questionnaire (IBQ-G). An independent samples t test and one-way ANOVA were used to analyze the data. This study included three research questions. The first research question used an independent samples t test and the following two research questions used a one-way ANOVA. Results did not indicate a statistically significant relationship comparing the mean scores of the 11 influence tactics with teacher gender in the first research question, nor was there a statistically significant relationship in the third research question that focused on the difference in a teacher’s total number of years based on a principal’s use of influence. The second research question compared the principal use of each of the 11 influence tactics from the retention rate at a campus and results showed two influence tactics with significant results.