Leadership behavior impact towards employees’ innovation performance through technological and cultural diversity within United Arab Emirates universities

• Main Author: Almaskari, Tariq Humaid
• Format: Thesis
• Language: English; English
• Published: 2025
• Online Access: http://eprints.utem.edu.my/id/eprint/29477/; https://plh.utem.edu.my/cgi-bin/koha/opac-detail.pl?biblionumber=124722

Leadership behaviors are critical in influencing employees' functioning and overall organizational performance, particularly within innovation. Effective leadership is essential for shaping a conducive work environment and promoting an organizational culture that supports innovation. In the context of universities in the United Arab Emirates (UAE), characterized by technological advancements and cultural diversity, understanding the impact of leadership on innovation becomes increasingly significant. The landscape of higher education in the UAE necessitates examining how different leadership behaviors, transformational, transactional, and laissez-faire, affect employees' innovative performance. Also, mediating factors, i.e., technological and cultural diversity, still need to be explored to improve this relationship. This research examines the direct and indirect relationships between leadership behaviors and employees' innovative performance in UAE universities, highlighting the mediating effects of technological and cultural diversity. Besides, it seeks to conduct a comparative analysis of leadership behaviors to understand their respective impacts on innovation comprehensively. The study gathered data from 633 employees working across universities in the UAE. A combination of descriptive and inferential statistics was employed, with Structural Equation Modelling (SEM) used to analyze direct and indirect relationships between variables. Bootstrapping techniques were applied to assess the mediating roles of technological and cultural diversity. The findings confirmed that transformational, transactional, and laissez-faire leadership behaviors positively impact employees' innovative performance. Employees' innovation was significantly associated with championing and implementing new ideas. Leadership behaviors demonstrated positive relationships with technological and cultural diversity, which further mediated the effects of innovation. The results highlighted the improved role of leadership behaviors in promoting innovation within culturally and technologically diverse environments. The study concludes that innovation-driven leadership significantly impacts employees' innovative contributions in UAE universities. Leaders' positions within organizations facilitate access to essential resources, enabling the successful execution of innovative ideas. Besides, cultural and technological diversity were found to amplify leadership's effectiveness in promoting innovation. These findings highlight the key role of leadership behaviors and diversity considerations in cultivating innovative performance in higher education institutions.