The Influence of Supportive Organizational Climate and Shared Leadership on Project Success through AI-Driven Ideation Support in Higher Education Institutions

Abstract

Artificial Intelligence (AI) has had a profound impact on the field of project management, specifically in knowledge-driven industries like higher education, where innovation, collaboration, and effective decision-making are critical to the success of projects. This study aims at examining how supportive organizational climate and shared leadership mediate project success among academic project-based organizations in Pakistan by providing support to their ideation process through artificial intelligence. The study suggests that project efficiency, creativity and innovation performance will benefit from the alignment between the social and technical aspects of organizational and team-based systems and the AI-enabled technical system. The research design adopted was quantitative cross sectional while data collected from 228 academic professionals engaged in project related activities from higher education institutions in Pakistan. The supportive organizational climate, the shared leadership, the support for ideas through AI, and project success were measured by using structured questionnaires based on validated measurement scales. The data was analyzed descriptively in SPSS, correlation analysis, multiple regression analysis and also mediation analysis. The results showed that supportive organizational climate was significant and positively related to project success (β = 0.391, p < 0.001), and shared leadership was significant and positively related to project success (β = 0.348, p < 0.001) as well. Moreover, the relationship between supportive organizational climate and project success was significantly mediated by AI-driven ideation support (β = 0.273; 95% CI [0.184, 0.367]) and the relationship between shared leadership and project success was significantly mediated by AI-driven ideation support (β = 0.248; 95% CI [0.162, 0.341]). The findings suggest that collaborating organizational climates and participatory leadership styles are more effective in leveraging the uses of an AI-based ideation system for creativity enhancement, information processing, knowledge sharing, and collaborative problem-solving, which in turn will enhance project efficiency, innovation quality, stakeholder satisfaction, and long-term institutional performance. The study adds to the project management and organizational behavior literature by adding Socio-Technical Systems theory to the realm of AI-based educational project management. It also offers practical implications for higher education institutions (HEIs) who are looking to achieve sustainable project success by organizational support, collaborative leadership, and the practice of digital innovation.