Digital Leadership in Aviation Perception of Leaders Driving Technology Adaptation

Abstract

The aviation sector is examples of such an industry operating on a road towards digital transformation with the latest innovations of AI and Cloud and Biometric system. Leadership has been an important component of change that can help drive an organization to success with technology adaptation in such an environment. This paper emphasizes on the role digital leadership plays on technology adoption in aviation sector and how it forms a bridge of mediation between leader's perceptions. Quantitative research methodology was followed with the help of a structured questionnaire in order to gather information about the professionals, who worked in the aviation industry.  The results show that the technology adaptation is influenced by digital leadership with a positive and strong influence. Results also show that the digital leadership is significant towards the leader perception of the emerging technologies. Furthermore, a positive perception of the leader was another factor that positively influenced the adaptation of the technology. The mediation analysis provided that leader perception mediates the correlation between digital leadership and technology adaptation partially, which suggests that the digital leadership has a direct and indirect impact on technology adaptation through perception of the leader. These findings highlight the importance not only of the technological infrastructure in technological transformation but also of the leadership competences and of cognitive perceptions. The results of these findings can be very beneficial for the aviation industry managers, policymakers and other stakeholders who are interested in better understanding about the technology adoption and organizations' performance.