EMOTIONAL INTELLIGENCE AND HUMAN–AI COLLABORATION: A MULTILEVEL ANALYSIS OF EMPLOYEE CREATIVITY AND ADAPTIVE PERFORMANCE

Abstract

Workplaces that are equipped with artificial intelligence (AI) technology have changed the relationship between technology and people at work and require knowledge about how the interaction between human competencies and the conditions of an organization impacts work. This paper examines the role of emotional intelligence and the ability to collaborate between humans and AI on employee creativity and adaptive performance using a multilevel analysis perspective. A quantitative methodology was chosen for this study with the use of questionnaire surveys distributed to 426 employees in organizations that use AI-based technologies. Data were analysed using Hierarchical Linear Modeling (HLM). The findings showed that there was a significant effect of emotional intelligence on employee creativity (γ = 0.41, p < 0.001) and adaptive performance (γ = 0.37, p < 0.001). In addition, there was also a significant positive impact of human and AI collaboration ability on creativity (γ = 0.39, p < 0.001) and adaptive performance (γ = 0.43, p < 0.001). From the findings of the intraclass correlation test, it is evident that organizational-level variables contribute to creativity by 18% and to adaptive performance by 21%. Moreover, organizational support for AI had a significant cross-level moderating effect on the relationship (γ = 0.28, p < 0.01). The final model accounted for 54% of the variability in employee creativity and 59% of the variability in adaptive performance. This study shows that a successful AI workplace needs to combine technological capacity and emotional intelligence, along with employee adaptability. The current research empirically proves how important it is to combine AI technology implementation with human-centred strategy in the workplace.