UNVEILING KEY CRITERIA FOR EFFECTIVE LEADERSHIP: A MULTI-CRITERIA DECISION-MAKING FRAMEWORK USING TOPIC MODELING AND ANALYTIC HIERARCHY PROCESS (AHP)

In this study, we introduce a novel framework for enhancing leadership decision-making through the integration of topic modeling techniques and the Analytic Hierarchy Process (AHP). Despite the critical role of decision-making in leadership effectiveness, existing literature lacks robust methodologies for selecting and applying key decision-making criteria. Addressing this gap, we employed topic modeling, specifically Term Frequency–Inverse Document Frequency (TF-IDF) and Latent Dirichlet Allocation (LDA), to analyze 178 leadership articles published from 2015–2023. Our analysis identified three empirically derived criteria essential for effective leadership decisions: feasibility, reliability, and adaptability & flexibility. We implemented these criteria using the AHP methodology, demonstrating their practical application through a case study of employee selection. The findings reveal that adaptability & flexibility emerged as the most critical criterion (weight=0.56), followed by reliability (0.32) and feasibility (0.12). This integrated approach transforms theoretical leadership constructs into a practical decision-making framework that enhances objectivity, reduces cognitive bias, and improves strategic outcomes. The study contributes to leadership theory by providing a systematic, transparent methodology for evaluating decision alternatives in increasingly complex organizational environments, while offering practitioners a replicable tool that can be calibrated to specific contextual demands.