2. PEOPLE FEEL CONNECTED TO
OTHER PEOPLE WHO ARE IDENTIFIED WITH THE OLD WAY
We are a social species. We become and like to remains connected to those we
know, those who have taught us, those with whom we are familiar – even at times
to our own detriment. Loyalty certainly helped our ancestors hunt antelope and
defend against the aggressions of hostile tribes, and so we are hard wired, I
believe, to form emotional bonds of loyalty, generally speaking. If you ask
people in an organization to do things in a new way, as rational as that new way
may seem to you, you will be setting yourself up against all that hard wiring,
all those emotional connections to those who taught your audience the old way -
and that’s not trivial. At the very least, as you craft your change message,
you should make statements that honor the work and contributions of those who
brought such success to the organization in the past, because on a very human
but seldom articulated level, your audience will feel asked to betray their
former mentors (whether those people remain in the organization or not). A
little good diplomacy at the outset can stave off a lot of resistance.
3. PEOPLE HAVE NO ROLE
MODELS FOR THE NEW ACTIVITY
Never underestimate the power of observational learning. If you see yourself as
a change agent, you probably are something of a dreamer, someone who uses the
imagination to create new possibilities that do not currently exist. Well, most
people don’t operate that way. It’s great to be a visionary, but communicating
a vision is not enough. Get some people on board with your idea, so that you or
they can demonstrate how the new way can work. Operationally, this can mean
setting up effective pilot programs that model a change and work out the kinks
before taking your innovation “on the road.” For most people, seeing is
believing. Less rhetoric and more demonstration can go a long way toward
overcoming resistance, changing people’s objections from the “It can’t be done!”
variety to the “How can we get it done?” category.
4. PEOPLE FEAR THEY LACK
THE COMPETENCE TO CHANGE
This is a fear people will seldom admit. But sometimes, change in organizations
necessitates changes in skills, and some people will feel that they won’t be
able to make the transition very well. They don’t think they, as individuals,
can do it. The hard part is that some of them may be right. But in many cases,
their fears will be unfounded, and that’s why part of moving people toward
change requires you to be an effective motivator. Even more, a successful
change campaign includes effective new training programs, typically staged from
the broad to the specific. By this I mean that initial events should be
town-hall type information events, presenting the rationale and plan for change,
specifying the next steps, outlining future communications channels for
questions, etc., and specifying how people will learn the specifics of what will
be required of them, from whom, and when. Then, training programs must be
implemented and evaluated over time. In this way, you can minimize the initial
fear of a lack of personal competence for change by showing how people will be
brought to competence throughout the change process. Then you have to deliver.
5. PEOPLE FEEL
OVERLOADED AND OVERWHELMED
Fatigue can really kill a change effort, for an individual or for an
organization. If, for example, you believe you should quit smoking, but you’ve
got ten projects going and four kids to keep up with, it can be easy to put off
your personal health improvement project (until your first heart attack or
cancer scare, when suddenly the risks of standing still seem greater than the
risks of change!). When you’re introducing a change effort, be aware of fatigue
as a factor in keeping people from moving forward, even if they are telling you
they believe in the wisdom of your idea. If an organization has been through a
lot of upheaval, people may resist change just because they are tired and
overwhelmed, perhaps at precisely the time when more radical change is most
needed! That’s when you need to do two things: re-emphasize the risk scenario
that forms the rationale for change (as in my cancer scare example), and also be
very generous and continuously attentive with praise, and with understanding for
people’s complaints, throughout the change process. When you reemphasize the
risk scenario, you’re activating people’s fears, the basic fight-or-flight
response we all possess. But that’s not enough, and fear can produce its own
fatigue. You’ve got to motivate and praise accomplishments as well, and be
patient enough to let people vent (without getting too caught up in attending to
unproductive negativity).
6. PEOPLE HAVE A HEALTHY
SKEPTICISM AND WANT TO BE SURE NEW IDEAS ARE SOUND
It’s important to remember that few worthwhile changes are conceived in their
final, best form at the outset. Healthy skeptics perform an important social
function: to vet the change idea or process so that it can be improved upon
along the road to becoming reality. So listen to your skeptics, and pay
attention, because some percentage of what they have to say will prompt genuine
improvements to your change idea (even if some of the criticism you will hear
will be based more on fear and anger than substance).
7. PEOPLE FEAR HIDDEN
AGENDAS AMONG WOULD-BE REFORMERS
Let’s face it, reformers can be a motley lot. Not all are to be trusted.
Perhaps even more frightening, some of the worst atrocities modern history has
known were begun by earnest people who really believed they knew what was best
for everyone else. Reformers, as a group, share a blemished past . . . And so,
you can hardly blame those you might seek to move toward change for mistrusting
your motives, or for thinking you have another agenda to follow shortly. If you
seek to promote change in an organization, not only can you expect to encounter
resentment for upsetting the established order and for thinking you know better
than everyone else, but you may also be suspected of wanted to increase your own
power, or even eliminate potential opposition through later stages of change.
I saw this in a recent change management project for which I consulted, when
management faced a lingering and inextinguishable suspicion in some quarters
that the whole affair was a prelude to far-reaching layoffs. It was not the
case, but no amount of reason or reassurance sufficed to quell the fears of some
people. What’s the solution? Well, you’d better be interested in change for
the right reasons, and not for personal or factional advantage, if you want to
minimize and overcome resistance. And you’d better be as open with information
and communication as you possibly can be, without reacting unduly to accusations
and provocations, in order to show your good faith, and your genuine interest in
the greater good of the organization. And if your change project will imply
reductions
in workforce, then be open about that and create
an orderly process for outplacement and in-house retraining. Avoid the
drip-drip-drip of bad news coming out in stages, or through indirect
communication or rumor. Get as much information out there as fast as you
can and create a process to allow everyone to move on and stay focused on the
change effort.
8. PEOPLE FEEL THE
PROPOSED CHANGE THREATENS THEIR NOTIONS OF THEMSELVES
Sometimes change on the job gets right to a person’s sense of identity. When a
factory worker begins to do less with her hands and more with the monitoring of
automated instruments, she may lose her sense of herself as a craftsperson, and
may genuinely feel that the very things that attracted her to the work in the
first place have been lost. I saw this among many medical people and
psychologists during my graduate training, as the structures of medical
reimbursement in this country changed in favor of the insurance companies, HMO’s
and managed care organizations. Medical professionals felt they had less say in
the treatment of their patients, and felt answerable to less well trained people
in the insurance companies to approve treatments the doctors felt were
necessary. And so, the doctors felt they had lost control of their profession,
and lost the ability to do what they thought best for patients.
My point is not to take sides in that argument, but to point out how change can
get right to a person’s sense of identity, the sense of self as a professional.
As a result, people may feel that the intrinsic rewards that brought them to a
particular line of work will be lost with the change. And in some cases, they
may be absolutely right. The only answer is to help people see and
understand
the new rewards that may come with a new work process, or to see how their own
underlying sense of mission and values can still be realized under the new way
of operating. When resistance springs from these identity-related roots, it is
deep and powerful, and to minimize its force, change leaders must be able to
understand it and then address it, acknowledging that change does have costs,
but also, (hopefully) larger benefits.
9. PEOPLE ANTICIPATE A
LOSS OF STATUS OR QUALITY OF LIFE
Real change reshuffles the deck a bit. Reshuffling the deck can bring winners .
. . and losers. Some people, most likely, will gain in status, job security,
quality of life, etc. with the proposed change, and some will likely lose a
bit. Change does not have to be a zero sum game, and change can (and should)
bring more advantage to more people than disadvantage. But we all live in the
real world, and let’s face it – if there were no obstacles (read: people and
their interests) aligned against change, then special efforts to promote change
would be unnecessary.
Some people will, in part, be aligned against change because they will clearly,
and in some cases correctly, view the change as being contrary to their
interests. There are various strategies for minimizing this, and for dealing
with steadfast obstacles to change in the form of people and their interests,
but the short answer for dealing with this problem is to do what you can to
present the inevitability of the change given the risk landscape, and offer to
help people to adjust. Having said that, I’ve never seen a real organizational
change effort that did not result in some people choosing to leave the
organization, and sometimes that’s best for all concerned. When the organization
changes, it won’t be to everyone’s liking, and in that case, it’s best for
everyone to be adult about it and move on.
10. PEOPLE GENUINELY
BELIEVE THAT THE PROPOSED CHANGE IS A BAD IDEA
I’ll never forget what a supervisor of mine said to be, during the year after I
had graduated from college, secure as I was in the knowledge of my well earned,
pedigreed wisdom at age twenty-two. We were in a meeting, and I made the
comment, in response to some piece of information, “Oh, I didn’t know that!”
Ricky, my boss, looked at me sideways, and commented dryly, “Things you don’t
know . . . fill libraries.” The truth is, sometimes someone’s (even – gasp! –
my) idea of change is just not a good idea. Sometimes people are not being
recalcitrant, or afraid, or muddle-headed, or nasty, or foolish when they
resist. They just see that we’re wrong. And even if we’re not all wrong, but
only half wrong, or even if we’re right, it’s important not to ignore when
people have genuine, rational reservations or objections.
Not all resistance is about emotion, in spite of this list I’ve assembled here.
To win people’s commitment for change, you must engage them on both a rational
level and an emotional level. I’ve emphasized the emotional side of the equation
for this list because I find, in my experience, that this is the area would-be
change agents understand least well. But I’m also mindful that a failure to
listen to and respond to people’s rational objections and beliefs is ultimately
disrespectful to them, and to assume arrogantly that we innovative, change agent
types really do know best. A word to the wise: we’re just as fallible as
anyone.
Copyright (c) 2003 A. J. Schuler,
Psy. D.
Permission is granted to copy this article as long as the following
information is included:
Dr. A. J. Schuler is an expert in
leadership and organizational change. To find out more about his programs and
services, visit www.SchulerSolutions.com or call (703) 370-6545.
Source:
http://www.schulersolutions.com/resistance_to_change.html
