Managing Change Resistance – Clear a Path to Success

This lecture kicks off the "Organizational Change Resistance" course with a welcome,  overview of instructor qualifications, course topic overview, and discussion of Learning Objectives.

For a quick start, jump straight to Section 3 for immediate use of The Essentials and look for the four Tools in Section 1 for on-the-job application.

Note that this course has high management value and low “entertainment” value.  The content discussed is serious, designed for managers facing serious challenges of resistance to their goals.  I considered using a theme built around “The Organizational Change Doctor,” but decided to focus instead on the essential knowledge and tools managers need to understand change resistance and avoid its consequences. 

However, before we get to your situation, let us discuss a more basic question –

How are you going to evaluate Success in Your Learning?

Kirkpatrick modeled a four-tier structure for learning effectiveness.

Level 1 – Reaction

This is the “applause meter” often captured in course ratings early in the course or near the end. Were you “entertained” or left the training “feeling good?” Were you “happy” with the instructor? While nice to hear and easy to assess, this is not my target level of learning effectiveness for you.

Level 2 – Learning Recall

This is the ability to recall key concepts days later and is often associated with traditional school testing. There are several ways to help with recall, such as desktop references like The Essentials for a topic and Tools for applying the learning on-the-job. However, this is only partial value that I hope you receive.

Level 3 – Behavioral Change

This is how you approach organizational change months later. This is difficult to capture in course ratings but is a much better indicator of value on your life. Behavioral change from training comes from knowledge retained, mindset shifts, and skill application. This is the minimum learning effectiveness I hope you reach.

Level 4 – Organizational Performance

This is where I would like to have you reach. At this level, you have not only personally grown, but can apply your learning for the benefit of others through how your organization performs. This is the return on your investment in learning that I work to achieve.

Now, back to Your Situation.

What problem(s) are you facing now? What do you hope to gain from this course to help?

Take a few minutes to think about this – how do you hope to apply what you learn here?

Ahead of you awaits Essential Knowledge and Tools for Application. However, higher levels of learning require application to a real situation – Your Situation. Nothing here is intended to be learned in isolation. Everything here is designed for your application as part of the learning process.

How much is Organizational Change Resistance costing your organization in lost opportunity, low productivity, management time, etc.  The total direct and indirect costs may surprise you.  Change Management starts with managing the costs of failure to change.

How is Organizational Change Resistance defined?  How can we classify Change Recipients in how they resist?  How change resistance can be understood at a high level - All Change is Personal.  While we might think of this as Change Management, it is much, much more.

Change Resistance is not a one-size-fits-all problem.  In fact, the reasons for resistance range from personal (both conscious resistance and unconscious reactions) to poor change visioning to poor change project methodology.  This lecture starts to get into how resistance is triggered while viewing Change Management from a different perspective. 

Sometimes, we are our own worst enemy.  Since Change Managers define resistance when they see it, they often incorrectly claim normal behavior as resistance, thereby taking actions they would not otherwise take.  Further, how the Organizational Change Objective is created and the change initiative is managed can lead to many pitfalls that result in resistance across the organization.  

Change Resistance can be demonstrated in an infinite number of ways, unique to each organization and change proposed.  Therefore, it is necessary to generalize the types of reactions to change to provide a framework for Change Management.  Further, the perception of risk in a proposed change is related to the organization's experience with past attempts at change.   

The reasons people generally resist organizational change can be tied to loss of something, learning anxiety, cultural pressures, or personal factors.  This lecture lays the last part of the foundation for Change Management of Resistance before going deeper into hidden reasons and how Change Resistance can be Mitigated.

Too much change too quick can cause fatigue to individuals and the organization as a whole.   

Part 1 of a four-part tool (worksheet) that serves as an Application of Learning for this course.

This lecture moves beyond how Change Resistance is demonstrated by behaviors to the six unconscious (psychological) factors that are often hidden from not only the Change Manager, but the Change Recipient as well.  This is the first step in moving from understanding resistance to mitigating it.

Routine management actions can accidentally trigger change resistance, an added challenge for Change Management.  In this lecture, the six core unconscious needs are discussed relative to how normal managerial action can trigger resistance.

The two downloadable resources are Tool #2 - Assessment of Core Psychological Needs and Tool #3 - Designing a Change Plan that Minimizes Resistance.  

This lecture discusses the first four responses that Change Managers can take when encountering resistance.  Two of the four are essentially admitting failure with the other two reactionary in nature.  In the next lecture, two proactive responses are added to the list.

This lecture completes the six approaches for dealing with organizational change resistance with the two proactive ways to mitigate (prevent) resistance from arising.  The lecture concludes with a discussion on group dynamics involved in resistance dampening or reinforcement.   

Contrary to what many people believe, change resistance offers many benefits in correcting mistakes in designing the change objective and process employed to implement the organizational change.   This lecture helps you identify these benefits and use them to your advantage.  Further, active resistance is better than passive-aggressive behavior when it comes to successfully moving a change initiative forward.  

Tool #4 addresses Are You causing the Change Resistance?

This is the first of two summaries - examining the effectiveness of the possible approaches to managing change resistance.  One approach leads to likely failure of the change initiative and three others are typically employed, but with some difficulty and mixed success.  Of the two most effective approaches, the second is probably the best due to difficulty in avoiding some issues that might arise when using of the most effective option.  

The second summary focuses on the mitigation of organizational change resistance.  This is a "not to be missed" lecture that captures the essential action items that change leaders need to build into their change visioning and change managers need for planning the change initiative process.    

The fourth section of the worksheet walks through action planning based on responses to the first three sections of the worksheet.