Resistance to Change

Resistance to change is a common phenomenon observed in individuals and organizations when faced with new initiatives, processes, or transformations. This resistance can stem from a variety of factors, including fear of the unknown, loss of control, or concerns about competency in adapting to new systems. People may also resist change due to past experiences that have shaped their attitudes, cultural backgrounds, or the perceived impact of the change on their roles and responsibilities.

Understanding the reasons behind resistance is crucial for effectively managing change. Engaging stakeholders in open communication, providing support and training, and fostering a culture that encourages adaptability can help mitigate resistance. Recognizing that resistance is often a natural reaction can lead to more empathetic approaches in addressing concerns and facilitating transitions.

Ultimately, effectively navigating resistance requires a balance of strategic planning and sensitivity to the diverse perspectives of those affected by the change. By acknowledging and addressing resistance, organizations can create a more supportive environment that enhances the likelihood of successful change implementation.

Published in: 2021

By: Scott Zimmer, JD

Subject Terms

Resistance to Change

Last reviewed: February 2017

Abstract

“Resistance to change” is the tendency of human beings to avoid having to experience the world in a manner that is different from what they are used to. Almost any kind of change can cause resistance, depending on how severely the change seems to or actually does impact an individual. In a top-down organization, change is generally imposed by those at the top of the hierarchy on those most likely to feel hindered, inconvenienced, or even threatened by workplace changes. It is worth keeping in mind that when it comes to resisting change, perception is as important as reality.

Overview

Research in the behavioral sciences indicates that human beings have resisted change throughout their long evolutionary history. Indeed, the process of natural selection has caused the trait of caution around new phenomena to predominate, because people with this quality were more likely to survive during earlier, more violent periods of history. During such periods, most changes were often dangerous, whether a change in the weather (which might affect the food supply), a change in one’s health (which might be a sign of illness), or a change in circumstances, as when one’s clan was forced to give up its territory by invaders. In a sense, change was almost bad by definition because it meant having to give up all or part of a comfortable position; after all, if the starting point before the change had been uncomfortable, one would not have stayed in it (Jost, 2015).

This raises the issues of perspective and control regarding change. Both of these factors influence the degree to which parties can be expected to resist a particular change. Generally speaking, people have less resistance to change when they feel that they have some level of control over it, even if the control is illusory or nominal in character. For example, if a group of employees were told that they would need to relocate their office to a less convenient location several miles away, the change would likely be perceived as a source of discomfort and be met with resistance. However, if the employees are given a degree of input in the move, for example, being allowed to choose what color the new office would be painted, some employees would respond more positively and be somewhat less resistant to the change.

The correlation between control and comfort with change essentially means that a person’s perspective toward a change is a major factor in determining how that person will react to the change. If a person thinks the change is his or her idea, that person will have a positive attitude toward it, but if the change is someone else’s idea, there is a good chance he or she will view it in a negative light (Wright, 2015).

Much of the literature on resistance to change comes from the field of business. In this area, change usually comes in the form of a new policy, procedure, or initiative that a company’s managers are presenting to the rest of the employees, in what is often called a top-down approach—those at the top of the hierarchy of power impose the change on those beneath them. From the outset, this approach can produce resistance to the change simply because employees feel that they did not get to participate in the decisions that led up to the change, yet they are required to bear the brunt of coping with the consequences of the change.

Some companies attempt to avoid this perception by behaving as transparently as possible. Nevertheless, some details, such as personnel matters, cannot be divulged to everyone, so eliminating all distrust is rarely possible (Di Fabio, Bernaud & Loarer, 2014). The art of change management is sometimes used to try to change employees’ instinctively negative reactions by presenting the change to them not as something inconvenient or something that should inspire fear, but as an opportunity to learn new skills, work in a different situation, or become more engaged with the organization’s mission.

Part of managing change is understanding and empathizing with the feelings others have about the change. To the person implementing the change, the change may seem like a perfectly logical response to the circumstances, and the tendency is for managers to dismiss resistance as being caused by mere stubbornness or small-mindedness and fear. For those who are on the receiving end of the change, however, the experience is much different.

Research shows that coping with unwelcome change can in many respects mimic the experience of having a loved one die (Constantinescu & Alexandrache, 2014). In both cases, there is a grieving process that one must go through before one can begin to understand the new world one finds oneself in. In the case of a loved one, the grief that is felt is for the person who is gone. In the case of a change, the grief is felt for the old way of life before the change occurred, which is remembered but no longer possible.

This grieving process is described in the literature as having five stages: denial, anger, bargaining, depression, and acceptance (Jost, 2015). Each stage of this grieving process must be experienced before one can move on with life as a whole person rather than as a wounded victim. In the denial stage, one may refuse to believe that the change is really necessary, or may feel that the change might come but it will not require any personal changes for oneself, only for others.

The anger stage occurs when people feel the unfairness of having to change when they do not want to and express this anger through active or passive resistance to the change. When this fails, people move on to the bargaining stage, where they try to make a deal so that they will not have to face the full force of the change, for example, a laid-off worker asking to be retained part time. Bargaining is usually not successful, and this leads one to a state of depression in which everything seems hopeless. The final stage, acceptance, comes when the depression lifts and one understands that the change has happened or is about to happen, and that nothing further can be done except to learn how to live with it (Georgalis et al., 2015).

Further Insights

Because resistance to change can be so time consuming for employers and damaging for morale, much thought has been given to how to predict which changes people will resist more than others, and why. As researchers have attempted to isolate the variables involved in change situations, it has emerged that the amount of resistance a change produces is partially dependent on the personalities of the individuals being affected and partially derived from the organizational context in which the change is occurring.

An example of a change situation that frequently occurs in the business world is when a company decides to implement a cross-training initiative. These programs ask employees to learn from one another, so that a given person can step in and do the work ordinarily performed by another when that other person is out sick or otherwise unavailable (Caruth & Caruth, 2013). Managers like cross-training because it distributes knowledge more evenly throughout the workforce, prepares the company to deal with the unexpected loss of subject matter experts, and can even improve the degree to which employees empathize and cooperate with one another.

Employee reactions, however, are largely dependent on the context in which the cross-training happens: If everything is going smoothly and workloads are not excessive, then the cross-training may be well received. However, if the company has recently experienced significant layoffs and shortly thereafter imposes a cross-training program, there is likely to be a high level of resistance because employees will be afraid that they are being forced to train their replacements and that they will soon be let go.

To some extent this resistance can be addressed through greater transparency, but this will also depend on the level of trust that employees feel toward top managers. What is more, sharing information in an effort to reduce resistance to change has often backfired. Researchers have determined that there is a tipping point for information sharing, beyond which the sharing of additional information actually increases resistance to change. This discovery was startling, because the assumption had been that the more information that is shared about the change, the better it will be received.

Several possibilities have been suggested to explain this information tipping point. One is that those receiving the information simply reach a point of feeling overwhelmed and cannot handle more input being forced on them. It may also be that those who have valid concerns about the consequences of the change resist hearing about it because it scares them, as often happens during human resources exit interviews when the person being let go is offered information about applying for unemployment. Even though the information is useful, it reinforces the reality of being terminated and makes the experience more unpleasant (Khodaparasti, Absalan & Khodavandegar, 2013).

Issues

Hundreds of books and articles have been written about how to help organizations cope with resistance to change. Many different models exist either to describe how change and resistance work or to explain what is necessary for resistance to a change to be overcome. One such model is known by the acronym ADKAR, which stands for awareness, desire, knowledge, ability, and reinforcement.

ADKAR’s five qualities are suggested as being necessary for resistance to change to be overcome on a long-term basis. Awareness means that those who must prepare for the change know about the reasons that the change is needed; these could be financial, regulatory, or even ethical in nature, but the important thing is that there needs to be understanding that the changes are based on identifiable motivators.

Desire, the next factor, is often the most difficult to address because it refers to a desire to engage with the change and even embrace it. This is often the last obstacle that must be overcome. Next is knowledge, which is simply the practical comprehension of the steps that need to be taken in order to accomplish and sustain the change. Knowledge is crucial, yet it must also be accompanied by ability. This often means that employees may require special training as part of the change process and that without it their resistance will remain because they will feel that they are being asked to do the impossible. Finally, reinforcement is the effort by the organization to make sure that the change succeeds beyond the needs of the present moment. This can take the form of ongoing training and explanations for the reasons behind the change, updates on the progress of the change, and metrics related to its success (Abdallah & Mohammad, 2016).

Much of the ADKAR method can be condensed down to two basic functions that facilitate change: talking and listening. That is to say, the leaders of the organization must start by talking to their employees about the change and why it is necessary. This may sound simple, but doing it properly is anything but easy. Talking to employees about change is different than announcing the change. Talking to them involves patience, compassion, understanding, and creativity in thinking about what the change may mean for a particular individual. This is a time-consuming and delicate communication process, and most organizations fail to take the time needed to do it correctly (Bellettini, Prarolo & Berti Ceroni, 2014).

The other side of the coin is listening, and most organizations do not even try to do this. After explaining to people what the change is and why it is being undertaken, it is crucial to listen to what they have to say. Failing to do so undermines the trust between employer and employee, and virtually guarantees that the change will not be embraced by the vast majority of employees.

In the end, the single most determinative factor in dealing with resistance to change is trust (Blankenship, Wegener & Murray, 2015). Those being asked to change must trust those who are doing the asking, before they can cooperate with the change in a truly meaningful way, and this can be a tall order in the business world, where fortunes change quickly and alliances form and dissolve from one day to the next. This points out an aid to overcoming change resistance that is often omitted from change management seminars: a long term commitment by an organization’s leadership to the welfare of each and every member of the organization. When such a commitment exists and its presence is felt throughout the organization, then there tends to be a higher level of trust and lower levels of resistance to change.

Terms & Concepts

Active Resistance: Active resistance occurs when one takes explicit steps to oppose or interfere with some type of change, in the hope of preventing or delaying the change before it can be fully implemented.

Change Management: Change management is a managerial skill that seeks to guide employees through the process of change so that instead of resisting it or sabotaging it, they can make the best of it and perhaps even learn to appreciate its benefits.

Engagement: Engagement is the degree to which an employee embraces his or her duties and situation, instead of resenting them or avoiding them. An engaged employee takes the initiative to do the best possible work under the circumstances. Organizations undergoing change efforts try to increase employee engagement with the changes because increasing engagement almost always means reducing resistance.

Passive Resistance: Passive resistance occurs when employees do not overtly resist change, but quietly try to avoid it in any way they can. An example of passive resistance to change would be a group of employees that dislike a new payroll system, but instead of voicing their concerns to the management, they simply continue to submit their information as they did under the old system.

Strategic Change: Strategic change is a philosophical outlook that some managers possess, allowing them to view change not as an evil to be delayed but as a tool that they can use to improve their position and their company’s outlook. Having a strategic change mindset allows one to stay ahead of the curve, anticipating new developments instead of being caught off guard by them.

Transparency: Transparency is a quality that an organization may or may not possess. It means that the decision makers within the organization make every effort to share with all employees information about the organization’s position, performance, and prospects for the future. Pursuing a policy of transparency means that leadership tries to give everyone access to the information that is being used to drive policy and decisions. Even in highly transparent organizations, however, not all information can be shared, due to legal restrictions, privacy concerns, and the need to maintain a competitive advantage.

Bibliography

Abdallah, M. S., & Mohammad, M. M. (2016). Critical thinking & lifelong learning: An ADKAR model-based framework for managing a change in thinking & english language learning styles at the secondary stage. Paper presented at the Academic Conference of Assiut University College of Education, Sharm El-Sheikh, Egypt, Mar 12-15.

Bellettini, G., Prarolo, G., & Berti Ceroni, C. (2014). Knowing the right person in the right place: Political connections and resistance to change. Journal of the European Economic Association, 12(3), 641–671. Retrieved October 23, 2016, from EBSCO Online Database Business Source Ultimate. http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=bsu&AN=96108765&site=ehost-live

Blankenship, K. L., Wegener, D. T., & Murray, R. A. (2015). Values, inter-attitudinal structure, and attitude change: Value accessibility can increase a related attitude’s resistance to change. Personality & Social Psychology Bulletin, 41(12), 1739–1750.

Caruth, G. D., & Caruth, D. L. (2013). Understanding a Resistance to Change: A Challenge for Universities. Turkish Online Journal of Distance Education, 14(2), 12–21.

Constantinescu, M., & Alexandrache, C. (2014). Resistance to changes in the field of the education. Presented at International Scientific Conference, University of Galati, Romania, 2013.

Di Fabio, A., Bernaud, J., & Loarer, E. (2014). Emotional intelligence or personality in resistance to change? Empirical results in an Italian health care context. Journal of Employment Counseling, (4), 146.

Georgalis, J., Samaratunge, R., Kimberley, N., & Lu, Y. (2015). Change process characteristics and resistance to organisational change: The role of employee perceptions of justice. Australian Journal of Management, 40(1), 89–113. Retrieved October 23, 2016, from EBSCO Online Database Business Source Ultimate. http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=bsu&AN=100948299&site=ehost-live

Jost, J. T. (2015). Resistance to change: a social psychological perspective. Social Research, (3), 607. Retrieved October 23, 2016, from EBSCO Online Database Business Source Ultimate. http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=bsu&AN=112817929&site=ehost-live

Khodaparasti, R. B., Absalan, A., & Khodavandegar, P. (2013). How to reduce or mitigate human resource resistance against organizational changes: The case of Iran. Management, 18(1), 119–129. Retrieved October 23, 2016, from EBSCO Online Database Business Source Ultimate. http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=bsu&AN=90604079&site=ehost-live

Wright, P. (2015). Engaging resistance: How ordinary people successfully champion change. Christian Education Journal, (1), 241.

Resistance to Change

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Subject Terms

Resistance to Change

Abstract

Overview

Further Insights

Issues

Terms & Concepts

Bibliography

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