Resistance to change can be adaptive if we would only let it
We still seem to be talking about resistance to change in various forms. While there are many factors that contribute to resistance, it is not practical to address them all. Unconscious bias for example is particularly difficult to address at an organizational level and arguably some types of unconscious psychological processes will always work against change. Two competing interests in a transformation program are worth looking at more closely as they highlight where resistance is not really resistance.
Firstly, change agents want to gain unchallenged approval for change because they think that this will improve the chances of success. I often hear things like ‘…if only they will just do what we are asking this would work…’ There is an implicit assumption by the change agent that this is the right thing to do and a tendency to blindly follow a plan. The people being asked to transform see this as an impediment because it is not obvious that it will succeed simply because they don’t oppose it.
Secondly, people being asked to accept the change want to ensure it is the right thing to do so their goal is, as far as possible, to critically evaluate the proposed change. The change agent sees this as resistance to change. However it could be argued that critical evaluation is not really resistance but prudent risk avoidance. So resistance is probably a misnomer here but many change agents don’t perceive it that way.
Inevitably, change agents spend a lot of time and effort figuring out ways to eliminate what they perceive as resistance and people spend a lot of time figuring out how to ensure the change is the right thing to do in the interests of the organization, department, office, group etc. Each group misinterprets the intentions of the other group. Effectively change agents are trying to eliminate critical evaluation so it could be said the resistance is not to the change but to the lack of prudence.
Rather than trying to eliminate so-called ‘resistance to change’ in this form, it would be better to make it an adaptive aspect of all transformation programs. This way the change agent is empowered by the people she is asking to change once they have evaluated it is the best thing to do and since the people being asked to change are now part of the process they are more engaged.
The long lead times and high transaction costs of transformation programs mean it makes sense to divide the effort into increments. It may be easier to change in small increments as the impact is easier to evaluate, there is lower risk and less chance of failure however, maintaining the vision and roadmap toward a strategic goal is more difficult. Critically evaluating every change is also a higher overhead and there is a trade-off between the size of change and meaningful progress. This is really an economic trade-off with a u-curve optimization.
So a strong vision and leadership is required to follow through in appropriately sized increments. Leadership is also required for knowing when a failure has occurred, the decision to pivot and understanding what can be learned from it. The balance between failing fast and progressing meaningful change is one area where appropriate critical evaluation (so-called ‘resistance to change’) is in fact the counter weight that may actually be a positive thing.