Lately I seem to have stumbled upon more than my usual share of posts addressing change management. One of the recurring themes in many of these posts is that people don’t like change, that they resist change and that change management efforts—including communications—need to address resistance. After all, the vast majority of change initiatives fail, according to every survey and study ever conducted on the subject.

I’ve always been amused by the assuredness with which people throw out the old chestnut that “people resist change.” People do nothing of the sort. They change their hairstyles, their cars, their homes, their fashions, their jobs and all kinds of other aspects of their lives with frequency and glee. People love change.

Suggesting otherwise is an easy out when companies run into employee resistance to change initiatives. When you’re developing a plan to communicate organizational change, you have to do your homework and figure out why people will resist it. You can be sure “I just don’t like change” isn’t one of the reasons. The reason could, however, be one of these:

Self-interest

A lot of employees achieved success on the back of the old order. The new order can be intimidating. “Will I have an equal opportunity to succeed in the restructured company?” Self-interest doesn’t just apply to those who rode the old structure to success. If employees rely on overtime pay, for instance, and the planned change limits overtime, they’ll resist because of the threat to their wallets.

Fear of the unknown

I went through a change process in a Fortune 500 company in which everybody, in every job, had to reapply for positions they wanted as they were defined in the new org chart. That left a lot of people wondering what process would be implemented for deciding who got to keep their job, who had to find something new and who would be leaving the company.

Organizational change often requires employees to learn new skills, adapt to new systems or assume new responsibilities. What will those be? How able do employees believe they are to do what they’ll be required to do? All this uncertainty can easily create resistance.

Loss of control

People who have been doing the same work for a long time fall into a routine that is comfortable and familiar. They could worry that their job in the changed organization will force them out of their comfort zones, and who likes to be uncomfortable?

Just not interested

The organizational change seems to some employees to have nothing to do with their own work, their objectives or their plans. The work involved in helping the organization change successfully is an obstacle to those goals.

Conscientious objection

Some employees may sincerely and genuinely believe the planned change is the wrong move. The reasons for these beliefs can vary. Some employees may think the change will result in less, not more, success. Others may find it runs counter to their ethical beliefs. That’s a situation I encountered when a human resources consulting firm helped a company introduce domestic partner benefits coverage (which would provide coverage to same-sex partners) to its employees in the Deep South. Some employees just thought it was the wrong thing to do. Fortunately, the communicators anticipated that particular reason to resist and developed their communications to address it. As a result, the change went fairly smoothly.

Conservatism

Rather than simply resist change, some employees may think everything’s fine the way it is and adopt an attitude of “if it ain’t broke don’t fix it.” In these situations, you’ll need to make a strong case for things not being fine the way they are.

Suspicion

The motives of the leaders behind the change may not be trusted. “They’re doing this to line their own pocketbooks at our expense,” could be the belief leading some employees to resist.

Skepticism about the process

“The proposed change is fine, but we have no faith in the leadership of this company to take us there.”

Other issues

This isn’t a comprehensive list, but it’s a good starting point in developing an understanding of why employees in your organization may throw obstacles in the path to change. A couple other points about employee response to change are worth noting:

• Even people who start out supporting the change could wind up resisting later as the honeymoon period ends and the flood of details start hitting them.
• Covert resistance is more dangerous than the people who stand up and shout their disagreement. You’ll find people who pay lip service to the change, thengo back to work and passively resist. That’s right, some people won’t say what they actually mean. You have to find a way to flush this kind of resistance out into the open.

Overcoming resistance

Three elements underlie any plan to overcome resistance to change:

The desire to chang—Nobody changes unless they’re motivated to change. Thus, you need to present a compelling reason that helps employees understand the benefits that will accrue to them that simply wouldn’t be possible without making the change.

The ability to change—You have to assure employees that they’ll get the help they need to make the change.

The permission to change—Company leaders and the organizational culture need to support employees’ ability to change. I worked with one company that introduced a new set of values that were supposed to guide a change in behaviors, but employees who continued to exhibit old behaviors were rewarded if they blew their numbers away. Meanwhile, employees demonstrating the new behaviors got no recognition at all. Eventually, the values became nothing more than a target of sarcasm. Ultimatley, nothing will change despite everything else you’ve done if employees continue to be rewarded and recognized for old behaviors.

Change management is a tricky activity and they fail because of a number of challenges, but it’ll be easier if one of your first steps is identifying why employees in your organization might resist, then aligning your efforts to address those issues.