You have explained it three times. The resistance is still there.
The first time, you explained it in the team meeting. The second time, you brought the numbers. The third time you set up a separate session with room for questions. Everyone nodded. And still things have slowed down since, new objections keep appearing and in the corridor you hear that "this will never work here".
For most managers, dealing with resistance to change means explaining it once more. Calmer, clearer, with better arguments. And that keeps the resistance going.
People who resist rarely lack an explanation. Something is in the way. If you want them to move anyway, finding that out helps more than a fourth presentation. That is what influence is about: having an effect on what people choose and do.
Dealing with resistance to change means finding out what holds people back and removing it, instead of pushing harder with explanation and arguments. Resistance is a normal response to losing freedom, certainty or habit. As a manager you have the most influence when you ask why someone is not doing it yet. More on change and behaviour →
What is resistance to change?
Resistance to change is the behaviour of people who do not stop a change and do not go along with it either. Sometimes you can hear it: objections, debate, a sharp email. More often it is quiet. Agreements that slip, a pilot nobody has time for, a new system that keeps running alongside the old one.
The word itself does something. Say "resistance" and you place the problem with the other person: they do not want to. The more useful question disappears, which is what makes it hard for them. Resistance to change is almost never resistance to the goal. People want things to improve too. They see something you do not see, or they lose something you do not lose.
So resistance is also information. It marks the spot where your plan and your people's daily work do not yet meet.
Why does explaining it once more not work?
Explaining is pushing. You add arguments and hope that together they outweigh the objections. In 2017, in a conversation broadcast by Freakonomics Radio, psychologist and Nobel laureate Daniel Kahneman described the best idea he had ever heard in psychology.[1] It came from Kurt Lewin, the psychologist he calls his intellectual grandfather.
Lewin saw behaviour as an equilibrium between two kinds of forces. Forces that drive you in a direction, and forces that hold you back. If you want someone to do something different, you can push harder or you can take away what is holding them back. According to Kahneman the second route is the good one. And it starts with a different question from the one managers usually ask themselves:
"Why isn't she doing it already?"
Daniel Kahneman on the work of Kurt Lewin, Freakonomics Radio (2017)
Kahneman calls that a very different question from "how can I get her to do it". With the first question you go through the obstacles one by one and look at what you can make easier. With the second you reach for arguments, incentives and pressure.
There is a second reason why pushing backfires, and it is called psychological reactance. In 2015, psychologist Christina Steindl and her colleagues reviewed the research on the theory Jack Brehm formulated in 1966.[2] People who notice that their freedom to choose is being threatened or taken away become motivated to win that freedom back. They feel irritated, start producing counterarguments and suddenly find the option being taken from them more attractive. Forceful language makes it stronger.
Read that again with your third explanation in mind. Every time you explain it again, your team hears: this is happening regardless. That is the message reactance responds to.
How do you deal with resistance as a manager?
As a manager you deal with resistance best by ending the persuading and starting to investigate. That sounds softer than it is. It is simply more efficient: you work on the cause and leave the symptom alone.
A manager has something a colleague or project lead does not have: position. When you explain something, it sounds like an instruction sooner. And people are less likely to tell their boss what is really bothering them. The objections you hear in the meeting are therefore rarely the ones that matter. "We don't have time for this" is safer to say than "I'm afraid I can't do this".
That calls for conversations with one person at a time, and for questions that do not cost anyone face. Ask what is awkward about it in practice. Ask what someone has to give up for it. And promise only what you can deliver, because an obstacle removed persuades more than a good story.
Which forces are behind resistance to change?
Four forces are behind resistance to change: two that move people towards the new behaviour and two that keep them with the old. At SUE we map them with the SUE | Influence Framework©, the model from Behavioural Design that turns Lewin's force field into something you can fill in per person or per group.[3]
You already know the two driving forces, because your explanation was about them. The pains: what is not working now, for them? The gains: what does the new situation give them? Note the word them. A lower cost price is a gain for the organisation. For the employee it is often nothing.
The two restraining forces decide whether anything changes. The comforts: the current way works well enough, takes no effort and everyone does it like this. The anxieties: the doubts and fears about the new. Can I do this? What happens to my role? Will this blow over, like last time?
Resistance is what you see when comforts and anxieties are larger than pains and gains. More explanation only adds weight to the driving side. What holds people back stays where it is.
One obstacle fewer does more against resistance than one argument more.
Dealing with resistance in four steps
You can do this in the coming week, without a new plan and without a new presentation.
1. Skip the fourth explanation
Say out loud that you are not going to explain it again. That takes the pressure off. People who no longer have to be convinced no longer have to defend themselves.
2. Ask why it is not happening yet
Ask Kahneman's question, per person and without judgement: what makes it hard to do this now? Write the answers down as they are said. You are looking for comforts and anxieties, not opinions about the plan.
3. Visibly remove one obstacle
Pick the obstacle that comes up most often and solve it. Scrapping a double registration, a practice session without an audience, a colleague who shows how it is done. Let people see that you did it. That is the proof that speaking up gets results.
4. Give choice back where you can
The goal is fixed, the route to it often is not. Let people choose in which order, with whom or from when. Reactance arises when freedom is taken away. People who have something to choose do not need to fight to get that freedom back.
Is resistance to change always the same?
No. Resistance to change looks the same from the outside and has a different cause per person. The experienced colleague who fears losing their craft, the new colleague who had only just mastered the old system and the team lead who dreads the conversations ahead: all three slow down, for three different reasons.
That is why one approach for the whole team rarely works. It pays to fill in the four forces separately for the two or three most important groups. If you are dealing with several parties that each have their own interest, read on about stakeholder management. If it is about the moment before the change, when you are looking for backing for your plan, building support for change fits better. And if your team says yes and then carries on as before, ownership is the subject.
Frequently asked questions about dealing with resistance
How do I deal with resistance as a manager?
Skip the next round of explaining and ask each person what makes it hard to join in. Listen for what people have to give up and what they doubt. Then visibly remove one obstacle and give choice back on how and when. That way you influence behaviour without adding pressure.
What are the steps for dealing with resistance?
Four steps work well in practice. End the persuading, ask why the desired behaviour is not happening yet, remove the obstacle that is mentioned most often and give people choice back in how they carry it out. The order matters: understand first, then intervene.
How do you reduce resistance to change?
You reduce resistance to change by making the restraining forces smaller. Map what people like about the current situation and what they fear in the new one. According to Kurt Lewin, as Daniel Kahneman summarises his work, that works better than raising the pressure.
What is psychological reactance?
Psychological reactance is the tendency to push back when you feel your freedom to choose is being threatened or taken away. The theory comes from psychologist Jack Brehm in 1966. People respond with irritation and counterarguments, and find what is being taken from them more attractive. Forceful language strengthens the effect.
Can you turn resistance around?
You can turn resistance around if you treat it as information. People who push back are telling you where your plan and daily practice do not fit. Use those objections to adjust the plan or the way you introduce it. People who see that their objection changed something are often the first to join in.
Conclusion
You explained it three times because explaining was the only tool within reach. The research points another way. Push harder and you get more pushback. Ask why it is not happening yet and you find the places where a small intervention creates a lot of movement.
That is influence: knowing which forces shape someone's behaviour and designing your approach around them. In The Art of Influence© online you learn how people choose and how to map those forces for your own change.
You can skip the fourth explanation. The question of why it is not happening yet is the one you have not asked.