Ultimately, it is because people are naturally resistant to change
Most people prefer predictability and stability in both their personal and professional lives. So, people typically avoid situations that upset the order of things, threaten their self-interests, increase stress, or involve risks. When faced with changes to the status quo, people usually resist initially. But the biggest reason for failed organisational change is the poor management thereof.
Here are five reasons why organisational change tends to fail:
- Not involving the employees. Leaders who believe the top-down approach still works are put off the problem when driving organisational change. The company needs to make sure employees are on board changes that are being made and that means they have to be convinced that the new way of doing things is the right way forward. Employer failure to make a compelling case for change can stifle any transition because people need to make sense of the change before they change.?
- Ignoring current organisational culture. Failure to understand the informal organisation is an immediate obstacle because any change has will be met with a response that is indicative of the organisational culture. In organisations where people don’t usually speak their minds to leadership, it will be difficult to identify possible pitfalls of a transition. In a company where employees are more outspoken, the challenge will be in balancing the dissenting voices with those who are enthusiastic about the change.
- Not dealing proactively with resistance. Every organisation has its own share of in-house politics. So, some employees resist change as a political strategy to “show or prove” that the change decision is wrong or that the person leading the change is not up to the task. In other cases, resistance to change is based on fear or job losses. In order to achieve a successful transition, leadership needs to understand the source of any resistance to change and deal with it proactively.
- Lack of Reward: There is a common business saying that managers get what they reward. Organisational employees will resist change when they do not see anything in it for themselves in terms of rewards. Without a reward, there is no motivation to support the change over the long run. This often means that organisational reward systems must be altered to support the change that management wants to implement. The reward does not have to always be major or costly.new team, or on unfamiliar projects because they fear that if they try and fail, there will be no one there to support them.
- Bad Timing: This is another viable reason employees resist change at work. Change must be introduced when there are no other major initiatives going on. Sometimes it is not what a leader does, but it is how, when and why she or he does it that creates resistance to change. Undue resistance can occur because changes are introduced in an insensitive manner or at an awkward time.
