Cathryn Doney, December 2021

This article is a plain English summary of my 2021 post-graduate research in the field of Psychological Science. This research was awarded the Australian Psychological Society Prize 2021. I am particularly grateful to the NT Government departmental Chief Executives who saw the value of conducting this research and agreed for their Departments to participate; and for the guidance and support provided by my supervisor, Dr Simon Moss. You can read a copy of the full thesis here– or a pdf here. 

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Key Findings

We identified six factors that are influential in helping organisations to manage and lower employee resistance to change:

Communication: Communication is a crucial factor in managing employee resistance to organizational change. Effective communication can help to reduce employee resistance by providing timely, relevant and clear information about the change, answering employees’ questions and addressing their concerns. It is important that communications are appropriate and timely: too little or too much, too early or too late, can exacerbate resistance. Clear communication can help to build trust in management, promote future clarity and increase employee resilience, all of which are associated with lower levels of resistance to change.

Resources: Resources refer to the staff, skills, processes, and systems that are available to support the implementation of organizational change. Having adequate resources is a robust predictor of lower resistance to change, and managers can influence this by ensuring that sufficient resources are provided to support the change initiative. Adequate resources can reduce resistance to change by positively influencing personal factors such as trust in management and future clarity, and by enabling effective communication and participation.

Participation: Participation refers to the involvement of employees in decision-making processes related to organizational change. Contrary to popular belief there is no direct correlation between increased participation and lower resistance. The role of participation in reducing employee resistance to change is not fully understood. In some circumstances, participation can reduce resistance by providing a sense of control and ownership over the change process, in other circumstances, excessive or inappropriate participation can actually increase resistance. Overall, the role of participation in reducing resistance may depend on various factors, including the context of the change, the quality of the participation process, and the degree of control given to employees.

Trust in management: Trust in management refers to an employee’s level of confidence and belief in the leadership of the organization. It relates to employees perception of the integrity, competence, and consistency of the management team. Employees who trust their management are significantly more likely to view the change positively and have less resistance towards it.

Future clarity: Future clarity refers to an employee’s ability to clearly imagine what their future at work looks like, particularly in the context of a change initiative. It involves having a clear vision of what their role and work environment will be like in the future, which can help reduce resistance to change by providing a sense of direction and purpose.

Paradoxical leadership: Paradoxical leadership refers to the ability of leaders balance seemingly contradictory or opposing behaviors, such as being both directive and empowering, or being both challenging and supportive. This approach emphasizes the ability to manage multiple tensions simultaneously, and requires flexibility and adaptability in responding to changing situations. Paradoxical leaders are able to navigate complex environments by holding multiple perspectives, and are able to engage and motivate their employees through a balance of different leadership styles.

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Background

Increasingly, organizations need to be able to quickly and flexibly respond to changes in the broader environment³³.  Covid-19 is a sobering example: many businesses that were unable to adapt did not survive^1,32. But change is not easy, and not easy to do well.  New initiatives and new ways of working can give rise to employee resistance. Such resistance might arise for several reasons, for example perhaps employees don’t have the skills they need to implement the change, perhaps they haven’t been consulted on the impact the changes will have on their daily work, or perhaps they have had bad experiences of workplace change in the past¹⁶.

Whatever the reason, employee resistance to organizational change can be costly. For employees, resistance to change is associated with increased insomnia, anxiety, absenteeism, stress, alcohol consumption, and quitting^{22,27,38,51,76,79,81}. And these effects may compound, for example fatigue and alcohol consumption might lead to workplace accidents; stress might lead to other related illnesses^22,76. For organizations, the costs of employee resistance includes failed projects, inability to reap the benefits of intended changes, increased financial costs of absenteeism and staff turnover, and in some cases, organizational failure ^19,28,52. The now-infamous UK National Health Service’s failed e-health project—in which resistance featured prominently—demonstrates how these costs can escalate to society: in that case, approximately £12.5 billion over 11 years ^37,39,72. In context, that is approximately 960,000 hip replacements, or 12 years worth of chemotherapy treatment for all cancer patients in the UK ^24,45.

A brief review of known antecedents

Participation and communication

Although resistance has been studied since at least the 1940’s, there is still no clear picture of why it emerges, and what companies can do to effectively manage it. Many change practitioners promote communication and employee participation as vital to reducing resistance to change ^43,44,66,67, however the evidence to support this is tenuous. In some studies, communicating about the change and offering employees opportunities to participate in decisions about the change reduced resistance^17,84,85 but in other studies communication and/or participation have differing effects ^2,29,49,81 and in some cases were actually associated with increased action against the change ^58,59,60.

This makes sense if you consider that communication about the change may communicate reasons to resist, as employees become aware of potentially negative impacts the change may have on their work. Similarly, opportunities to participate may carry increased opportunities to oppose the change. Certainly the research to date shows there is a relationship between participation, communication, and resistance, but it provides little guidance on the direction and timing of that relationship. Potentially, too much or too little, too early or too late, may have the opposite of the intended effect, exacerbating resistance rather than reducing it.

Resources and Trust in Management

Besides participation and communication, other workplace characteristics can impact on whether employees resist or support proposed changes. For example, adequacy of resources—having the right skills, systems, processes and staff—is crucial to support successful change ⁶³, and it seems likely that adequacy of resources would play a role in reducing employee resistance, although that relationship has not (surprisingly) been empirically investigated. Trust in management is another factor: when employees feel they can count on their organization’s management team, employee resistance to change is consistent lower, across contexts and countries, including Australia, Greece, Israel, the Netherlands, Norway, and Sri Lanka ^{29,2,60,61,77,12,84}.

Future Clarity and Personal Resilience

Besides workplace characteristics, certain individual attributes also affect an employees propensity to support or resist change ^60,64,85. Future clarity and personal resilience are two such attributes. Future clarity is how clearly and employee can envisage their future at work: when people can clearly and vividly envisage their future, they are less resistant to change ⁵³. Personal resilience—a composite of self-esteem, perceived control, and optimism also plays a role ^59,85.

Paradoxical Leadership

Paradoxical leadership is emerging a powerful approach for managing change ^26,78. Paradoxical leadership arises from complexity theory, and embraces ambiguity, recognizing that leadership situations often call for paradoxical, or ostensibly contradictory, skills— “the ability to exhibit contrary or opposing behaviors (as appropriate and necessary) while still retaining some measure of integrity, credibility, and direction” ^20:p.526 . Change can be highly ambiguous and paradoxical ⁷⁸: a manager who embraces ambiguity and paradox is likely better able to respond to the complex and often competing demands of organizational change, meeting the needs of employees as well as the needs of the change initiative, and hence lowering resistance.

The Theoretical Framework

Social cognitive theory (SCT) ^6,7 is a useful framework for envisaging how resistance arises. SCT suggests that behaviour is driven by an interplay of personal factors and environmental factors. In considering the ‘modifiable’ factors involved in resistance to change—that is, the things that managers have control over—managers have control only over the organisational factors, such as provision of adequate resources, appropriate communication, and opportunities to participate. Theoretically, actions such as these should influence the personal factors, i.e. increasing trust and future clarity, which should in turn decrease resistance to change. The theoretical model is shown in Figure 1.

 

The Research Project

Integrating the theoretical model with our review of past research,  we developed a conceptual model of resistance that could be tested using scientific and statistical methods. This model is shown at Figure 2.

The research was conducted from July to October 2021 and investigated whether the conceptual model was supported:

• Does behaviour to support or resist change arise from the personal factors—future clarity, personal resilience, and trust in management?
  • Do the organisational factors—resources, communication, participation—influence resistance and if so, is this influence through the personal factors?
  • Does paradoxical leadership influence resistance, and if so, is this through the organisational factors? Does it also influence on employees’ personal resilience?  

To test these research questions, we surveyed employees several NT government departments who had recently experienced organizational change.  250 useable responses were received from employees across the NT.  To analyse the responses, we used a technique called structural equation modelling, which is one the most respected, rigorous and robust statistical methods available. We conducted the analyses in the statistical packages SPSS, and R, and the model that we tested, is shown in Figure 2. The model suggests that the organisational factors on the left impact the personal factors on the right, ultimately leading to behaviour to either support or resist a change.  

 

Statistical analyses demonstrated that the model is accurate, and the results are summarised in Figure 3. Employees with high levels of trust in management, future clarity, and personal resilience exhibit significantly less resistance to change than those with low levels. Organisational factors that influence resistance include resources, communication, and participation: they exert their influence on resistance by building trust and future clarity. Paradoxical leadership also reduces resistance by exerting a positive influence on all three of the organizational factors.

Employees’ personal resilience also plays a role: those with higher levels of personal resilience are less likely to resist change. However, future clarity and trust in management exert a stronger effect on resistance to change than employees’ personal resilience.  

Contrary to our expectations, paradoxical leadership had no significant effect on employee resilience. Also contrary to expectations—but consistent with past studies in Australia—participation played only a minor role in reducing resistance, and had much less influence than any other modifiable factor.

Novel findings from the research

Novel findings refer to new and previously undiscovered information that has been identified by a study. These findings can help to expand the current knowledge base, provide insights into phenomena that were previously poorly understood, or challenge existing theories and assumptions.

This research identifies four novel findings related to employee resistance to change.

• Firstly, resources are found to be a robust antecedent to resistance, and managers can reduce resistance by focusing on ensuring adequate resources to support implementation of change.
• Secondly, the study confirms the relationship between future clarity and resistance to change, and resources and communication are identified as antecedents to future clarity.
• Thirdly, paradoxical leadership is a strong antecedent to resistance, and companies could benefit from cultivating characteristics of paradoxical leadership in their managers.
• Finally, social cognitive theory provides a useful framework for conceptualizing resistance to change, and future researchers may consider applying and extending this framework.

Key Findings For Organizations

All paths lead to trust

Ultimately the most influential factor in our model of resistance is trust in management, and this finding is consistent with other studies across context and countries.

All three of the modifiable organisational antecedents (resources, communication, and participation) exert an effect on trust in management, which accounts for almost half of employee resistance.

The finding that trust in management and future clarity have a stronger effect on resistance than employees’ personal resilience is important. It implies that even if employees have low personal resilience, perhaps, for example because of turmoil in their personal lives or through changes as a result of Covid-19, this low personal resilience may be able to be countered my management activities that focus on building trust and future clarity.

Beware the participation panacea

Our research shows that providing opportunities to participate in a change can reduce resistance to it, but contrary to popular narrative participation is not paramount.  Despite pervasive emphasis on participation by popular change management approaches such as Prosci and Kotter’s 8 Steps, the evidence to support participation reducing resistance is highly variable, ranging from reducing it, to reducing it indirectly via some other mechanism, to having minimal or no effect, through to significantly increasing resistance. Of note, this latter finding is from one of the most respected researchers in this field.

We suspect, based on our findings and the findings of other studies, that the relationship between participation and resistance is probably nonlinear, and possibly curvilinear: that is, too much or too little participation, too early or too late, may have the opposite effect than was intended. The implication is organisations need to be very careful about how they manage opportunities for staff to participate in changes:  getting it wrong may exacerbate rather than reduce resistance.

The other key finding regarding participation is that it exerts its effect on resistance via trust in management: therefore any actions to involve employees in the change process must be genuine, and should focus on building trust. This implies a need for managers to walk the talk and to follow through; promises made but not delivered on, or any other action that breaches trust, is likely to worsen resistance.

There is still considerable research required to understand how and in what circumstances participation exerts its effect over resistance but in any case, our research indicates that its effect is minor in comparison to the effects of resources  and communication.

Communication is critical

Of all of the antecedents in our model, communication is by far the most important factor that managers have control over. Communication has five times more influence on trust in management than participation or resources, and double the effect of resources on future clarity.

Communication initiative should be timely, adequate, useful, and should answer employees questions about the change. Most importantly, they must be trustworthy in the eyes of employees. To foster a strong sense of future clarity, communication activities could focus on building a clear vision of the future for employees using a range of visual management tools such as storytelling about the future, rich picture diagramming, visioning workshops, and visual posters.

Resources: square pegs for square holes

Adequacy of resources is the second-most important factor managers can focus on to reduce resistance. Adequacy of resources includes providing adequate staff, adequate skills and capability, and adequate processes and systems to support successful implementation of the change. Not providing the right resources at the right time is likely to significantly increase resistance, putting the change initiatives success in jeopardy. Alternatively, providing the provide the right tools, skills and people for the job, will improve both trust in management and future clarity, consequently lowering resistance and increasing the likelihood of change success.  

Future clarity: see it to believe it

There is considerable evidence that having a clear vision of the future is less threatening than a future that feels uncertain, and people who can clearly envisage their future tend to be more optimistic and have a greater sense of wellbeing.

Our research shows that, in an organizational change context, employees who can clearly envisage their future are likely to be less resistant to change that those who cannot. As a personal, or endogenous, factor, there is likely little managers can do to directly increase employees’ sense of future clarity; however, our research shows that future clarity is directly influenced by both resources, and communication.

Hence, if managers provide sufficient resources and appropriate communication to support a change initiative, this should encourage a stronger sense of future clarity which in turn will reduce resistance to the change. Already mentioned, communications activities could leverage visual management techniques to maximise the opportunities to build future clarity for employees.

Personal resilience

Personal resilience plays a role in reducing resistance: employees who have higher resilience have lower resistance. However, managers have little influence over how resilient their employees are. Of interest, though, is that the other personal factors – trust in management and future clarity—exert considerably more influence over resistance than employee resilience; and, these other factors are amenable to modification via the organisational factors. The implication is that even if employees are low on resilience, organisations may be able to counteract this by taking actions that build future clarity and trust.

Cultivate paradoxical leadership

Organizations should consider cultivating a paradoxical leadership style to improve their change management efforts and ultimately reduce employee resistance to change. My research finds that paradoxical leadership exerts a positive influence across all three organizational factors of resources, communication, and participation; and these factors in turn positively influence the personal factors of trust and future clarity, ultimately lowering resistance. Therefore, companies that are experiencing or planning to implement significant changes could benefit from cultivating characteristics of paradoxical leadership in their managers. Such characteristics might include building managers’ capacity to deal with ambiguity, developing flexibility to adopt different management approaches to suit different contingencies, treating employees uniformly whilst also addressing employees’ individual needs in relation to the change, taking charge of important work issues but also delegating details to employees, and maintaining personal boundaries with staff but also treating staff with respect and amiability.

Conclusion

Key findings from this study include that communication is arguably the most important factor managers can focus on to reduce resistance: communication activities should be timely, adequate, useful, and answer questions, and should focus on building future clarity for employees, and trust in management. Resources are also an important factor affecting employee resistance: organizations should focus on providing sufficient staff, skills, systems, and processes to support successful implementation of the change. Participation plays a role in resistance but, contrary to popular narrative, it is important but not paramount. Our study found only a small influence of participation on reducing resistance, and other studies findings vary across contexts and countries. Further research is needed to understand the specifics of this relationship more granularly, such as timing, quantity, and quality of participation opportunities. Finally, paradoxical leadership is strongly associated with reduced resistance and organizations facing change may benefit from cultivating a paradoxical leadership style. Organizations may use these findings to inform how they manage organizational change to reduce employee resistance and to mitigate its detrimental effects. 

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