Making change happen is one of the biggest challenges in most operations. Most of us are resistant to change, and want to know WHY it’s important. Unless process improvement in institutionalized in the organizational culture, Resistance is a reality.
In order for change management to become a process that everyone accepts (or at least does not reject) we have to understand why there is so much resistance. Here are some of them:
- I like things the way they are
- It might be inefficient but we’ve always done it this way
- Luddite mentality. Resistance to technology change, includes:
- Really don’t like new technology
- Scared they can’t learn it
- Will put me out of business
- Organizational change that will negate my net worth
- Stove pipe or departmental mentality
- I own this department and its activities, stay out of it
- Misunderstanding of enterprise goals
- Poor goal setting by management and HR
- Going to lose my job includes:
- Offshoring
- Outsourcing
- Management change
- Diminished responsibility
- Change in reporting structure
- Loss of Power … perceived or real
- Fear of the future
- Don’t like the players involved
This list could go on, but these are some of the objections we run into when trying to implement change in an organization.
