Resistance of Change

Resistance of Change

As a leader in your organisation, you are going to face instances where others resist your efforts to make change. You should expect it to occur. It’s one of the many organisational realities that come with your position.

As you encounter resistance, it’s important to understand the complexity of change. First, it’s inaccurate to say that it is human nature to resist change. This is a common misunderstanding about change. We don’t naturally resist change.

The truth is that we accept change all of the time. We easily make changes that we believe are in our best interests.

Instead, what we do resist is change that we believe is not in our best interests.

This is an important change distinction that’s critical for any leader to understand.

When people resist you, it’s because they see some aspect of what you want to do as not being in their best interests. They could be mistaken in this belief or they could be correct. Either way, however, their resistance makes perfect sense to them.

To counter their resistance to change, you’ll have to understand their perspective and then respond appropriately.