Getting people to buy into and adapt new behaviors and attitudes can be at difficult at best, and almost impossible at times. One of the most common complaints from managers and leaders is that they struggle to get the people they are responsible for to be open to, and embrace, change. Most leader’s experience of implementing change is dragging people forward whilst they complain, kick and scream about wanting to maintain the status quo.
Not everyone embrace change the same. One person may be open to it, whilst another is openly against it all costs. And why the difference? There are too many reasons to explain here, so I will quickly cover one of the main ones. And that is everyone is motivated differently and hence embraces the change differently. For some change actually motivates them, whilst for others it de-motivates them. For example some people are motivated by certainty and security so just hearing the word ‘change’ sends them running in the opposite direction. Others are motivated by rapport and good team dynamics so depending upon if the change threatens this or improves it, will determine how they respond, whether against or for the change. Yet others are motivated by working in processes that are well defined and implemented, so if they change fixes a problem with a broken process they would be more than willing to embrace the change.
Knowing how people are motivated by change allows you to handle likely objections and predict their response to the change announcement. Click To Tweet
It takes time to know how people are motivated and embrace change, yet if you have even a basic understanding you can predict how they will likely handle the change and more importantly predict their likely objections and concerns with the change. Knowing these allows you to prepare your communication plans and conflict resolution plans proactively rather than trying to deal with these objections reactively mid-implementation.
You can never predict all objections and concerns, some of which may not even be valid. Yet by predicting some of the objections and having developed a response for them, can help alleviate likely concerns even if you don’t have an answer for their specific concern. And if you are not good at thinking on your feet, having some pre-planned ideas of what to say and how to address concerns will allow you to feel more at ease when communicating and to communicate more influentially.
Question: For your current change what are some of the likely objections you will face or are even facing right now and how can you address each of these to help people embrace the change?
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