How to Reduce Resistance to Change: Brain-Based Guide
The new intake process went live on Monday. Everyone had seen the demo, and nobody objected. By Thursday, half the team is logging requests in the old spreadsheet again, and you're starting to wonder why people are resisting the change.
The answer: probably nobody is. When you look closely at what gets called resistance during a rollout, it usually comes down to one of three things. Something in the workday still triggers the old way. The new way costs someone something they haven't said out loud, and nobody acknowledged. Or people aren't sure what the next step is, so they take the step they know. Each of those needs a different response, and explaining the reason for the change again fixes none of them.
This guide covers how to tell the three apart, and how to reduce resistance to change with moves you can make this week, using The Shift Method.
Key takeaways
Resistance during a rollout is something you can see: a pause, a repeated question, a return to the old process. Treat it as information about the work before you treat it as attitude.
Most of it comes from one of three places: a cue in the workday that still points to the old routine, a cost to the person that nobody has named, or a next step that isn't clear.
Ask people to walk you through the last time they went back to the old way. The answer and steps usually tell you which of the three you're dealing with.
Change what happens at the moment the old habit starts. Retire the old template, change how the meeting opens, and train and practice on real work.
What resistance looks like in a normal week
In my 18 years leading learning and development at a Fortune 500 company, I saw initiatives get the systems and the processes right and then struggle for years, because the people part was an afterthought. When I wrote about resistance to a change program in 2019, I put it plainly: "Resistance is fundamental to being human." A change asks people to stop doing something that has worked for them for a long time. Some pushback is the normal cost, and it shows you where to look.
It helps to describe it the way you'd describe anything else you can see. Someone asks the same question about the new tool twice. A report arrives in the old format. A team lead says she'll switch after quarter end. Those are behaviors. "They're resistant" is a conclusion.
The conclusion matters because it decides your next move. If you think people are unwilling, you explain the reasons again and ask the executive sponsor to send an email. If you think something in the work is pulling them back, you go and find it.
Three things that usually sit underneath it
Something in the workday still sets off the old way
A lot of what people do at work isn't decided in the moment. Something in the day prompts it: the Monday meeting, the template that opens by default, a customer's call. I've written about how that works for individual habits in The Neuroscience of Breaking Bad Habits at Work. In a rollout, the same thing happens across a whole team at once.
Go back to the intake process. The weekly review still opens with the spreadsheet on the screen, because that's how the meeting has always started. The spreadsheet is still in everyone's bookmarks, and nobody took it away. So on Thursday, when a request comes in during a busy hour, people put it where they've always put it. Nobody decided to resist. The workday still points them to the old way.
The new way costs someone something
Some changes take something away from a person, even when the change is good for the business. In 2019, I was program sponsor for the change work behind a national system rollout in our title offices. One example I used with the people leading that change locally was the person who had always kept the transaction information. If you needed to know where a file stood, you asked them. The new system made that information visible to everyone. Their job title didn't change, but the reason everyone came to them was gone. Someone in that position might even keep information out of the new system.
That person rarely says "I'm losing my standing." They say the new system is slow, or it doesn't handle their special cases, or they'll switch once the bugs are fixed. David Rock's SCARF® model from the NeuroLeadership Institute calls this a threat to status. In plain terms, they're losing the thing they were known for. Complaining about the software feels safer than saying that.
Nobody is sure what the next step is
The third one is the simplest, and it's easy to miss. People understood the demo, but the demo showed what the system can do. It didn't show what to do at 2:15 on a Wednesday when a request comes in missing half its information. When nobody has said what to do in that moment, people do what they did last month.
One small shift this week: Pick one place where the old way keeps coming back. Before you decide why, write down which of the three it looks like: a cue, a cost, or an unclear step. If you can't tell, that's your next conversation.
How to reduce resistance to change with The Shift Method
The Shift Method is the process I use for change: Identify, Question, Reframe, Vision, and Act. Here I'm applying it to a rollout: to what your team is doing, and to the story you're telling yourself about why.
Identify: name the behavior and the moment before it
Start with one behavior, not the whole change. "People aren't adopting the system" is too big to act on. "Requests get logged in the spreadsheet during the Thursday rush" is something you can work with.
Then look at what happens just before it. Is there a meeting, a screen, a type of request, a time of day? For any rollout, build a one-page worksheet that asks people to write down their old work habits and their new ones for their own role. Make two columns, take one role at a time, and write one line for each moment where the work changes.
Question: ask about the last time, not the usual time
Next, check your explanation against the people doing the work. Ask someone to walk you through the last time they went back to the old way, with the details, rather than what they usually do. "It came in at four, it was missing the policy number, and I didn't know if the new form would let me save it half-finished" tells you far more than "the new system is clunky."
Listen for which of the three you're hearing. A cue sounds like "I just did it without thinking." A cost sounds like a complaint that changes shape every time you solve it. An unclear step sounds like a question that starts with "what do I do when."
That worksheet also asked a question I still use: "What choices do I have in adopting these new work habits?" It's worth asking your team out loud. Even when a change isn't optional, there's usually some choice about how, in what order, or with whose help. David Rock argues in Quiet Leadership (2006) that doing someone's thinking for them rarely sticks, because people act on conclusions they reach themselves. When your team works out the how, they own it.
Reframe: change the story you're telling about them
This step is for you, the leader. If the story in your head is "they're dragging their feet," every question you ask will sound like an accusation, and people will answer it that way. Once you've heard what's happening, replace that story with a more accurate one: "the Thursday rush still runs through the spreadsheet," or "Dana is losing the part of her job she was proud of."
The more accurate story changes what you do next. For the person who always kept the information, the move is to use what they know instead of debating the software with them. Ask them to help set up the special cases the new system has to handle, because nobody knows those cases better. That keeps them the expert, now in the new way of working.
Vision: describe the new routine at the exact moment
Get specific about what the new way looks like at the moment the old one used to start. Instead of "use the new intake system," try "when a request comes in during the Thursday review, it goes into the new form, even if half the fields are empty, and whoever runs the meeting reads from the form." If you can't write that sentence, your team can't follow it.
This is also where the next step gets clear. Say what happens when something doesn't fit. Who do people ask? Is it fine to save a request half-finished? What hasn't changed? Questions like these, left unanswered, are where people fall back on what they know.
Act: change the moment, then practice on real work
Now change the moment itself. A few moves that usually do more than another reminder:
Retire the old path. Once the new way can handle the work, archive the spreadsheet or make it read-only. As long as the old way is one click away, it's the easy choice on a busy day.
Change what opens the meeting. If the weekly review starts with the new tool on the screen, the whole team practices the new routine every week without anyone having to be told.
Put the prompt where the work happens. A line in the template or on the form does more than a reminder from a launch meeting three weeks ago.
Practice the process, not the features. One rule I wrote for change teams back then was that demonstrations should be habit- and process-based, not about functionality. Walk through a real request from start to finish instead of touring every button.
Keep your own signals consistent. Use the same words about the change in one-on-ones and team meetings, and use the new process for your own requests. If you keep using the old way yourself, your team will follow your lead.
One small shift this week: Choose one recurring meeting or template that still opens the old way. Change how it starts, so the first thing people see is the new process.
When the old way keeps winning
Sometimes you do all of this and people still drift back. Again, before you decide it's attitude, check whether the new way does less than the old one.
One of the rules I wrote into my change planning template was to verify that no functionality had been taken away before asking people to commit. If the old spreadsheet let someone see all of their open requests at a glance and the new tool doesn't, going back to the spreadsheet is a reasonable response to a real gap. The fix is to close the gap, or to say plainly when it will be closed, rather than pushing harder on adoption.
Then check how much practice people have had. If they learned the new process in one session and then went straight back to a full workload, the first busy week is their first real attempt. Give them another round on the requests that trip them up, and sit with the people who are still unsure while they work through one.
One small shift this week: Ask the person who has gone back to the old way most often what the old way does for them that the new one doesn't. Write their answer down word for word before you respond.
Where to start
Pick one behavior, find the moment just before it, and ask one person to walk you through the last time. You'll usually learn more from that conversation than from another round of explaining why the change matters.
If you're in the middle of a rollout that isn't landing, Feed Your Brain | Consulting works with leaders to find what's pulling people back to the old way and fix it in the work itself.
Frequently asked questions
Why do people go back to the old process after agreeing to the new one?
People agree to a change in a meeting. Doing it happens in the middle of a busy day, when something familiar sets off the old routine before anyone stops to think. People can support the new process and still slip back if the meeting, the template, or the type of request that used to prompt the old way hasn't changed. Change what happens at that moment, and people get a real chance to act on what they agreed to.
How can I tell whether it's resistance or confusion?
Listen to what people ask you. Confusion shows up as a specific question, like what to do when the form won't save or who approves this now. Resistance tied to a personal cost tends to move around: you solve one complaint and another appears. Both are worth taking seriously, and they need different responses.
Should I remove the old system or process right away?
Remove it once the new way can handle the work people do, including the awkward cases. While the old path stays open, people will reach for it whenever they're rushed. Removing it before the new way is ready pushes people into workarounds and tells them you weren't listening. Check with the people who use it most before you switch it off.
What do I do with one person who keeps pushing back?
Talk with them one-on-one and find out what the change takes away from them. It might be control over their own work, being the person others rely on, or time they don't have. If there's a real cost, look for a way to give some of it back, such as a role in setting up the new process. If the new way creates a real gap, fix it. If you've done both and nothing changes, handle it like any other performance issue: privately and specifically.
Does more training reduce resistance to change?
It can, when the problem is an unclear next step. Training that tours the features rarely helps with the other two causes. Practice on real work, in the setting where the old habit lives, does more than another classroom session.
How long does it take for a new process to stick?
There isn't a reliable number for a team process. It depends on how often the moment comes up, because each time is a chance to practice. Watch whether people use the new way during the busiest part of the week. When they do it without a reminder, it's holding.
About this article. Tiffany Whitney is a NeuroLeadership-trained brain-based coach with 18 years of Fortune 500 Learning & Development leadership, and Amazon bestselling co-author of Strength with Kathy Ireland. Statistics are cited to primary sources; where a figure comes from an organization's internal data rather than independent research, that is noted in the text. This article is for educational purposes and is not medical, psychological, or clinical advice. SCARF® is a registered trademark of NeuroLeadership Institute, Inc. or its affiliates. Feed Your Brain is not affiliated with or endorsed by the NeuroLeadership Institute.
