Good morning everyone and welcome back to the Breakroom!
We are doing another blog after we have struggled with some scary instances regarding the health of our dog, Loki. He is doing great but we have not been able to get the time to put together a podcast.
Obviously our goal is to do both a blog and pod each week but as they say, when it rains it pours.
For this week I wanted to talk about one of the most daunting of issues that we as employees can face and that is change. Between initiatives from senior leaders, technology, and random issues that arise the business world is constantly evolving. But not every change is received with a warm welcome. The most common pushback is tied to employees resenting the fact that they are being told how to do business in a way that they have been doing for years. A classic example from The Office is where Stanley Hudson resents Ryan Howard (when he is in his new position at corporate) in how he is trying to change how the sales team does business. Requiring them to use technology like Blackberries is very reminiscent of how many employees view the adaptation of AI. While technologies might have their place in business, it often feels like leaders are jumping on the bandwagon simply because the tools are new and flashy. This does not inherently mean that they are better than what was being used up to that point. Another great example is when Sabre takes over and introduces their “sales-first” mentality resulting in employees from non-sales departments feeling like they are not receiving the necessary support in their own roles.
These examples do paint leadership as the villains in a sense and I think it is important to call out leaders who implement change for the sake of change. As leaders, you must be prepared to address the concerns of employees with the key question being why the change? If you cannot answer that question, perhaps your change is not being implemented for the right reasons. Ryan, for example, is great example of a new leader who is trying to make a name for himself and do something big and flashy. I do not recall him providing data to support why his push for new technology is the correct one, just that he is trying to bring some style and emulate other industries in which the employees are glued to their phones, even outside of work. Another example might be when Jim decided it would be beneficial to group all the birthdays for the month into one party. What he should have done was take the time to speak to employees to see how they felt about this change. He also could have made this change effective with the new calendar year or compiled data to show that the multiple parties disrupted productivity or were a drain financially. In reality, it seems to show he simply could not be bothered to order the cake and thought a last minute change was a good idea. Making changes, even small ones, should require research and explanation to support the rationale behind it. Instead, he wasted a whole day on that decision that could have been nixed with one conference room meeting.
Now there are two different types of change that occur in the workplace and they are often met with different levels of apprehension. We have adaptive change which are often seen as small, incremental changes and often occur has events dictate them. Transitioning to a new software could be seen as a method or perhaps your company is transitioning into a hybrid/remote model which would require new forms of communication be in place. We then have transformational change and this is seen as the larger changes which will often take extended periods of time to plan. Creating a new position/department could be seen as an example as it is a change that impacts the company as a whole rather than a small piece.
What is the reason?
First and foremost, why are you looking to bring in this change? Too often we hear about how the world is always changing for the sake of progress. But progress doesn’t inherently mean better as it could just as easily mean flashier, but not cost effective or productive. Before you begin implementing your change or looping people in, ask yourself if you are addressing a real problem that the current model does not support, or is this just a vanity project or even a whim because you read about AI in the newspaper and thought it sounded cool. Implementing a great idea might bring you respect, but costing a company a fortune on a colossal misstep will give you a reputation.
Research and Support
Perhaps the greatest tip that can be recommended to leaders implementing change, which I have spoken about above, is that you should not make quick decisions on the fly. Time should be spent reviewing your options and using your resources to research and be able to support it with data. Too often we see in film and television about leaders who simply follow their gut to make rapid fire decisions. While there is a place for trusting your instinct, you should still be able to thoroughly defend your decision with more than a simple “because I said so.” I am a firm believer that a leader implementing a change should be able to refute criticisms and concerns with their proposition with clear facts and explanations. If your idea cannot hold up to the smallest bit of scrutiny, it is likely not the ideal option to begin with.
Have a Plan
We all have those people in our lives who hate structure and prefer to have an adventure on a whim. That might be fine for whipping up a stew or exploring a city on vacation, but businesses require order and planning in all of their endeavors. If you were implementing a change at work, such as bringing in some new software, it would never be as simple as “put the disk in on Monday and there we are.” Even such a change that sounds simple should have a full plan to lay out all of the different steps. Using that above analogy, who is responsible for installing the software? Updates? As it been tested to ensure it works with your existing programming? Who is leading training seminars for staff? These are but a few of the many questions that can arise if you have no laid out a plan detailing the steps to seeing your change through 1.
Involve Stakeholders
If you are going in on a change alone, you are already doomed. It is not enough to simply assign steps to people, you should be working alongside colleagues so they work on the project together. If you are a senior leader of a company, you would definitely need people from Information Services to have a hand in determining changes to software. Using the adaptation of AI into the business world, I am willing to bet most of the leaders who have pushed their company to bring it in have no experience in the field. I am a firm believer that if you cannot be considered an expert in the field of the change you are leading, you need support from people who do understand it with the authority to make key decisions.
Even further, you should be speaking with the employees whom will be dealing with these changes. When I was a leader for Environmental Services and was tasked with redesigning the job plans of routines, I didn’t just sit down and make it up on the spot. I walked these routines with my staff who were the experts of what they do every single day. While I was able to bring up aspects that they admitted would make the routine easier, there were plenty of aspects to their jobs that were not thoroughly documented and could have been fully missed had we not mapped it out together. A true leader leads, and that often involves working with your staff alongside each other and utilizing their knowledge and skills.
Follow and Track
True change is not done just because you have implemented your project or initiative. You need to have measurable metrics that you can track to ensure that the change you likely just spent a great deal of time and money on is not a failure. Catching a issue with the launch early on by yourself is far more forgiving than being caught months later but dozens of employees. Before the change is even completed, you should know what sort of information you are gathering and reviewing so that you can begin monitoring the moment it is live.
Perhaps the greatest tool of all is simply communication. A company runs on the continued teamwork of everyone involved and I fear that leaders often forget that because they get it in their head that their title gives them the authority. While I am not saying employees should disrespect their leaders, but I am saying that it should be encouraged to provide honest feedback and criticisms when a costly blunder might be on the horizon.
What are some other good strategies for implementing change in the workplace to ensure the act of introducing the change can offer a smooth transition?
While you think of your own ideas, I hope you all are staying warm out there, you have a great weekend, and as always I’ll see you around the Breakroom.
- Stobierski, T. (2020, January 23). 5 Tips for Managing Change in the Workplace. Harvard Business School. Retrieved January 28, 2026, from https://online.hbs.edu/blog/post/managing-change-in-the-workplace ↩︎
