Navigating Organisational Change: Key Challenges and Solutions

Organisational change frequently happens, but knowing how to navigate it can be a difficult task without the right mechanisms in place. In our view, prevention is better than cure - so deciphering and mitigating these challenges early on can safeguard your company culture as well as keep employees satisfied.

We’ve highlighted the three key challenges brought on by organisational change as well as solutions that you can implement to mitigate these early on.

#1 Employee resistance

A common challenge with change management is employee resistance. This could be present even before change commences, which can then make it even tougher. Employee resistance isn’t something that can be avoided altogether, either. 

Even the most robust businesses with brilliant cultures will experience some sort of employee resistance to organisational change. We are all human - and humans are complex with a variety of emotions that can change in an instant!

Solution: Effective communication

“Communication is key.”

How many times have you heard this phrase before?

However, it couldn’t be more apparent when looking at organisational change and what can go wrong during the process. Employee resistance can come in many different shapes and forms: employees may feel like their roles are at risk because of the change, or, they may simply struggle to be on board with the change because they don’t understand why it’s happening. 

Communication dissipates all of these minor (and major) worries and allows for an open forum for questions to be answered and for anxieties to be squashed. You want to ensure that your communication doesn’t just float at the management level, but instead permeates all layers of the business, so all employees are looped in and feel heard. 

#2 Employee fatigue

Some organisational change can feel fluid and fairly quick, however, there will be larger projects that will disrupt for an extended period of time. Certain change, such as implementing new systems or changing organisational structures can take months - and some change can take over a year depending on the size and scale of the organisation, too. The result of this can be employee fatigue, also known as change fatigue.

“Change fatigue is resistance or passive resignation to organizational changes on the part of an employee.” - [Source]

Solution

In some cases, change fatigue/employee fatigue can be difficult to avoid altogether. This is because certain projects unfortunately do take an extended period of time - change cannot happen overnight. 

A great solution for this is not just communication but also ensuring that timelines are tight and that you have the right talent in the post to execute the change effectively. Not only will this enable you to have a better pace within your organisation, but it will also demonstrate to employees that you understand the negative impact that change fatigue can have, and that you’re doing everything within your power to mitigate it!

#3 Lack of buy-in 

When conducting organisational change, you will find that resistance can be caused by lack of buy-in, and lack of buy-in can cause resistance: it’s a situation that can be compared to the “chicken and egg” analogy - what came first? The lack of buy-in can be for the organisational change project as a whole, but it can also be for whoever is leading it, too. 

Solution

Instead of becoming caught up with how to avoid the chicken and egg scenario, accept that lack of buy-in can cause bigger problems down the line. It can not only extend the length of your organisational change project, but it can cause employee fatigue, and resistance, and eat through your budget as a result of that. 

The solution for lack of buy-in is a double-pronged approach: hire great leaders (or choose great leaders) to sit on the frontline of the project, and ensure that communication is at an all-time high to keep employees looped in. 

Additionally, too much change can cause stress and confusion within an organisation - but structured change that is frequent and palatable (for example, change once a year or once every six months) can make it easier for employees to digest. 

You can’t plan all change, but having set timeframes can encourage employees to be more open and embrace change. It also, as a by-product, becomes part of your culture - which then sets the precedent that change is normal, and not something to be feared.

Want to learn more about organisational change? Read our latest blog here.