You don’t want employees to view change with confusion and react with fear. You want to mitigate the uncertainty they are feeling. It is not always that your staff is resistant to change, they may just not have been given enough time to deal with it. In contrast management has often had more time to prepare for change and does not share this uneasy staff situation, points out the management.about.com website.
Marathon effect
This is something that William Bridges, famous speaker and consultant in change management, calls “The Marathon Effect”. It comes from a marathon line up. The fastest runners start the race and only then can the next group of racers start the race. Then there is the next group and so on. Every group starts its race at different times. Those at the very end often don’t even notice that other runners have already ran their first tenth kilometer. That is a great metaphor for when a company undergoes a change.
Managers and staff have different starting times
Senior leaders usually have been working on making the change happen well before it is introduced to the organizational staff. Therefore they have had plenty of time to think about it, talk about it and adopt their new mindset. They have gone through their own, personal transitions before the organizational changes were launched. Middle managers usually also have more time for their personal transitions than the rest of the employees.
Be aware of the marathon effect
For a senior manager the intended destination is clearly visible. However, for majority of employees it takes longer to let go of the old ways and habits that stand in the way of finally moving through the transition phase. Be patient.
Book:
BRIDGES, William: Managing Transitions: Making the Most of Change. Da Capo Press, 2003, 144 pages.
-jk-