As a leader, you likely got to where you are through a combination of competence, having the right skills, and knowing when to step into something new. But now, you may find that you aren’t as open to change as you were before assuming a leadership role. It may be that your leadership assumptions are getting in the way of you and your team trying something new.
Why Leaders Resist Change
Change is necessary for growth in any business. Whether you are founding a start up, or taking over the legacy of a retiring professional, your company will face changes under your leadership. And yet, many leaders find it hard to be open to change.
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Many of the reasons leaders resist change are unconscious and emotionally driven. You may be worried about proving your fitness for your new position or avoiding resistance from your colleagues and team members. Maybe you are afraid a new technique will lead to failure or too proud to admit an existing strategy isn’t working. By taking time to unpack the reasons you are resistant to change, you can remove many of those barriers, helping you and your team embrace new things and bigger risks.
5 Common Leadership Assumptions Preventing Change
Often, when business owners, managers, and other leaders are not open to change, it is because they are operating under leadership assumptions that get in the way of trying something new. This can take many forms, but here are five common leadership assumptions that could be stopping you from embracing new ideas:
1. The Leader Already Know What the Problem is
When you are in the mix every day, it can be easy to assume that you already know all the problems in your workspace. Alternatively, if you are a new hire, you could assume that you were brought on because of your ideas about what needs to change. The truth is that often the leaders are the last to know about the obstacles in the workplace. This could be due to a lack of trust or a disconnection between team members. To combat this leadership assumption, any time you are considering a change, the first thing you should do is invite your team members to weigh in and listen to what they are telling you are the strains and bottlenecks in their day-to-day lives.
2. As a Leader, You Shouldn’t Have to Explain Yourself
One of the older and more prevalent leadership assumptions plaguing business leaders is that they should not explain their actions. There are some leaders who have a more traditional mindset who believe that changes should be stated definitively. Offering explanations may even be seen as a sign of weakness. But the truth is that when leaders don’t provide explanations for the changes they want to see in the workplace, employees will fill in those gaps with assumptions of their own, and they may not be the right ones. A lack of open communication can erode employee trust and make it harder for your team to collaborate. Not only that, it will be harder for your team to tell you whether the change is working if they don’t know why it was implemented in the first place.
3. Emotions Should Play No Part in Your Approach to Change
There is a common leadership assumption that business decisions must be made purely on an intellectual level, rather than an emotional one. Business leaders may even believe that any show of emotion at work is a red flag to be addressed immediately. The truth is that emotion drives every decision you make in your work, either consciously or unconsciously. Rather than trying to divorce yourself from your emotions, learn from them. Identify the emotions the idea of change raises in you and your team members, accept them, and then allow those emotions to inform (not control) the decisions you make about your team’s future.
4. Your Team Can Implement Any Plan You Put In Front of Them
It is not uncommon for leaders to assume that their teams already have all the tools they need to make the changes they ask for. But often, that is simply not the case. Even the most agile team will take time to adjust to a new process. They may also need additional resources to get there. Whether it is upgraded technology, different task assignments, or simply training, employees often need support from their organization to make the transition to a new way of doing things.
5. All You Need to Do to Change is Implement New Policies
As a leader, you expect that your decisions will be respected and your plans and policies will be followed. That means when it is time to make the change you might assume all you need to do is implement new policies and trust your team to do the work. This is a mistake because it ignores the value of iteration. There is likely more than one way to bring about the change you are seeking. But if you are not checking in with your team or measuring the success of your new initiative, you won’t know if you got it right the first time.
Instead of making assumptions, commit to follow up with your team to see how your new policies are playing out. Does your new system create new bottlenecks? Are there adjustments or expectations that need to shift? Are there unforeseen impacts on different parts of the work due to a shift in priority or resources. Change should never be a one-and-done event. Instead, it should be a process that invites your team to try, innovate, and yes, sometimes even fail on the way to finding a solution that works for everyone.
David Stanislaw and Karen Sherwood are leadership and executive coaches with 70 years of combined experience. Together, they apply their psychodynamic training and extensive experience to help leaders, business owners, and employees develop skills and facilitate change. Contact us to meet with Stanislaw Consulting today.
This post was written by a human without the use of AI. Stanislaw Consulting does not consent to the use of its online content to train large language models or other forms of artificial intelligence.
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