How to Get Your Team on Board with a Major Change

Four strategies for leaders.

by

and

Michael Thorley

by

and

Michael Thorley

August 04, 2022

HBR Staff/Westend61/Getty Images

Summary.

Most change management has shifted from a simplistic, top-down, “create a vision, change the structure, roll out the new program, and get buy-in” approach to more emergent, empowered, and purpose-led approaches. But leading big, complex change is still a struggle — the rate of failure for transformation projects remains stubbornly high. The authors have seen both in their research and their work with clients that the missing ingredient is the ability to look for and work with deeper systemic forces. And they found the force that has the greatest impact on change outcomes is humans’ primary need to belong. The authors present four strategies for leaders to skillfully attend to people’s most primal need to feel secure in disruptive contexts.

George, head of the Asia Pacific region for a global industry leader, was running the annual meeting of his group’s 300 executives and managers. After reviewing the year to date and addressing the changing context for the coming year, he was heading for the usual wrap up. This time, however, he had a key decision to share with his people, a decision he told us he felt both resolute in and nervous to share. Their operating model — the model that everybody knew and understood and that guided every interaction — needed to change.

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Deborah Rowland is the co-author of Sustaining Change: Leadership That Works, Still Moving: How to Lead Mindful Change, and the Still Moving Field Guide: Change Vitality at Your Fingertips. She has personally led change at Shell, Gucci Group, BBC Worldwide, and PepsiCo and pioneered original research in the field, accepted as a paper at the 2016 Academy of Management and the 2019 European Academy of Management. Thinkers50 Radar named as one of the generation of management thinkers changing the world of business in 2017, and she’s on the 2021 HR Most Influential Thinker list. She is Cambridge University 1st Class Archaeology & Anthropology Graduate.
Nicole Brauckmann focuses on helping organizations and individuals create the conditions for successful emergent change to unfold. As an executive and consultant, she has worked to deliver large-scale complex change across different industries, including energy, engineering, financial services, media, and not-for profit. She holds a PhD at Faculty of Philosophy, Westfaelische Wilhelms University Muenster and spent several years on academic research and teaching at University of San Diego Business School.
Michael Thorley is a qualified accountant, psychotherapist, executive psychological coach, and coach supervisor integrating all modalities to create a unique approach. Combining his extensive experience of running P&L accounts and developing approaches that combine “hard”-edged and “softer”-edged management approaches, he works as a non-executive director and advisor to many different organizations across the world that wish to generate a new perspective on change.

New!

HBR Learning

Change Management Course

Accelerate your career with Harvard ManageMentor®. HBR Learning’s online leadership training helps you hone your skills with courses like Change Management. Earn badges to share on LinkedIn and your resume. Access more than 40 courses trusted by Fortune 500 companies.

Change may be the only constant in today's organizations. Here's how to lead through it.

Start Course

Learn More & See All Courses

How to Get Your Team on Board with a Major Change

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