The Problem with Change summary

Do you ever feel like your work life is constantly in flux? Are mergers, reorganizations, new strategies, new models, or new office spaces the norm in your company? For some, today’s business world is one where the ground beneath their feet is always shifting and they’re never quite sure what tomorrow will bring. Ashley Goodall, the author, likens this to “life in the blender.”

For many business leaders today, disruption is an article of faith. They have to disrupt to stay competitive in today’s fast-paced world. But what if all this change came at a price – a price that often goes unrecognized?

Consider Sarah who works in human resources. When her company was acquired, the HR departments of the two firms were consolidated. Although she kept her job, many of her colleagues were replaced or quit. She describes being deeply unsettled as she lost almost her entire network within the company.

Across companies and industries, the stories are consistent; stories of confusion, frustration, and fatigue. Constant flux makes it hard to get work done as reporting lines shift, processes change, and key people leave. Networks and relationships that took years to build are suddenly severed, leaving employees disoriented and distrustful.

Layoffs, which often follow on the heels of reorganizations, sow further disruption. Uncertainty breeds anxiety as everyone wonders when the next big shake-up will hit. Employees resort to reading the tea leaves in their boss’s behavior, bracing for impact when communication drops. Some leaders try to shield their teams from the onslaught, feeling more like human shields than coaches. Amongst it all, the “toxic positivity” of executives touting silver linings begins to ring hollow.

Over her 24-year career, Linda has been through so many changes – mergers, spin-offs, reorganizations, acquisitions, and so on – that she started a spreadsheet to keep track of it all. By her count, she’s weathered 44 major changes across 12 companies. Each entry is a reminder of the chaos she's endured: the time her division was sold and she had to re-interview for her own job; the time a layoff claimed half her team; the miserable year in which her company cycled through three CEOs. What struck Linda is how little all this change has ultimately accomplished. Despite the endless restructurings, her industry is still struggling. As she puts it, “It makes you wonder what it’s all for.”

Yet curiously, once a major change is set in motion, it often takes on a life of its own. No matter how much chaos it unleashes, course corrections are rare. It’s as if organizations become captive to their own change initiatives, seeing them through even as evidence mounts that things have gone off the rails.

Leaders aren’t disrupting for the thrill of inflicting pain. And most would agree that change is sometimes needed. All of this begs the question, then: If change is supposed to be so good and necessary, why, in practice, is it so often experienced as miserable and destructive on the ground?