Managers must anticipate objections from their employees, understand their message, address the problems, and seek solutions, contends professor Erik Nagel in this examination of resistance in the workplace. As long as employees use resistance to get management’s attention and lodge protests, managers must build the skills needed to cope with recalcitrance, learn from it, manage it, and respond effectively. Nagel cites common forms of resistance and offers both executives and employees a way forward.
Managers deal with resistance every day.
Handling resistance is part of a manager’s job. Because dealing with resistance is no fun, managers typically view employee pushback as negative. In truth, resistance is neither positive nor negative; it’s a normal aspect of any ongoing relationship. Because change is stressful for employees, they’re likely to object to some aspects of any change a company imposes. However, resistance doesn’t crop up only when big changes are afoot. It can occur any time and for a variety of reasons.
Being proactive about addressing employees’ concerns can keep problems from escalating or becoming public, as happens with the most dramatic forms of resistance, such as a labor strike following unmet demands for higher wages. However, pushback doesn’t always involve picket lines and bargaining impasses. People may engage in more passive resistance, such as quietly declining to go along with management’s changes.
Resistance doesn’t always grow from high-level conflict. Contention can arise even during seemingly mundane conversations about routine subjects. One misconception is that resistance always comes from lower-ranking employees reacting...
Erik Nagel, Vice Dean and Head of Continuing and Executive Education at the Lucerne School of Business, is head of the Institute for Management and Regional Economics (IBR). He has written other books, speeches, and articles on leadership, corporate culture, and change management.
Comment on this summary