Interpersonal · Overview
Six Ways Leaders Undermine Change (Without Meaning To)
Most leaders do not undermine a change they are asked to carry out through open resistance. It happens through small, often unconscious signals, a sigh of solidarity, a quietly granted exception, a conversation they keep meaning to have but have not.
This is a diagnostic, not a checklist.
The goal is not to work through all six patterns below. It is to recognize the one or two you are most prone to, and work on those. Some of these you will recognize immediately. Others may take a colleague pointing them out.
Read through all six first
Notice which ones feel closest to something you have actually said or done, then open those.
2.1
The Signals You’re Sending
The small verbal tells that quietly tell your team you are not fully behind this.
Open this module2.2
Behavior Over Talking Points
Your team follows what you do, not what you say in the room.
Open this module2.3
Where to Spend Your Energy
Spending your energy on the people who will never move, instead of the people who actually could.
Open this module2.4
Empathy Without Commiseration
Acknowledging that a change is hard without agreeing that it is wrong.
Open this module2.5
Creating Space So It Doesn’t Go Underground
What does not get said in the room gets said everywhere else.
Open this module2.6
The Conversation You’re Avoiding
The direct conversation with a quietly disengaging high performer, the one everyone else is watching you not have.
Coming soonIf more than one felt familiar
Start with whichever one feels most uncomfortable to admit. That discomfort is usually a reliable sign of where the real work is.