Can psychological principles and insights inform mass influence for change professionals?
“Executives at companies that took the time and trouble to address mind-sets were four times more likely than those that didn’t to rate their change programs as at least “successful.”” — Scott Keller & Bill Schaninger, Getting personal about change, McKinsey & Company ¹
Wow — where to begin? If I were to summarise five full-time years of psychology education? Then illustrate the important bits for change professionals? This article is a logical start. We explore five psychology schools which have influenced organisational change management.
Like advertising, organisational change management needs skills in mass influence. Psychologists like Adam Ferrier ² illustrate how psychology contributes to more effective advertising campaigns. Other change professionals aim to link psychology to change management. I see links between neuroscience and change management; how people’s brains respond to change. Some creative people have created quotients for change professionals. Organisational psychology concepts, such as Lewin’s model, are foundational change management doctrine.
I would start by talking about five ‘schools’ of psychology. These schools have brought to bear influential concepts shaping organisational change management.
The five schools and major concepts
Enter Sigmund Freud: the Psychodynamic school
There are at least five psychological ‘schools’ related to change management. The psychodynamic ³ ⁴ school started the entire discipline of psychology. As a change professional, I can think of at least two ways the psychodynamic school influences our change practice.
The first concept: projection ⁵. Our stakeholders may feel anxiety from impending change, and project (or extend) their anxieties on change leaders. Projection might manifest in the form of direct anger, passive-aggressive behaviour, and “getting on the soapbox”. Yet we know that people’s behaviour has many influences. The second concept evolves from the psychodynamic school: transactional analysis. I remember reading a book by Eric Berne: Games People Play. In short, people may adopt three roles when expressing their personality: ‘parent’, ‘adult’ or ‘child’. I sometimes reflect on ‘transactions’ (or relationship / power dynamics). This reflection is often in light of the games and dynamics played out in a stakeholder engagement.
Rewarding good behaviour: the Behavioural school
The idea of ‘gamifying’ the change journey has roots in the behavioural school. Positive and negative reinforcement applies to change management. For example, what are your change objectives for the project you are currently on? Have you broken down your change objectives into concrete behaviours? If so, how are you rewarding people for engaging in behaviours you want to see (or at least encourage)? Rewarding ‘ideal’ behaviours is positive reinforcement in action. What less-than-constructive behaviours are you in inadvertently rewarding? ‘You’, in this context, applies to your project team and organisation. These less-than-constructive behaviours are rife in organisations who permit them. Behaviours include:
- Less-than-professional escalations/complaints;
- Mutiny (rejecting the change completely);
- Bullying others who adjust to your change.
‘Rewards’ (in this context) reinforce these behaviours. Then what could happen?
- Your change’s progress is slower;
- Aspects of your project are de-scoped;
- Others observe (and ultimately model) poor organisational citizenship.
These examples are negative reinforcement in action.
“…In all these examples, the companies did a good job of recognising the behavioural change needed to achieve the desired goals. Yet they didn’t take the time, or use the tools available, to understand why smart, hard-working, and well-intentioned employees continued to behave as before.” ¹
Big picture thinking: the Gestalt school
Gestalt psychology contributes to change practice too. Gestalt contributes and examines the role of problem-solving — and insight. Are hundreds or thousands of people affected by your future state? If so, what insights they arrive at when adjusting to change? How do they solve problems related to the change? These problems could include overcoming miscommunication (despite your best efforts to construct excellent messages!). Are there shortfalls in people’s training? How does the future state fit in with the ‘big picture’ of the organisation and each person’s job role?
People make their sense of change and need to rely on their capacity to solve problems, see the big picture and arrive at sudden insights. The idea of tapping into your own creative ‘genius’ is fascinating to me. I studied the role of motivation in creative insight for my research project in fourth-year psychology.
As an aside, I see artificial intelligence (AI) starting to show aspects of on-command creativity. AI might perform the hard joining-the-dots work that we define as ‘insight’. Projects like GPT-3 ⁶have many practical offshoots. Think of the most off-the-wall illustration you want to see. For example, a baby chipmunk in a tutu sipping a latte. Any request you want to make — the GPT-3 artificial intelligence ‘engine’ finds out. You can choose from many versions of GPT-3’s ‘answers’. Check out DALL-E ⁷.
Many AI applications are starting to become useful for change professionals. Check out The Change Decathlete for these practical applications.
Brain wiring and change management: the Biological school
The biological school helps us understand the parts of someone’s brain and central nervous system. What parts activate when something happens? This something includes picking up an object, seeing something alarming (like a bear nearby), meditating, or feeling threatened in a meeting. We hear terms like neuroscience, and these concepts have a close relation to the biological school. We know that our pre-frontal cortex helps us make balanced executive decisions. We meditate to develop our pre-frontal cortex. Meditation engages our parasympathetic (rather than sympathetic) nervous systems. Our parasympathetic nervous system helps us rest. This rejuvenation is useful for maintaining equilibrium in demanding project environments. Or when we need to adjust to changes of our own! What happens when stakeholders get stroppy in a meeting and take their frustrations out on us? Our limbic system contains our amygdala, which triggers fear and resulting central nervous system activity. And when we empathise with our stakeholder’s struggle to adjust to change? Our mirror neurons are firing.
Thinking driving behaviour: the Cognitive school
And the space between stimulus and behaviour? Thought. The cognitive school broadly owns the role of thoughts on our behaviour. The cognitive school considers the role of one’s attention, cognitive load theory 8 and the role of short-term and working memory. Visual perception is also a part of the cognitive school. User Experience designers use cognitive psychology to design better user experiences ⁹. Cognitive-behavioural therapy (CBT) is a gold-standard therapy used in modern psychological practice ¹⁰. CBT merges aspects of cognitive and behavioural school (yep, who would have thought?). The role and interplay of thoughts, feelings and behaviours is a useful way of viewing our world. This trio helps us understand:
- An individual’s context (say, in therapy or considering your change on an individual);
- Team and organisational contexts (organisational change management).
What else?
Want to undergo training to become a psychologist? Statistics is a large part of the curriculum. Why? Because psychology uses a scientist-practitioner model¹¹ ¹². Psychological treatments undergo rigorous testing using a scientific approach. This includes selecting an appropriate research design and statistical techniques. Statistical techniques include both descriptive and inferential statistics. Inferential statistics mean we can sample a part of a population. We then identify statistically-significant differences between treatment and control. Our findings from this sample generalise to a larger population. In other words, we can survey a percentage of our affected stakeholders. What we learn from our sample generally represents the whole (with a suitable sample size and other statistical aspects in place). Findings are reported tentatively and viewed through the lens of peers.
Scientific rigour also applies to data capture and survey design. Not to mention ethical standards interwoven in the research process. As change professionals, we mainly deal with descriptive statistics. With what? Change readiness assessments, and measuring how many people have taken steps to adjust to our future state. Early in a change, it may be readership numbers for our awareness communications. Later on, training registration, attendance and completion. After go-live, how many people have adjusted to our future state? How many people repeat the target behaviour (in other words, make a habit).
Can you measure your effectiveness? This measurement ethos is embedded in the psychology profession. As change professionals, do we take every opportunity to measure our effectiveness? Every time is a chance to reflect our value to the organisations we serve.
Other schools of psychology, like social psychology, also play a role in shaping effective change. Psychology contributes an evidence-based understanding of human nature, including both strengths and foibles. I find it a fascinating hunting ground for anyone looking to add skills and approaches to their change toolkit.
Recap
Psychological principles help you think through how you are going to change human behaviours. They are no panacea, but a good starting point.
Your call to action
What psychological principles do you apply to your work in leading change?
Want to learn more about change management psychology and how to apply this knowledge to your work? Our book — The Change Manager’s Companion — is available now. You can also check out our online course on Change Management.
Reference List
1. Keller S, Schaninger B. Getting personal about change. McKinsey & Company. https://www.mckinsey.com/business-functions/organization/our-insights/getting-personal-about-change. Published 2019. Accessed October 31, 2020.
2. Ferrier A. Adam Ferrier — The Consumer Psychologist. https://theconsumerpsychologist.com/. Accessed January 10, 2021.
3. Psychodynamics — Wikipedia. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Psychodynamics. Accessed January 10, 2021.
4. Ackerman CE. What is Psychodynamic Therapy? 5 Tools & Techniques. PositivePsychology.com. https://positivepsychology.com/psychodynamic-therapy/. Published 2020. Accessed December 20, 2020.
5. Psychological projection — Wikipedia. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Psychological_projection. Accessed January 10, 2021.
6. Marr B. What Is GPT-3 And Why Is It Revolutionising Artificial Intelligence? Forbes. https://www.forbes.com/sites/bernardmarr/2020/10/05/what-is-gpt-3-and-why-is-it-revolutionizing-artificial-intelligence/?sh=2b41e039481a. Published 2020. Accessed January 10, 2021.
7. Ramesh A, Pavlov M, Goh G, Gray S. DALL·E: Creating Images from Text. Openai.com. https://openai.com/blog/dall-e/. Published 2021. Accessed January 10, 2021.
8. Soloman H. Cognitive Load Theory (John Sweller). InstructionalDesign.org. https://www.instructionaldesign.org/theories/cognitive-load/. Accessed December 20, 2020.
9. Donska T. The Mind’s Eye — A Look at Data Visualization Psychology. Toptal.com. https://www.toptal.com/designers/data-visualization/data-visualization-psychology. Published 2020. Accessed October 31, 2020.
10. Australian Psychological Society. Evidence-based Psychological Interventions. 2018:1–175. https://www.psychology.org.au/getmedia/23c6a11b-2600-4e19-9a1d-6ff9c2f26fae/Evidence-based-psych-interventions.pdf.
11. John I. The Scientist-Practitioner Model : A Critical Examination. Aust Psychol. 1998;33(1):24–30.
12. O’Gorman JG. The Scientist-Practitioner Model and Its Critics. Aust Psychol. 2001;36(2):164–169. doi:10.1080/00050060108259649