Responding to Change at Work

Choosing healthy ways to meet your needs while on the job.

We’re frequently expected to adapt to changes at work. These could be changes in policy, work group configuration, the organizational hierarchy, or job duties. Underlying our responses to change is the issue of how we will get our innate needs met in light of the changes in our work world.

In a previous post, I explained the “Big 4” universal human needs or motivations as they related to job satisfaction. These Big 4 are 1) contribution or calling, 2) choice or control, 3) competence or capability, and 4) connection or community. Meeting these four needs is what we humans require to feel like we’re living our best life. When we have change thrust upon us at work, the ways we get these needs met at work may be threatened, and it can be tempting to resort to unhealthy or unproductive methods to meet them.

Let’s start with contribution or calling

We humans have a need to feel like what we do with our time and effort is meaningful and purposeful. With changes to your work, it can feel like those who lead the organization are implying that what you used to do before wasn’t worthwhile, and hence the need to change what you’re doing. That can feel defeating. Or perhaps some or all aspects of the change seem meaningless, and therefore not very motivating.

In response, it can be tempting to disengage and simply go through the motions. Doing so isn’t healthy for you or the organization. So what can you do instead?

It may fall to you to create meaning in your work. Frequently, leaders fail to illuminate how each person’s job responsibilities contribute to the mission of the organization. So you may have to uncover and remind yourself of how your work makes some sort of difference as a necessary piece of fulfilling the organization’s mission. You might also choose to look for ways to alter your work to make it more meaningful, even if that means doing a bit more than is expected or that falls under what you’re being paid to do. Rather than seeing it as providing uncompensated work, recognize the personal benefits that come from doing something meaningful.

Choice and control

When it comes to meeting the need for choice and control, an unhealthy approach is to rebel against the changes. When we are told we have to do something, it’s natural to resist, even if just psychologically. A healthier or more productive way to respond to the threat to your autonomy is to focus on what you have control over. For example, you may not have much choice in what you are responsible for getting done, but there may be latitude in your choice of how to accomplish what you need to. In a previous post, I wrote about this process, which psychologists call job crafting.

Competence or capability

When it comes to competence or capability, change can threaten your established ways of being successful. Change at work frequently requires you to learn new things, do new things, or at least use skills that may be rusty. An unhealthy or unproductive response is to continually question the reasons or legitimacy for change. Doing so can seemingly provide an excuse to drag your feet.

A healthier or more productive way to address the need for competence and capability is to focus on the end result. The experience of the change can be stressful and unsettling, but what knowledge, skills, or abilities will you gain as a result? How might these aspects of growth possibly contribute to your future success or professional advancement?

Last, consider the need for connection and community

Frequently, change at work results in people meeting this need through bonding over shared gossip, complaining, or second-guessing leadership. It makes sense that people all going through the same stressful experience would look to each other for support. However, as I wrote about in previous posts, there are recognized problems created by gossip and cliques.

So, rather than meeting the need for connection and community through commiseration, and possibly excluding others who don’t share similar views, is there a way to support each other more productively? For example, might the team agree to focus on positive ways to help each other cope, such as offering help to those who could use some, and reinforcing progress and small wins along the way?

Even when change is positive and desired, it inherently involves some degree of stress. During times of change, I reflect on the importance of considering the Big 4 universal human needs. To the extent that meeting those needs is threatened, people may find themselves resisting the change, or meeting these needs in ways that are less healthy and productive than had previously been the case. Whether you’re a leader or working in the trenches, I encourage you to give the Big 4 some thought as well.

Written by: Michael Wiederman, Ph.D., a former clinical psychology professor who now works full-time applying psychology to the workplace, for Psychology Today.