We don't want to change our habits and routines. Some people deliberately try to kill good ideas and others to beat the system for their advantage as they attempt to block change efforts. People resist change for a variety of reasons. Maintaining the status quo. People like things the way they are now, view the change as an inconvenience, or don't agree that a change is needed.

Uncertainty: People tend to fear the unknown and wonder how the change will affect them. Learning anxiety: The prospect of learning something new itself produces anxiety. Fear: People often fear they may lose their jobs, that they will not be successful with learning new ways, or that they may lose control over how they do their jobs.

Before making changes, anticipate how employees will react to or resist the change and how you will overcome it. Resistance to change involves the variables of intensity, source, and focus, which together explain why people are reluctant to change. People often have four basic reactions to change: acceptance, tolerance, resistance, and rejection. The resistance intensity can vary from strong to weak or somewhere in between. As a manager of change, you should anticipate the intensity of resistance to change so that you can effectively plan to overcome it.