Change Management Protocol

Origin. Lewin's unfreeze-change-refreeze; Kotter's eight steps; ADKAR.

Mechanism. Treats resistance as information about restraining forces rather than as an obstacle to overcome, and sequences the intervention so that the restraining forces are removed before the driving forces are applied. Lewin's asymmetry again.

Procedure. Establish why the current state is untenable, in terms the affected party accepts. Remove the restraint — the loss the change imposes on the party. Then change. Then institutionalize, or the system relaxes to its prior equilibrium.

Applies to. Any change whose success depends on the behaviour of people who did not choose it.

Limitations. 'Refreeze' presupposes a system that can reach a new equilibrium and stay there. Where change is continuous, the third stage never occurs and the model's account of institutionalization does not apply.