When Employees Are Drowning in Change

In 2021-2022, CareRx was handling an ambitious expansion. In a span of 20 months, the Canadian pharmacy services company tripled its business through a series of acquisitions. Each acquired company brought its own processes, systems, and cultural norms. 

Employees barely had time to adjust before the next change arrived. “We were growing so fast that the organization could not keep up,” said Adrianne Sullivan-Campeau, chief employee and customer experience officer at CareRx. “We had teams under the same roof not speaking the same language. It was an us-versus-them situation.”

In late 2022, compounded by the pressures of the COVID-19 pandemic, turnover spiked and customer complaints piled up. At one location, Sullivan-Campeau recalled, a leader from the head office arrived to roll out yet another change, and employees turned them away. “‘Leave us alone,’ they said. ‘We’re done.’”

“People were overwhelmed,” she said. “They were asking us as leaders, ‘Why are you doing this? Where are we going?’”

I see this pattern repeatedly in my work advising C-suite leaders through organizational transitions: too much change, too soon, with too little attention to the people living through it. The leaders who navigate this well focus on one thing: managing how their people experience it.

Right now, multiple forces are driving change, including mergers and restructurings, economic volatility, geopolitical instability, and AI technology. Employees and leaders are feeling all of it. Eighty-three percent of business leaders are experiencing more major change than ever before, according to research conducted by my company, The Grossman Group, with The Harris Poll. Employees can realistically absorb only one or two major changes per year, yet leaders are planning on three or four by 2027, our research found. Meanwhile, though nearly all business leaders believe that they communicate change well, we found that 1 in 4 employees say they disagree or are not sure.

Three leadership disciplines make the difference in helping teams analyze and handle change.

1. Make Dialogue Nonnegotiable

Dialogue is one thing many leaders cut back on during periods of change. It takes time and effort, both of which feel scarce in the middle of transformation. Leaders default to what feels efficient. They craft the message, send it out, and move on.

But change is emotional, not just operational. The people closest to the work have perspectives on what’s going well and what isn’t.