Change Fatigue at Work: Why Constant Change Wears You Down

Abstract

This article is about a tiredness that many people feel when one change follows another: change fatigue at work. Three pieces of research bear on it. A study that built a measure of change fatigue (Bernerth and colleagues, 2011) found that change fatigue was linked with exhaustion, and that exhaustion was linked with lower commitment and stronger intentions to leave. A study of 252 employees before a restructuring (Rafferty and Restubog, 2017) found that a poor history of past changes was linked with seeing the new change as a threat or a harm, and with leaving later. A 60-year review of 79 studies (Oreg and colleagues, 2011) sorted what shapes people's reactions to change. These are associations in specific organisations, not in finance teams. The three steps at the end are practical readings, not tested methods, and this article is not medical advice.

The fourth change in eighteen months

On Monday morning an email arrives with the subject line "Our exciting next phase". A new module is going into the ERP system in the autumn. The close calendar is changing in September, and a reorganisation is "under review".

You read it twice and feel nothing except tiredness. You have just finished learning the last approval workflow. You wonder whether you are being resistant, and whether you are the only one who feels like this.

Change fatigue at work: what the research says

The research cited here does not say that change is bad, or that everyone gets tired of it. It describes a measure of change fatigue and what it is linked with, how past change shapes the reading of a new one, and what a large review found about reactions to change. The studies were of organisations in manufacturing and of mixed settings, and none was limited to finance. The next three sections cover what each one found. None of them tested the three steps at the end.

What a study that measured change fatigue found

Bernerth and colleagues (2011) note that organisational change often strains employees, but that few studies had looked at how several changes together affect well-being and withdrawal. They developed a six-item measure of change fatigue and gathered initial evidence of its validity. They drew on input from change consultants and from a manufacturing organisation in the United States that had been through several changes over three years.

Change fatigue was positively associated with exhaustion. Exhaustion was negatively related to commitment to the organisation and positively related to intentions to leave. This is summarised from the published abstract.

Read the Monday email through this. Tiredness after a series of changes is something the authors set out to measure, and it was linked with exhaustion, not simply with a bad attitude. This is an inference. The measure was at an early stage of validation and was tested in one organisation.

What a three-wave study found about change history

Rafferty and Restubog (2017) surveyed 252 full-time, permanent employees of a manufacturing firm in the Philippines just before a company-wide restructuring. At the announcement, employees reported their history of past changes and how they appraised the new change. Six months later they reported whether they felt the organisation had broken its promises to them and whether they intended to leave. Two years later the researchers collected records of who had actually left.

A poor change history was linked with seeing the change less as a challenge and more as a threat or a harm. Harm and challenge appraisals were linked with feeling that the organisation had broken its promises, which was in turn linked with intentions to leave and with actual leaving. Seeing the change as a threat at the announcement was also directly linked with leaving two years later. This is summarised from the published abstract and a repository page.

Read your own reaction through this. How the last changes went may colour how the next one looks, before anyone has explained it. This is an inference. It was one firm in one country, and the study did not test what leaders can do about it.

What a 60-year review found about reactions to change

Oreg, Vakola and Armenakis (2011) reviewed quantitative studies of how people who receive an organisational change respond to it. They kept 79 studies published between 1948 and 2007. They treat explicit reactions to change as attitudes with three dimensions.

They sort what shapes the reaction into two groups. The first is what exists before the change, which covers the characteristics of the people and the internal context of the organisation. The second is the change itself, which covers the process, whether recipients see the change as beneficial or harmful, and its content. Reactions were in turn linked with work-related and personal outcomes for the recipients. This is summarised from the published abstract.

Read the new close calendar through this. How people react depends on the change process and on whether it looks beneficial or harmful to them, as well as on the people. This is an inference. The review sorts studies into a model, and it does not give a recipe for a single change.

Change fatigue at work: three steps

None of these is a tested method, and none was studied in finance teams. They combine what the research points to with ordinary practice. Where a step goes beyond the research, it says so.

1. List the changes of the last twelve months, and mark which are finished. Write them down, one line each, and share the list with your team or your manager. Bernerth and colleagues (2011) looked at the effect of several changes together, and a list shows the total instead of one change at a time. This is a judgement, and no study cited here tested this step. For instance: "ERP module: live, five open bugs. Approval workflow: live. Close calendar: week two. Reorganisation: announced, not decided."

2. For every new change, say what is not changing. Name what stays the same, in the same message as the change. Rafferty and Restubog (2017) found that seeing a change as a threat was linked with leaving, and this step addresses what the change leaves untouched. This is a judgement, and no study cited here tested this step. For instance: "The close calendar changes in September. Reporting lines, sign-off rules and the team stay as they are."

3. Finish or park one change before starting another. If you lead, ask which change can wait. If you do not, ask your manager the same question. Oreg and colleagues (2011) list the change process among the things that shape reactions. This is a judgement, and no study cited here tested this step. For instance: "Can we finish the workflow clean-up before the next module starts, or should one of them move?"

If the change affects people in HR, Emotional Labour in HR Work: The Cost of Staying Neutral covers that side of it. For the wider picture of tiredness that does not lift, there is Burnout in Finance: Why High Performers Hit the Wall. If you are the one explaining the change to a team, How to Build Trust in a Team: What the Research Supports may help. And if a break did not fix the tiredness, see Does a Holiday Cure Burnout? Why the Relief Fades So Fast.

Questions People Ask

What is change fatigue?

In the research cited here, Bernerth and colleagues developed a six-item measure and found that change fatigue was linked with exhaustion. This article does not reproduce the measure. It is a research construct, not a diagnosis.

Is change fatigue the same as burnout?

The abstract reports that change fatigue was linked with exhaustion. It does not say that the two are the same. Burnout in Finance: Why High Performers Hit the Wall looks at burnout itself.

How do I know if my team has change fatigue?

The studies cited here did not test a quick check for teams. The steps above are a way to see the total load, and you can ask the team directly which changes they consider unfinished.

Can coaching help with change fatigue?

Coaching is educational support for work patterns. It can help you notice how you and your team are reading a change, and plan how to talk about it. It is not treatment and not HR advice. No study cited here tested coaching.

When it is more than a tired team

A tired team is one thing. It is more when exhaustion does not lift after rest, when people cannot sleep, when someone feels persistently low or anxious, or when physical symptoms appear. In those cases talk to your doctor, your occupational health service or a qualified mental health professional. This article is not medical advice. Coaching is educational support for work patterns. It is not treatment and not a substitute for it.

Sources

• Bernerth, J. B., Walker, H. J., & Harris, S. G. (2011). Change fatigue: Development and initial validation of a new measure. Work & Stress, 25(4), 321–337. DOI: 10.1080/02678373.2011.634280 (Summarised from the published abstract.)

• Oreg, S., Vakola, M., & Armenakis, A. (2011). Change recipients' reactions to organizational change: A 60-year review of quantitative studies. Journal of Applied Behavioral Science, 47(4), 461–524. DOI: 10.1177/0021886310396550 (Summarised from the published abstract.)

• Rafferty, A. E., & Restubog, S. L. D. (2017). Why do employees' perceptions of their organization's change history matter? The role of change appraisals. Human Resource Management, 56(3), 533–550. DOI: 10.1002/hrm.21782 (Summarised from the published abstract and a repository page.)