Change Friction to Change Behaviors at Work: Top 3 Steps

Do You Leverage Change Friction to Change Behaviors at Work?
Experienced leaders understand that organizational change can either accelerate strategy execution and elevate team performance or stall progress entirely. Change management consulting experts often describe guiding an organization through change as navigating turbulent waters, demanding both strategic foresight and deft execution. This is where the concept of leveraging change friction to influence workplace behaviors comes into play — a principle grounded in behavioral economics and organizational psychology.

When applied thoughtfully, leveraging change friction transforms obstacles into opportunities. By intentionally shaping the small frictions that influence decisions and actions, leaders can guide behaviors in ways that reinforce organizational goals, embed new business practices, and sustain meaningful change over time. Instead of viewing resistance as a barrier, it becomes a strategic tool to align behaviors with desired outcomes.

What Is Change Friction?
In behavioral economics, change friction refers to the obstacles or factors that increase the effort, time, or complexity required for individuals to make decisions or complete tasks. Within organizations, change friction represents the natural resistance discussed in change management training that arises when people are asked to move away from familiar routines or challenge the status quo. Change management simulations reveal that this resistance takes many forms — from entrenched habits and cultural inertia to structural or procedural barriers.

Friction reduces the likelihood of a behavior and shapes our choices. For instance, distance can act as friction: the farther away a gym or a healthy food option is, the less likely we are to engage with it. Similarly, time and effort create friction — tasks that take longer or require more effort are less likely to be completed. By recognizing these subtle barriers, leaders can design strategies that reduce unnecessary friction and guide behaviors toward desired outcomes.

How to Leverage Change Friction to Change Behaviors at Work
Instead of seeing change friction as a barrier, leaders can reframe it as a powerful lever for driving and sustaining organizational change. By understanding why individuals and organizations cling to the status quo — even when compelling reasons to change exist — you can identify the underlying sources of cultural inertia and strategically address them. This approach turns resistance into insight, enabling targeted interventions that guide behaviors, reinforce new habits, and embed lasting change across the organization.

1. Understand Change Readiness
   By identifying sources of resistance and uncovering the psychological forces behind them, change leaders and change catalysts can design targeted interventions that break entrenched patterns and accelerate the adoption of new behaviors and practices.

   Have you evaluated your organization’s current readiness for change?

2. Create Behavioral Nudges
   Leveraging the principles of choice architecture, leaders can use subtle but powerful behavioral nudges to guide individuals and teams toward desired outcomes. By thoughtfully shaping the organizational environment and framing decisions to encourage preferred behaviors, leaders can reduce resistance and create conditions that support lasting change. Examples include adjusting default options, delivering timely feedback, and cultivating team norms that reinforce new ways of working.

   Are you harnessing behavioral nudges as gentle yet effective catalysts for meaningful organizational transformation?

3. Design Adaptive Organizational Structures and Practices
   Organizational alignment research shows that culture accounts for 40% of the difference between high- and low-performing organizations. For new strategies and changes to take hold, they must pass through your culture and your people. Harnessing change friction means identifying and addressing the sources of cultural inertia that can slow or block progress.

   Organizational structures and business practices often act as either enablers or inhibitors of change. Leaders who understand this can leverage change friction strategically — restructuring teams to reinforce desired behaviors, introducing agile ways of working, flattening hierarchies, and promoting cross-functional collaboration to dismantle silos.

   Equally important is modeling and rewarding a culture of experimentation and continuous learning. This not only strengthens resilience to change but also builds the agility needed to adapt quickly to evolving priorities.

   Is the way work gets done today supporting your desired changes — or standing in their way?

The Bottom Line
Properly understanding and harnessing change friction can turn change resistance into momentum. To convert organizational inertia into agility and uncertainty into opportunity, deploy strategic interventions grounded in behavioral economics — using friction not as a barrier, but as a catalyst for growth, innovation, and lasting change.

To learn more about how to leverage change friction to change behaviors at work, download 5 Science-Backed Lenses of Successful Change Leadership