The Effect of Commitment, Communication and Participation on Resistance to Change: The Role of Change Readiness

Abstract

There is growing concern surrounding the effect of resistance to change on organisational change success. The main purpose of the present research was to clarify the relationships between important contextual variables highlighted in the literature, and resistance to change and readiness for change. Participants completed an online survey while their organisation was about to or already going through a change. As predicted, the results show the importance that participant perception of the adequacy of communication had on resistance to change and that this relationship was mediated by the readiness dimension of viewing the change as appropriate. The relationship between other contextual variables of perceived opportunities for participation and affective organisational commitment, and resistance to change were not found to be mediated by readiness for change dimensions. Affective commitment however, showed a direct negative relationship with resistance to change. These findings highlight the importance of a planned approached to change-related communications, and its potential to reduce resistance to change by effectively creating readiness for change in an organisation. Implications of these results and suggestions for future research are discussed.