Episode 279: What Neuroscience Reveals About Making Change Stick (with Travis Hahler)
What if the resistance you're seeing from your team isn't opposition at all?
David Green is joined by Travis Hahler, who leads global strategy and transformation at Salesforce and is also the founder of Neurological Nomad, where he applies neuroscience and neuropsychology to how leaders manage change. Travis is the author of the new book Rethink Resistance, and his central argument reframes almost everything: resistance isn't personal, it's protective.
Discover why resistance to change should be read as information, not opposition:
The six neurological barriers to change, and why leaders need to understand each one
How routine and old habits quietly pull people back toward what made them successful before, even when they're not against the future
Why cognitive load and pacing determine whether people actually learn through a transformation, or just survive it
What employees are really losing in change that's genuinely good for them, and why leaders often miss it
How to apply these insights practically to workforce transformation and AI adoption
Whether you're leading a transformation right now or preparing for one, this conversation will change how you think about the resistance you're seeing.
This episode is sponsored by Valence.
Nadia, Valence's AI coaching platform, connects talent strategy to the work employees are actually doing — offering coaching from the frontline to the boardroom, and surfacing organisational insights that weren't visible before.
As the most widely deployed coach in the Fortune 500, Nadia is already helping global leaders like Nestlé, Delta, CVS, and Kraft Heinz transform talent at scale.
Learn more at valence.co/insight222
Additional resources:
Rethink Resistance: Embracing Neuroscience to Lead Transformational Change
This episode of the Digital HR Leaders Podcast is brought to you by Valence.
[0:00:09] David Green: Before we get into today's conversation, I want you to think about the last time you announced a change to your team. Not a huge one, necessarily. It could have been a new tool, a restructure, a new way of reporting into someone. I bet somewhere in that room or on that call, you could almost feel the shift in energy, that slight pulling back, even from people who on paper had every reason to be fine with it. We've got a word for that; we call it resistance. In fact, my guest today, Travis Hahler, has written a whole book around it, Rethink Resistance, on how resistance impacts our neuropsychology. Travis leads Global Strategy and Transformation at Salesforce. And outside of that, he's the person behind Neurological Nomad, where he takes his background in neuroscience and neuropsychology and transformation, and points it straight at how leaders manage change. And the whole book really comes back to one idea he keeps returning to, that resistance isn't personal, it's protective. And once you see it that way, it changes everything.
So, today, Travis walks me through the six neurological barriers to change and how leaders can read resistance as information for successful change management. And, of course, as everyone is going through some form of AI transformation right now, this couldn't really come at a better time. So, without further ado, let's start with an introduction from Travis.
Travis, welcome to the Digital HR Leaders Podcast. Great to have you on the show.
[0:01:52] Travis Hahler: Great to be here. Thanks for having me, David.
[0:01:54] David Green: So, you're leading, as we said in the introduction, you're leading Global Strategy and Transformation at Salesforce at the moment, and through Neurological Nomad, you bring neuroscience into how leaders manage change. Tell us, tell our listeners, how do these two worlds come together in your work?
[0:02:10] Travis Hahler: Yeah, I mean those two worlds come together because, I mean transformation eventually has to become behaviour. And so, when you have the right strategy, the right technology, the right operating model, and the right business case, you at some point have to take that transformation and move it through real people who are being asked to work differently and decide differently, learn differently. And so, that's where the neuroscience becomes really useful in my work, and that's kind of how the two worlds combine. So, my enterprise work gives me the practical laboratory and I get to see what happens when organisations are trying to change at scale. And my neuroscience background gives me the lens to understand why people respond the way they do. So, instead of only asking, "Did we communicate the change?" I'm asking different questions like, "Did we reduce threat around change? Did we give people enough time to learn?" And that's where the two worlds meet. Strategy tells me where the business needs to go, neuroscience helps us understand what it takes for humans to actually get there.
[0:03:07] David Green: Great. That sounds like a fantastic combination for me and something, I imagine, that's high in demand at the moment. And we always hear about practice and academia, but I suppose you've got the 'pracademia', if we want to fuse those two terms together, which I guess is really helpful, because obviously neurology is science, and obviously doing big transformations in large organisations is effectively practice. And as you said, we want to understand how to make it work.
[0:03:37] Travis Hahler: Absolutely. And I love your new term, I think we should coin it.
[0:03:41] David Green: It's not mine, I've heard it from other people. I'm not going to claim credit for that one, I'm afraid. So, Travis, what led you to study neuroscience and neuropsychology, and how has that changed the way that you think about transformation?
[0:03:55] Travis Hahler: So, I was always really fascinated by why people behave the way that they do, especially in moments where behaviour doesn't seem to match what logic would dictate in that situation. So, early in my career, I would see these transformations happening where leaders would say, "We explained the change, the case makes sense, the future states better, people still aren't moving". And at first, I thought the same way a lot of people do, maybe they're just not bought in, maybe they don't understand it, maybe we need to communicate more, push harder. But the more I studied the neuroscience and the neuropsychology, and going back to my background in just general psychology and human behaviour, the more I realised that it was really an incomplete thought. And what looked like resistance was often the brain doing exactly what it was designed to do, it was protecting safety, preserving energy, reducing uncertainty, holding to patterns. And that changed the way I thought about transformation, because it moved me from what I'd considered to be judgment to a diagnosis, and it gave me better language with leaders. So, instead of saying things like, "That timeline feels aggressive", I would say things like, "Here's what we're asking people to learn, to unlearn, to repeat. Here's what that cognitive load looks like. And here is where ambiguity is going to create threat. Here's where managers will need to create safety in order for people to move". And that's a really different conversation.
So, the neuroscience didn't make that change softer for me, it made it more precise. And I think in a lot of the transformations that I was running, seeing, working with, I was looking at our leaders and giving them this kind of insight. And the response that they were giving me was, "Wow, I didn't really think about it that way". And that's what really drove the neuroscience and the delving deeper into the neuropsychology and the neuroscience of change.
[0:05:49] David Green: There's a saying, isn't there, that people don't like change. And many leaders have looked at a change programme and wondered why something that makes sense on paper still meets resistance. So, from a neuroscience perspective, what happens in the brain when people are told that their work is about to change? I'm guessing it's a lot of, "Aargh!".
[0:06:10] Travis Hahler: Well, David, the brain doesn't start with a business case. If I were to summarise the answer, we start with business cases as leaders of organisations. The brain doesn't start with a business case, it doesn't say, "Oh, it makes sense logically", it says, "What does this mean for me?" And there's a number of things that the brain does that might differentiate from, "Oh, it makes sense on paper", to becoming resistant. So, when people hear about their work about to change or what's going to happen to them, the brain starts calculating the cost of that change. So, things like, "Will I still be good at my job? Will I lose influence? Is there enough time for me to learn this?" All of those things start going through our brains. And those questions aren't always conscious. So, we're not always sitting there thinking, "Okay, I'm asking this question". They're just happening and that's shaping our response.
So, I won't get too neuroscience-y with you, David, but the different systems that are involved, it's a lot. So, we've got the habit system, which pulls people back towards familiarity; we've got the prefrontal cortex, which has to work harder to learn and to process what's new; the threat system becomes more active when there's uncertainty or pressure. And so, from the outside, it probably looks like someone's saying, "I don't want the future". But internally, the brain is really saying, "I don't know yet if the future is a safe place for me to be". And for leaders, I think that distinction really matters. A logical explanation is necessary, but it's not enough. People need clarity and practice and support, all of those things in order to move to a new way of working. So, our brains don't start from a business case. Our brains start from a place of what does this mean for me and how is this going to impact me in a major way, because it's our job.
[0:07:53] David Green: How does having your background and your knowledge on neuroscience help you? And how can someone actually do transformation without that level of understanding? I mean, I would imagine that it has a dramatic impact on the likely success of a transformation if you don't have that knowledge or have access to that knowledge, if it's not the person leading transformation.
[0:08:13] Travis Hahler: Yeah, so for me, what it's changed in me and the way that I've led transformations or helped leaders lead transformations, is really I go to the people. I want to look at the person and say, "What's causing this friction? What's causing us to not get where we need to go?" and start to ask those questions. I think a lot of leaders naturally go to a place of us-versus-them mentality, where it's, "Hey, they're not bought in, they're against me. I need to push harder, or I need to become more authoritarian". And that's a very natural response in us, it's a very defined response of response, honestly. And so, it's helped me remove that defensiveness in the transformation process. And to your second part, how do leaders who maybe have never heard of neuroscience, have never even looked at something neuroscience-related, drive transformation without that? And you're right, it does have a major impact. And I think that's where you see the stats that say 70% of transformations fail to reach their objective. That's that 30%. Those leaders that do have that kind of mentality, whether they know it or not, some people have learned it over time, and that has helped them get into that 30%.
But for the leaders that are in the 70%, what I tell a lot of folks who are like, "If you were to give me one thing, what would it be?" and I lean a lot into empathy. A lot of what neuroscience tells us is naturally empathetic. And so, if a leader can kind of harness that empathy through the change and get out of the spreadsheets and out of the checklists, that helps immensely kind of get them and bridge that gap.
[0:09:56] David Green: What do leaders generally misunderstand when they treat resistance as opposition rather than information?
[0:10:05] Travis Hahler: Yeah, and I kind of touched on it just a minute ago, but they do. They treat resistance as opposition and they usually respond by pushing harder, they usually respond by mandating. And they do things like communicating louder, they escalate accountability, they label people as blockers. I'm sure you've heard it a million times, "Well, those are the resistors, those are the resistant people". And sometimes, that creates short-term compliance, and it can give the illusion of effectiveness, but it rarely creates real adoption. And so, the misunderstanding is that resistance is not always a vote against the change. Often, it's the brain signalling that something feels unsafe, unclear, or too costly. So, that's the way I think about it and that resistance is not the full diagnosis, it's the symptom that tells you to look deeper. And so, you can kind of double-click in that. But I think that's where a lot of leaders struggle, is that they get stuck in this world of, "Well, I'm going to become more rigorous or more demanding of this change happening", and then they see result from that because people do move, right? But the long-term effect of that is not adoption, it's just kind of synthetic compliance, if you will. So, you miss that insight if you're not going deeper as a leader, if you're just mandating it.
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Obviously, with your experience and your knowledge around neurology and what's driving behaviour, when you bring some of that insight to leaders, what's the general reaction you get? I mean, I guess some are like, "You're right, Travis, we need to do it slightly differently". And I guess you probably get pushback as well.
[0:12:58] Travis Hahler: Yes, I'd love to say I've never gotten any pushback, everyone's like, "That's brilliant. Let's go with it". But the reality is that you're right, there's two reactions. One is I get a lot of people who have that look of like, "Oh, wow, I never realised it was that". And in a lot of those cases, I see leaders who are like, "I really pushed hard on my people for something that really wasn't their fault". And so, you get kind of that reflective, pensive look of someone who's like, "Oh, wow, that actually explains a lot". And then, they're very interested, they get very curious. The other side, though does want to push against it and does want to say, "Well, that's not accurate or that's not the way I see it, or that's not the way that I've gone through transformations in the past". And a lot of times where I get the most pushback is, and this is my most unpopular phrase, and it's, "All change is loss". So, that's where I see a lot of leaders kind of stand up and be like, "No, I'm going to go to the man on this one". And they'll start to talk about, "Well, if all change is loss, what about great changes? You get promoted, that's not a loss". Well, it's not in the overall, overarching, but you do have to give something up to get there, right, whether that's comfort, whether it's relationship, whatever that might be. And so, it takes a little bit for some leaders to come around to some of these ideas being very natural ways that we just operate as people.
[0:14:27] David Green: Yeah, I mean it sounds like it's more having more of a 360-degree view, seeing it. I mean, it's just, as you said, empathy. A lot of it is just seeing how it might feel from the other side, from the people impacted by the change.
[0:14:42] Travis Hahler: Yeah, it really is. And it's getting that clearer view, like you said, of what's actually happening beyond just what I want to push out. But what's it going to do when it's out there? What's someone going to do when they have it in their hands? And that's a very different situation, and I think that's where a lot of transformations fall down, especially when we move beyond maybe, shall we say, systematic changes into more of the behaviour, mindset, belief systems. If you don't have that thought in what's going to happen when someone grabs that change and it becomes theirs, then you're not going to get very far, because those things require someone to actually take that and really own it.
[0:15:26] David Green: A lot of the people that listen to this podcast, Travis, are working in the people analytics space or behavioural science or linked to culture. So, I think they'll like this next part. So, in Rethink Resistance, you outline six neurological barriers to change. Could you briefly walk us through each of the six barriers and explain why each one matters for leaders?
[0:15:48] Travis Hahler: Absolutely. And the six barriers are really the six places where the brain commonly creates friction during change. And what I think is really beautiful about that is that I get into rooms with leaders who are very seasoned, and I assume a lot of folks that are listening are also in that space where they've gone through a lot of this before. And what's interesting about those six barriers and the solutions that come with each of them is the solutions are really well-known. I'm not introducing anything in terms of like, "Hey, this is brand new. We've never done X". It's things like communicating, it's things like learning, it's things that we know inherently. What the barriers bring to it, though, is that foundational why they work. And I think that's really important for leaders to connect those dots. And at least what I've seen when I work with leaders and we talk about those barriers to the solutions, when you can put the barrier to the solution, it makes a lot of sense as to why they work, and that changes the way that people approach it.
So, six barriers, the first barrier is routine. Our brains love routine because it saves energy. So, when we're asking people to change how they work, we are asking them to give up a pattern that may have been something that made them very successful. And so, routines are a major barrier to change. And for leaders, I think it's really important for them to recognise that everything we do in our jobs in our day is some form of routine that we're asking someone to change if we're asking them to go into a different system or a different way of working or a different belief.
The second barrier is around learning, and that's kind of coupled with the routine. So, learning is really expensive for our brains. It requires attention, effort, practice, time, and we can really easily overload people. So, they may not be resisting the change, they may just be cognitively maxed out and not have the ability to actually go in and learn everything that needs to be learned in the timeframe that's being given to them.
The third is exclusion. So, this is really important for leaders because most change is naturally exclusionary. And I think recognising that as a leader is critical because what happens is a small group made a decision. We're asking a larger group to come along with that decision. And if people feel like the change is being done to them, they often become very defensive and protective of their current way of working. And so, that exclusion is a major barrier for us as people. And I think as leaders, that's why the psychological safety piece comes in a lot into our conversations as leadership, because we have to battle some of that exclusion that people are feeling.
The fourth barrier is ambiguity. So, the brain doesn't like gaps in information. When leaders don't provide a story, people often create one. And the difference is that people, when they create their story, they're coming from a lens of threat. So, we're trying to determine whether or not the situation is threatening for us. And so, we're masking whatever our story is in the lens of what's the worst-case scenario, what's the potential threat there.
The fifth is anxiety. So, the brain feels threatened. It prioritises protection over adaptation or over adoption, and it makes creativity, learning, problem solving that much harder. What is really interesting for leaders, that I think is something that we don't always think about, is the fact that we only know so much about someone's anxiety load or where their ambiguity lives. And I say that because we live lives outside of work. And so, we don't always know how close someone is to the breaking point of that anxiety of stopping them from being able to really learn and be creative and be a problem-solver. Once you go over that line, you can't really do any of those things. So, it's something that I think leaders need to be really cognisant of as they're watching and observing their people.
Then, the sixth is loss. So, as I mentioned, every change is loss, every change requires people to give something up, even if it's positive. So, that could be competence, relationship, control, and just ways of getting through the day. And the important piece for leaders, in my opinion, is that each barrier requires a different response. And as I mentioned, they're all known. So, habit is repetition; learning is pacing; exclusion requires involvement or inclusion; ambiguity is clarity; anxiety requires safety; loss requires empathy. So, again, I didn't list anything that leaders don't naturally know through the course of just leading people, but I think that pairing it with the barrier has been really impactful for a lot of leaders. And that's where I've seen the most success with this idea of Rethinking Resistance.
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What does it look like when people are not resisting the future? So, they're not resisting, I don't know, AI, for example, but they're being pulled back by habits that made them successful in the past. That sounds like quite a tension for people when that happens.
[0:22:04] Travis Hahler: It is. And it's an important one because I think it reframes who we think of as resistant. And a lot of people assume that resistance comes from a person who's disengaged or difficult. But in my experience, some of the strongest resistance comes from really high performers, which I think a lot of leaders wouldn't naturally guess. And when I talk about that and what makes sense when you think about it, is that if I've become really successful through a certain process, a certain tool, a certain rhythm, a way of making decisions, a way of just working, that's a routine, but it's also part of my competence and it's also part of how I know I'm doing well or how I'm doing good in my job. It's something that set me up for success. So, when you ask me to change it, I may not be resisting the future. I'm probably protecting a formula that's helped me succeed in the past, and that's really threatening to us as people, obviously, and especially to high performers.
So, you especially see this in technology changes, like you were mentioning around AI, even though I would say I'd use technology change loosely on AI because it is such a different change than we've ever really seen before, at least in my experience. But in a technology change, people are asking for better tools. That tool arrives, and then they still keep using that spreadsheet on the side. And from a leader's perspective, that can look irrational. It can look like, "Why is someone doing that? We just gave them the system they've been asking for that does all the things they want. Why are they doing this thing on the side?" But that's, from the brain's perspective, what is the known path. It's what keeps us on that safety path. And the old path has worked before. So, it's what's created success before. And so, the leadership move is really not to shame people for reverting, it's to build the new routine deliberately.
So, make the first behaviour small, create clear cues, reinforce the behaviour, let people practise and remove the old path where you can. And then the new way of working doesn't just become real because we launched it. It becomes real when people start repeating it enough that it starts to feel like the norm. And so, giving them that time and that space to truly start to move away from the old and into the new with safety, I think is really critical. And when you think about it in the perspective of this is a formula for being successful that we're asking people to abandon, it becomes a lot easier for a leader to say, "Oh, I get it. I get why someone would be resistant to that. I get why they're not responding with applause and jumping up and down".
[0:24:50] David Green: How do you recognise that? How do you measure that? And how do you communicate that back to leaders? Because obviously, some people will just go with it, they'll go with the change, but others won't. So, what are the signs that you look for that it's happening and that you definitely need to do something about it?
[0:25:09] Travis Hahler: Yeah, I think there are lots of signs, especially with this one in particular, that are easier to see. Oftentimes, as a leader, what you'll see is that you'll go through this training motion in organisations where we'll say, "Okay, we're going to all focus on learning this new thing". And you'll see people start to use the new way of working really quickly, right, because they just learned it, it's fresh. But then you can also notice in a couple of days that that will start to taper, and you'll start to see people doing things that were the old way, whether that's referencing a spreadsheet or referencing a report that doesn't exist anymore that we're not really using anymore. That's the biggest tell.
The other one is that, and I think this is easier for leaders to see as well, you're assuming that by putting in this new thing, oftentimes you're getting more of an ROI from someone's time, right? So, David, I gave you a better system. You should use less time in that system, right? And you're not going to see that, if people are still reverting back and using that spreadsheet on the side. What you're actually going to see is they either have the same amount of time that they're using, or they actually are using more time because they're duplicating. And so, as a leader, when you start to really push on, "Well, I'm expecting, David, that you're able to spend three days a week with our customers in the field. And I'm seeing that you're really struggling to do that", it's a pretty clear indicator that something that time, and it's usually trying to balance both worlds.
[0:26:45] David Green: You mentioned learning in that example as well. And obviously, you highlighted learning as a barrier and also, particularly, the impact that learning can have on cognitive load, because obviously we all need to learn. But as you say, it takes a lot of energy away. So, in large transformations, how can leaders pace change so people can genuinely learn, rather than just survive the rollout?
[0:27:09] Travis Hahler: And this one is equally important because, as we're talking about, the only way to move from routines is to learn a new way of working and to then create that new way of working into the routine, right? So, it's not just about this one barrier, it's really kind of a combination of the two. And the biggest thing that I would say about learning in particular is that exposure is not the same as learning. And just because someone's attended the training or watched a video does not mean that they've learned; it means that they were exposed. And learning requires attention, repetition, practice, feedback, and it needs space for that brain to actually absorb what just happened, what they just learned. And I think that matters because in large organisations, people often ask others to do three things at once, right? They have to keep performing in their current role or their current system; they need to learn a new way of working; and they need to unlearn old habits that made them successful. That's a lot.
So, pacing is not only about slowing down because we want everyone to feel comfortable, pacing is really about asking, "Can people absorb this quickly enough for the change to actually work?" And so, practically, leaders can do a few things. Break the change into smaller behaviours. So, be clear about what those behaviours are and what they should stop doing, not just what they should start doing. So, break that into clear behaviours and then build in practice, so not just information. Give managers language to help people prioritise. Allow leaders to actually look at, "Okay, we're going to do this particular part of that new way of working", not just, "Okay, here's the manual or here's the playbook of what we're doing now". And one question I like for leaders is, "What are we asking people to learn this month? And what capacity have we created for that learning?" I think it's an important stop-and-think moment, because what I often see and I mentioned, the three areas where we're asking people to exist in, in the same moment, it's continue to keep the lights on, abandon your routines that allow you to keep the lights on, and then learn something brand new.
What I oftentimes see is people looking at it and leaders looking at it and saying, "Well, it's been four weeks. They should be up to speed by now". Well, in that four weeks, how much time and capacity did we create for learning to actually happen? And oftentimes, the answer is that we've created no capacity, right? We've not dedicated any time for someone to truly learn, play, and start to think about things differently. People just kind of survive that rollout. So, they're not sustaining that change. And it's really an unpopular thought, only because we want to go really fast, right? Especially, AI is a great example of that. We want to go fast because everyone's trying to adopt it. But the reality is that if we're not allowing people to actually have that time and capacity, learning's not really happening. We're just exposing them to tools that are able to be used, not really helping them learn how to use them.
[0:30:22] David Green: Yeah, and embedding it and making it a part, making it a habit effectively. So, two of the other barriers you talked about, let's take them together, so exclusion and ambiguity. I think these two will definitely resonate, I think, with a lot of the HR professionals that are listening. How do lack of voice, unclear timelines, or mixed messages, other than the obvious, increase resistance during transformation?
[0:30:52] Travis Hahler: Yeah, exclusion and ambiguity are really powerful because they really take away two things that the brain wants during change; its agency and predictability. And those things fly in the face of that, right? So, when people don't have a voice, the change often feels like it's being done to them, and that matters because the people closest to the work usually understand the friction better than anyone. And so, if they're not involved at all and leaders lose insight and employees lose ownership, that's not going to be a great way to move that forward. Now, that doesn't mean that every employee has to be involved in every decision. That's not realistic, right? I work in an organisation with 80,000 people. We would be talking to people for years before we'd ever implement anything if that was the case. But people need mechanisms to be heard.
So, they need to know that someone like them was consulted. That's one way. They need to know that feedback was taken seriously and leaders drawing from that feedback. And then, they need to know that there's a place for them to go to ask questions or to raise concerns. Those three things really drive inclusion without actually going out to 80,000, or however many people you have in your organisation, asking every single one, "What do you think about this change?" So, that's really about the exclusion part. And then, the second piece of your question was around ambiguity. And while similar, it creates a different issue. When people don't know what's happening, when it's happening, or what it means for them, the brain just fills in the blanks. And we use a lot of our previous experiences to help us do that. The spoiler alert here is that the brain rarely fills in the blanks with generous interpretation. So, we're not filling in blanks and saying, "You know, I believe David's a great person and I'm going to give him the benefit of the doubt". That's not the story we're crafting in our brains. The story we're crafting is, "It doesn't actually matter if David's a great person. Last time I received this type of email or went through this type of change, it meant X and that meant layoffs. And that's where I'm going to go, because I need to protect myself from that particular scenario". So, mixed messages make that even worse. So, if one leader is saying nothing's changing, another is saying everything's changing, employees hear both and they conclude that leadership just doesn't know what's going on or they're not being honest.
So, for HR leaders, I think this is a really huge opportunity. As you mentioned, this is the one that I think HR leaders are really going to be interested in, because HR could help leaders create clarity without pretending everything's certain. And, say what you know, say what you don't know yet, say what people will hear more of, and keep the communication rhythm even when there's no really perfect update. And I think that's where HR can provide that clarity and provide that coaching. And really, what they're great at is leaders are looking to them to say, "Well, what can I say, what can I say?" I think acknowledging all of that and saying, "Here's what we're saying now, here's what you can acknowledge that we're not sharing yet, and here's how you're going to be able to get them that information or how people are going to be able to ask those types of questions moving forward". Consistency itself creates that safety, and I think HR is highly involved in that process.
[0:34:18] David Green: And as you said, consistency obviously, and HR helping leadership have a consistent, clear message. But actually, sometimes, I guess this leads to the leaders being vulnerable, admitting vulnerability themselves, that they don't necessarily know everything. It's actually fine to say; it's better to say that than not to say that.
[0:34:38] Travis Hahler: Absolutely, it's better to say that. And the one question that I think I could probably point to in every single work workshop talk I've done is someone always asks, "How do I this when I know literally no more than my team does?" And the answer is, that's okay, and acknowledge that that's where you are, because anything beyond that is dishonest, right, and people see through that really quickly. And so, like you said, it is vulnerable, but it should also be a little freeing as a leader, because you don't have to put that pressure on yourself. No one said, "Here, you're a leader. Here's the manual of everything that's ever existed, and you'll know everything now". That's not a reality of what it means to become a leader. So, acknowledging that and being open about the fact that you're still on a journey too, and you're still learning, and you're still trying to figure this out, I think is a really great place. And what I usually tell leaders is, I flip it a little bit and I tell them, "What a beautiful opportunity you have to go through this with your team, instead of being the one that's kind of preaching at them. You get to sit with them in that discomfort and really understand what it feels like". And that builds strength, that builds team relationships and bonds. And it's a beautiful moment to really be able to build that strength within your team, that resilience and that trust.
So, don't think of it as you losing kind of your stature, but think of it more of the way that you're going to be able to build your team and strengthen your team.
[0:36:11] David Green: You talked about loss as well. That was the last barrier that you talked about. And as you said, every change involves loss, even when it's positive. And you gave a great example of someone being promoted. You still lose something, even if you gain more, perhaps. What are employees often losing during a transformation that leaders fail to see?
[0:36:35] Travis Hahler: A lot of times, leaders fail to see loss altogether, or they don't want to acknowledge it. And that comes back to kind of communicating and how we talk about change, which we just talked about with ambiguity. But there are really three types of loss that people experience in the workplace: a loss of competence, which is today they're an expert, tomorrow they won't have that expertise anymore; a loss of relationships, today they know who the people are that do the things, and tomorrow they might not have those same relationships or it might change; and then, a loss of control, whether that's how they spend their time, control over the process or the patterns of their work, day to day. Those three things are the most common losses that happen. And oftentimes, leaders don't see those three. Competence is probably the one they see the most, because they are usually acknowledging that there's learning that needs to happen. But I would say that's even very light.
So, for me, when I talk about loss and I talk to leaders, the way I reframe it often, and it gets a few laughs in the room, David, if I'm being really honest, but we understand loss really well as people. We've all experienced loss in our personal lives very, very vividly. We can all point to a moment that was like, "Wow, that was a loss and it was deep and it was really real". And then, we forget all of that the minute we walk in the door of our corporate company jobs, right, and we completely leave that outside in the parking lot. And then, we get into our organisations and we treat it as something that doesn't exist or it can be overcome with just, "Let me give you all the reasons why this is great". And what ends up happening is that you actually alienate people even more when you do that.
The visual that I oftentimes give, and this is what gets a few laughs, is let's take corporate life and put it into the personal world. You have a child, they've just lost the family pet, they're very sad. If we use corporate logic, we walk over to them and we get the PowerPoint deck open and we say, "Hey, here's 86 slides as to why this is the greatest thing that's ever happened to you. And let me tell you what they are in excruciating detail", right? Does that child feel any better after 86 slides of why this is great? No, not at all. And it's because we understand as people that empathy is so critical to helping someone through loss. And so, it's so important that we bring that back into our corporate worlds and we think about that. And there's all the right reasons for giving people, "Here are the benefits". But without acknowledging, "Here's the loss", you sound like a car salesman. You sound like you're trying to sell someone something, rather than trying to help them understand, to your earlier point, the 360 of what's actually happening here. And so, a lot of leaders don't go to that level, they don't go to the loss, they only go to the gain, and they like to sell. And I think we're naturally that way, especially in corporate America. I think we see the sales pitch or the brand or the spin as important.
[0:39:48] David Green: Bringing this together then, Travis, so when it comes to workforce transformation and AI adoption, how should HR leaders apply these neuroscience insights in practical terms?
[0:39:59] Travis Hahler: Yeah, it's a great question. And for me, it's really about shifting the thought process of how we need to treat AI adoption. And I kind of described it earlier, I think we're looking at it as if it's a technology change. The reality is that it's far different from technology. And, David, I would have been really shocked if we hadn't gotten into AI at some point in this conversation, because you can't walk down the street without AI somehow entering the conversation. But what's interesting to me is we are treating it as a technology deployment. But the reality is that it's actually a behavioural change in people, it's a belief change in people. So, as I mentioned, access isn't adoption, just like exposure isn't learning, right? So, giving people access to AI does not mean that they're going to adopt AI in the way that we want them to. So, giving people that tool doesn't mean that they trust it, it doesn't mean they understand it, it doesn't mean they know how to use it in the flow of real work. And what's really interesting about AI is that a lot of organisations are saying, "Here are the tools, go innovate, go find efficiencies". But from the employee perspective, the unspoken question is probably, "Am I being asked to improve my work, or am I being asked to quietly design myself out of work?" That's a very difficult emotional starting point, that I think we have a very big gap between what organisational leaders are thinking when they're bringing AI in, and what employees are actually thinking when they receive it.
So, HR can help create the conditions for that adoption. So, making that purpose clear, giving people real use cases, making experimentation safe, creating those learning spaces, helping managers to model behaviour, I think is extremely critical, and HR is really, really impactful in that space. And then, connecting AI to meaningful business problems, not just personal productivity. So, managers are especially important in this process and HR is especially important in this process, because that's the place where the transformation really becomes real. And if people are anxious or averting, managers might say, "We already covered that", or, "Why are we going back to that?" But they really need to diagnose that barrier that that person's up against. And with AI, there are several barriers that we're dealing with. So, it's extremely important for organisations like our HR organisation to help build, I guess, that manual or that book for our leaders and how to start to approach this change, because it's very different. And quite frankly, most leaders aren't even that great at the more run-of-the-mill, time-after-time changes. So, they're certainly not equipped for this type of change, which is very, very different from anything we've ever done.
[0:42:59] David Green: And stay with HR for a minute, Travis. If you could get or encourage every HR and business leader listening to this episode of the podcast to unlearn one thing about managing change, what would it be? And if you want three things, you can choose three things. But what one, two, or three things?
[0:43:23] Travis Hahler: I love the options. I would want leaders to unlearn the idea that change sticks because the message was clear. Clear communication matters, but communication by itself doesn't create behavioural change. And I think that's one thing that I have noticed in transformations, is that sometimes leaders, and especially HR leaders, they focus very much on the language that we use, on the packaging of the change. And they don't necessarily focus on the person that's receiving it and what behaviour needs to change. We're very focused on, "Okay, let's not go too far this direction, let's not promise too much". We're being protective of the communication itself rather than actually focusing on the person who's receiving it. And most transformations don't fail because people never heard the message. They fail because the work system kept rewarding old behaviour. And so, the better question is not just, "Have we told people what's changing?" it's, "Have we made the new behaviour easier to repeat than the old one?" And I think that's where HR could really unlearn a current behaviour and kind of embrace a very new thinking around that and be very impactful. And I think that is only more important now with the introduction of AI in all these organisations.
[0:44:48] David Green: Yeah. And I think on the AI point, so listening to what you just said then and your previous answer, Travis, is it reminds me of something. We had Sandra Durth, Senior Partner at McKinsey, on the podcast a few months ago. And I've had a couple of CHROs say something very similar since. It's like, we shouldn't think of AI as a technology transformation, you've said exactly the same thing, it's a people transformation. And everything that you've said then holds true, doesn't it? It's about changing behaviours, it's about helping people see that this is not just a benefit for the organisation, but a benefit for them. It's about providing that opportunity for people to learn, to unlearn, to experiment in a safe space. It's about communicating it consistently and effectively. And it's realising that this isn't a short term fix. This is something that's going to take time, isn't it?
[0:45:45] Travis Hahler: Yeah, absolutely. And I think that's where HR is extremely powerful in this space, because change isn't embedded by programme, it's embedded by system and environment. And HR primarily controls that environment. They help design the habits, they help design the rewards and recognition, they help design how managers learn and how people in the organisation learn. They create the reinforcement mechanisms. That is really a powerful environmental control that they have. And so, in things like AI transformations, they can help create that environment that allows that new behaviour to actually stick and to be adopted. And so, I think HR plays such a critical role. And that's why, when you look at my list of people that I partner with very often -- we call it employee success -- our employee success team is always one of the top on that list because they do control that environment. And without that buy-in, you're not going to move very far.
[0:46:52] David Green: And a last question, Travis. This is the one that we're asking everyone in this series of the podcast, and I think you've covered a little bit of it there as well. So, obviously, we have predominantly HR professionals listening to this podcast, hence this question. How can HR own workforce transformation in the AI era, so not just transforming HR, but the actual workforce transformation for the enterprise?
[0:47:19] Travis Hahler: Yeah, it's a big question. I think can own workforce transformation in the AI era by becoming the function that understands how people adopt and adapt. And it sounds simple, but it's really a big shift. So, AI transformation cannot sit only in technology, it cannot sit only in strategy. AI changes work, it changes roles, skills, identity, all of that, including things that we typically don't give ownership to a particular function, like trust and relationships, things like that. It changes all of that within an organisation. And a lot of that is deeply in HR's domain. But to own it really credibly, HR has to connect what I think are four things: business strategy; work redesign; skills; and human adoption. And so, when you think about the business question, "What value are we trying to create?" the work question is, "How is the work changing?" The skills question is, "What capabilities do people need?" And then, the human question is, "What will it take for people to safely and repeatedly behave differently?" And that last question is where I think HR has an enormous opportunity. So, HR shouldn't just be the function that supports that rollout. HR should really help design the conditions that make that rollout adoptable and adaptable. The companies that are going to win in the AI era, they're not going to win simply because they have the best technology. They're going to be the ones whose people can actually adapt fast enough and safely enough to be able to use that technology really well.
[0:48:55] David Green: Travis, really enjoyed our conversation. I know you share a lot online as well. So, how can listeners follow your work, learn more about the book, Rethink Resistance, but also the Neurological Nomad as well, and stay up-to-date with everything else that you're doing?
[0:49:12] Travis Hahler: Absolutely. So, visit me on my website, just travishahler.com. Connect with me on LinkedIn. I love to share things there and I do read all my own messages. So, I do actually interact with anyone that's connecting with me on LinkedIn. And then, Rethink Resistance, it's available now on Amazon, Barnes & Noble, anywhere that you buy books. So, yeah, please feel free to reach out, connect. I'd love to hear how this resonates with you or how the book has resonated with you as well, and whether or not it's changed the way you think about your own leadership.
[0:49:45] David Green: And I certainly recommend it as a read to listeners of the Digital HR Leaders podcast. So, Travis, thank you for sharing more about the book and your work and everything with listeners. Thank you very much.
[0:49:56] Travis Hahler: Thank you, David.
[0:49:58] David Green: A huge thank you to Travis for joining me today. What a fascinating conversation. I think a lot of people listening are going to walk away thinking differently about resistance the next time they see it show up in their own teams, or maybe even themselves. I'm curious, for those of you listening, which part of this conversation landed most for you? Head over to LinkedIn, find my post about this episode, and let me know in the comments. I read every single one, and honestly, the conversations that happen there often build on the one we have on the show. If you think a colleague or friend would get something out of this episode, please do share it with them. It really helps us bring more of these conversations to HR professionals and leaders around the world. And one last thing before we go. For those who would like to keep up with what we're working on at Insight222, follow us on LinkedIn, or head to insight222.com. You can also sign up for our bi-weekly newsletter at myHRfuture.com to get the latest thinking on HR, people analytics, and everything shaping our field.
Right, that's us for the day. Thanks for listening and we'll be back next week with another episode of the Digital HR Leaders podcast. Until then, take care and stay well.