Almost a quarter of senior leaders expect employees to simply adapt when they resist organisational change, according to research from digital coaching platform CoachHub.
The Make Change Stick report is based on a survey of 800 senior transformation, business and people leaders across seven markets in Europe and North America. It was conducted independently by Coleman Parkes Research between May and June 2026, with analysis concluded in September.
Just 21% describe their most significant recent transformation as a clear success. While 79% say it created measurable business value, only 64% say that value was sustained after implementation.
Listening and support remain uneven
When employees resist change, 41% of leaders begin by seeking to understand their concerns. However, 24% take an approach amounting to “the decision has been made, employees need to adapt”, while 15% escalate resistance to senior leadership.
Organisations allocate 22.4% of transformation budgets to technology platforms and systems, compared with 9.2% to coaching for managers and leaders. Only 16% of programmes offer managers coaching, although 86% of recipients rate it useful.
“Transformation only happens when people are able to translate that change into new behaviours and new ways of working.
Matti Niebelschütz, CEO and Co-founder of CoachHub.
What stronger performers do differently
The research compared the top and bottom quartiles of performers. The strongest performers were 45 percentage points more likely to have managers adapt plans in response to team feedback, and 41 points more likely to listen to concerns before deciding how to respond.
Support also began earlier: 38% of the strongest performers supported managers before announcing the transformation, compared with 18% of the weakest performers.
CoachHub argues that resistance should be treated as information about uncertainty, confidence, competing priorities, expectations or established habits.
Sarah Henson, Senior Behavioural Scientist at CoachHub, said: “Resistance is a normal human response to uncertainty and disruption, not evidence that employees are inherently opposed to change. Leaders should reduce friction around new behaviours, create the right environmental and social conditions for change, reinforce progress and help new behaviours become embedded over time.”
The full findings are available in CoachHub’s Make Change Stick report.
