Before Calling It Resistance, Check Capability and Opportunity

Resistance is a convenient explanation for a change that has not taken hold. It locates the difficulty inside the employee and leaves the design of the work largely unexamined. Before accepting that explanation, leaders should check whether people can perform the requested behaviour and whether their environment allows it.

The COM-B model developed by Michie and colleagues describes behaviour through interacting capability, opportunity and motivation. Developed as part of a behaviour-change framework, it is not a guarantee that a management intervention will work. It does provide a useful set of questions to apply before calling a workplace problem resistance.

The operational examples below are Q Branch's application of those questions. They illustrate a way to investigate a problem, rather than findings from the original research about hospitality or retail.

Can the person perform the behaviour?

Capability requires more than attendance at a briefing. A colleague may understand the new procedure in principle but struggle to use it when the queue grows or information is incomplete. Ask them to demonstrate the work under realistic conditions, with appropriate support and without turning the exercise into a public test of competence.

For example, an attraction attendant asked to resolve a ticket exception may need to recognise the ticket type, understand the permitted options and operate the relevant system. A slide explaining the new customer promise does not establish those skills.

Where a gap exists, provide focused practice and feedback. Check again in the setting where the behaviour is needed. The business needs evidence of usable capability, rather than a record that the instruction was delivered.

Does the working environment permit it?

Opportunity includes practical conditions and social expectations. The employee may know what to do but lack access, time, equipment or permission. They may also have learned that their manager dislikes the very discretion the new process requires.

Follow the task through an actual shift. Does the system work at the point of service? Can the colleague find the information without leaving the customer? Does the rota provide enough coverage to complete the required conversation? Which approval, if any, is genuinely necessary?

Correcting these constraints may require decisions outside the training department. Operations, finance and senior management can all determine whether a new behaviour is feasible. Asking employees to be more positive does not resolve a missing permission or an unavailable tool.

What makes the old behaviour attractive?

Motivation should be examined without assuming laziness or bad faith. The previous approach may be faster, more familiar or less likely to attract criticism. The new one may have been introduced with an unclear explanation of the benefit or an incentive that points in the opposite direction.

Ask employees what they expect will happen if they follow the new method. Their answer may reveal a rational response to local management practice. It may also expose a misunderstanding that can be addressed directly. Avoid assuming that every objection is valid, but understand it before selecting an intervention.

Change one manageable part of the process and observe the result. If the behaviour improves after access is fixed, that is useful local evidence about the constraint. It does not prove that motivation never mattered or that the same solution fits another site.

The wider issue is whether learning survives the return to work. A careful diagnosis helps the organisation spend on the right response. Resistance should be a conclusion supported by evidence, rather than the first label applied to an inconvenient result.