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    • Key Barriers to Effective Change Management to Put on Your Radar for 2026

    Solve your change management issues with my in-house master class with Capability for change

    During my time coaching and training delegates on my change management courses we often come face to face with the same barriers to effective change management. During #Malaga25 I also spoke to the top change professionals and I’ve collated these into a list below along with my solutions. How many of these issues are on your priority list for 2025 and into 2026?

    Many of these issues form the basis of my in-house master classes where I go into detail about the best way to solve them. My change management master classes are especially created for senior leaders dealing with multiple, simultaneous change. If you booked your managers/sponsors to have a master class session with me, which issues would you want me to address?

    Key Barriers to Effective Change Management

    When delivering my online courses, I am always taking time to listen to my delegates to get the best understanding of issues and barriers to success. this then feeds into other resources I can provide to clients where I provide in-house change management coaching and also as master classes on the ChangeabilityPro® platform.

    Here are my top key barriers to successful change management that you should be keeping on your radar into 2026.

    1. Building the Volunteer Army: Democratising Change Capability for Non-Change Leaders

      The most frequently discussed theme from #Malaga25 centres on developing change capability across multiple roles – not just dedicated change managers. Organisations need “multi-trade” professionals who blend change management with project management, business relationship management, and enterprise architecture. This demands a fundamental shift: teaching people how to learn and adapt continuously, building change-ready capacity from the ground up. The challenge is creating hybrid roles and cross-functional capability without diluting expertise, whilst making change management coaching accessible to line managers, team leaders, and individual contributors who manage change daily without the title.

      2. Portfolio Paralysis: Managing Change Volume and Impact

      The metaphor of expanding IT demand pipelines whilst adoption remains “a garden hose that’s going to explode” captures the portfolio management crisis. Organisations need visibility into the cumulative impact of multiple changes, understanding change as a portfolio rather than discrete projects. The 80/20 principle emerges: focussing energy on the 20% of activities that create 80% of impact. Change capability coaching must address portfolio-level thinking, helping organisations prioritise ruthlessly and recognise that more change initiatives don’t equal more progress without corresponding adoption capacity.

      3. The Budget Battle: Justifying Change Investment Under Cost Constraints

      Economic pressures create a recurring challenge: clients and organisations viewing change management as discretionary spending. The outsourcing world particularly struggles with suppliers saying “we would have done more change management, but the client doesn’t want to pay for it.” Concerns about cybersecurity and other priorities potentially reducing change budgets further intensify this challenge. Change management coaching must equip practitioners with compelling investment cases, demonstrating that change capability prevents costly failures rather than adding expense, positioning it as risk management rather than optional overhead.

      4. Human Impact: Personal Wellbeing and Anxiety Management

      Recognition that change affects “everybody” brings wellbeing and anxiety management into focus. This reflects growing awareness that change capability isn’t just organisational – it’s deeply personal. Making change “less painful,” helping people “welcome it as opposed to oppose it,” and supporting those experiencing change-induced anxiety represents an evolving dimension of change management. Coaching for change management must address psychological safety, resilience, and emotional intelligence, acknowledging that sustainable change requires caring for the humans experiencing it, not just managing the process.

      5. From Episodic Projects to Continuous Transformation

      The shift from change as “episodic project drop-in activity” to “pervasive continuous activity” represents a fundamental reconceptualisation. Organisations must become “transforming organisations” in perpetual evolution rather than executing discrete changes. This requires change to become “an enabling capability that underpins all activities” rather than something you “get around to if we have time.” Change capability coaching must prepare practitioners and organisations for this paradigm shift, developing muscles for continuous adaptation rather than project-based intervention.

      6. Creating Conditions for Experimentation and Learning

      Practitioners recognise that “we don’t know what 2030 looks like” and must create space for experimentation – which “isn’t an easy thing to execute” in large organisations. Building capability to learn, experiment, and adapt emerges as more valuable than prescriptive methodologies. This connects to teaching people “how to learn” from the beginning, developing intrinsic change capacity. Change management coaching must foster experimental mindsets, helping organisations become comfortable with uncertainty and view change as opportunity for discovery rather than threat to stability.

      7. Ecosystem Integration: Building Partnerships Across Functions

      The recognition that change capability requires ecosystem thinking – connecting C-suite strategy with ground-level implementation, integrating with PPM, working across organisational boundaries – represents mature systems thinking. Examples of successful co-development partnerships demonstrate the power of collaborative approaches. This includes understanding that “the richness really comes in when we get onto the ground” and recognising different worldviews across organisational levels. Change capability development must span the entire ecosystem, creating shared language and mutual accountability across functions, levels, and partnerships.

      Break Through Barriers with Change Management Master Classes

      If you’re reading the barriers above and know that these are issues you need support within your organisation, then contact me to book an in-house master class in change management.

      With in-house change management coaching and training, we can focus soley on your organisation and help you get your team informed and onboard with change.

      You can also sign up to ChangeabilityPro®, the online change management coaching and training platform designed for organisations and individuals to learn and thrive through change.