Behavioural Change Toolkit · Frameworks

Bridges Transition Model

The change involves loss — of role, status, identity, competence or team

William Bridges’ distinction is the one insight most change plans are missing:

Change is situational. Transition is psychological. Change happens on a date. Transition takes as long as it takes.

The new system goes live on the 14th. The people using it may still be in transition in March. Programme plans track the change; nobody tracks the transition, and then everyone is surprised when go-live is a mess.

The three phases

1. Endings — letting go

What people lose: a familiar tool, a routine that made them look competent, a team, a sense of expertise, status, a relationship with a system they’d mastered.

Signs: nostalgia, “we tried this in 2019”, anger, bargaining, quiet disengagement, sudden interest in other roles.

What helps:

• Name the loss out loud. The most under-used move in corporate change. “You’ve been the person everyone came to for the old system. That expertise doesn’t transfer, and that’s a real loss.” This costs nothing and buys enormous goodwill.
• Mark the ending. A genuine last-day-of-the-old-way moment.
• Be clear what is not changing. People overestimate the scope of change; the reassurance is free.
• Don’t defend the past. “The old process was terrible” insults everyone who ran it well for a decade.

2. The Neutral Zone — the messy middle

The old way is gone, the new way isn’t yet fluent. This is where productivity dips and where most programmes declare victory and leave.

Signs: anxiety, drop in output, workarounds, spike in errors, conflict, people reverting under pressure.

What helps:

• Tell people it’s coming. “Weeks 2–6 will be slower and more frustrating than now. That’s normal, not failure.” Predicted pain is tolerated far better than surprise pain.
• Short-term wins and temporary structures — daily stand-ups, floorwalkers, a visible help channel.
• Protect people from a second change landing simultaneously.
• Treat this as the creative window: the neutral zone is the only time people are genuinely open to new ways of working. It’s an opportunity, not just a cost.

3. New Beginnings — the new normal

Not the go-live date. This is when people identify with the new way.

Signs: the new language used without prompting; people teaching each other; the old way referred to in the past tense.

What helps: the 4 Ps — Purpose (why), Picture (what it looks and feels like), Plan (step by step), Part to play (what I do). Reinforce early wins hard. Celebrate the first person who does it well without being asked.

The productivity dip — draw this for your sponsor

Performance
   │  ────╮
   │       ╲                          ╭──────  ← new, higher normal
   │        ╲                       ╱
   │         ╲                    ╱
   │          ╲__________________╱
   │              ↑ the dip ↑
   └────────────────────────────────────────► Time
      Ending    Neutral Zone     New Beginning
              (where programmes
               get cancelled)

Use this in the sponsor conversation before go-live, not after. If a leader has not agreed in advance that a dip is expected and normal, they will interpret it as failure and start intervening in ways that make it worse — usually by adding pressure, which extends the neutral zone.

Ask them directly: “Performance will dip for roughly six weeks. Can you hold your nerve, and can you hold the line with your peers when they panic?” Get the answer in the room.

Where this matters most in your three changes

Links

→ Resistance Decoder — most “resistance” is unprocessed ending → Sponsor Briefing Pack — the dip conversation → Executive Failure Modes — Declaring Victory Early

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