The 8-Week Sequence

A default running order. Compress or stretch it, but don’t reorder it — the common failure is starting at Week 5.

Weeks 1–2 · Diagnose

Goal: know what behaviour needs to change, for whom, and what the real barrier is.

Draft Behavioural Diagnosis Canvas from what you already know (1 hr, alone)
6–10 conversations using Barrier Analysis — COM-B Interview Guide — frontline, not managers
Stakeholder Map and Power Grid
Change Readiness Assessment — score it honestly
Run Workshop — Behavioural Diagnosis (90 min) with the core group

Exit test: you can name 3–5 specific behaviours and, for each, say whether the barrier is Capability, Opportunity or Motivation — with evidence, not opinion.

Week 3 · Target and align

Goal: agree the vital few, and get the sponsor genuinely on the hook.

Target Behaviour Definition — cut to a maximum of five
Change on a Page v1
Sponsor Briefing Pack — 45 minutes with the sponsor, one-to-one
Leader Behaviour Contract drafted with the leadership team
Run Workshop — Leadership Alignment (half day) if the top team is not aligned

Exit test: the sponsor can state the target behaviours from memory and has agreed to three specific things they will do.

⚠️ Do not proceed without this. Everything after Week 3 is wasted if the top of the house is not aligned.

Weeks 4–5 · Design

Goal: interventions matched to actual barriers.

Intervention Design Worksheet per target behaviour
Raid the Nudge Library
Score every option against APEASE — see COM-B and the Behaviour Change Wheel
Comms and Narrative Plan — narrative after design, not before
Measurement Plan — Leading and Lagging — baselines captured now
Champion Network Playbook — recruit
Run Workshop — Design the Nudges (2 hr)

Exit test: every intervention traces to a named barrier on a named behaviour. Anything that doesn’t, gets cut.

Week 6 · Pilot

Goal: find out you’re wrong while it’s cheap.

Pilot Design and Experiment Card — one team, two weeks
Brief managers with Manager Conversation Guide
Collect leading indicators daily, not weekly

Exit test: you have changed at least one thing based on what the pilot told you. If nothing changed, you weren’t listening.

Weeks 7–8 · Deliver

Scale to the next wave, sequenced by Diffusion of Innovations (early adopters first — never start with the sceptics)
Managers cascade using Manager Conversation Guide
Arm everyone with Objection Handling Bank
Sponsor does something visible in week 7 — not a video

From Week 9 · Sustain

This is where most programmes stop and most change dies.

Drift Check — 30 60 90 — put the three dates in the diary today
Embedding and Reinforcement — get the behaviour into onboarding, objectives, and system defaults
Change Retrospective at day 90
Formally hand ownership to the line. Name the person.

The three dates to book right now

Date	What	Why
Week 3	Sponsor one-to-one	The highest-leverage hour in the whole programme
Week 6	Pilot review	Your last cheap chance to be wrong
Day 90	Drift check	The behaviour has either stuck or quietly died by now

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Last updated: 11 August 2026