Change fatigue in projects: Recognizing when the team is exhausted and taking action

Competition is the most important element in a free market economy. It describes the rivalry between market participants for the favour of buyers. To win them over, the price must be right and continuous progress must be made to ensure high-quality products. This competition ensures that only competitive companies survive. This means that companies must implement change. However, too much change too quickly can lead to so-called ‘change fatigue’, a state of exhaustion that jeopardises the motivation, creativity and performance of employees.

The term ‘change fatigue’ describes a state of mental and emotional exhaustion caused by constant organisational change. This can lead to demoralisation, increased stress levels and declining enthusiasm among employees. All of this can limit their ability to act, learn and perform, and cause them to withdraw from or resist their tasks. But change fatigue can have consequences not only for individuals, but also for the organisation. When emotional commitment wanes and motivation and job satisfaction decline, this can lead to undesirable outcomes in the organisation: increasing absenteeism or high turnover due to resignations. Failure to provide employees with the support and resources they need during change can weaken their coping mechanisms and encourage behaviours such as emotional detachment from work. 
However, professional stress can also lead to emotional exhaustion and loss of motivation, resulting in employees merely doing the bare minimum. Here, too, emotional commitment is reduced due to heavy workloads, little freedom to make decisions and a lack of support. This raises the question of whether there is actually a big difference between the terms “change fatigue” and “stress”, or whether the cause is simply different. 

If change fatigue is already noticeable, management should work closely with project managers. To do this, they need to be aware of the causes of change fatigue in their organisation: ongoing transformations without periods of rest, lack of success, overload due to parallel projects or initiatives, lack of control over changes or lack of understanding of the reason for the change? This list is not exhaustive, but it is important to identify the cause in order to be able to actively counteract it. Through continuous evaluation, involving all stakeholders, obstacles can be identified early on and strategies adapted before problems escalate.
Management should be aware that a supportive and employee-oriented approach to managing change processes at the individual and organisational level leads to positive results. Too many changes in too short a time can be overwhelming, whereas targeted breaks give employees the chance to focus on the essentials. In addition, sufficient resources must be made available so that changes can be understood, managed and mastered. By actively uncovering the causes of uncertainty or scepticism and remaining in dialogue, managers can reduce fears and gradually gain more acceptance. This also includes drawing up a realistic timetable that helps to reduce uncertainty and illustrates the role of all those involved in the process. Actively involving employees could help here. Enabling participation and taking feedback seriously creates identification. When employees feel that their perspective counts, they are more willing to engage constructively in change rather than blocking it. But small and large milestones also deserve recognition. Celebrating progress together boosts motivation, reduces exhaustion and shows that change is worthwhile. 
So when a psychologically safe and supportive environment is created, employees feel secure and supported. This keeps motivation to work on tasks high and encourages active support for change.

However, before countermeasures need to be taken to address change fatigue, organisations should actively ensure that it does not arise in the first place. As already outlined above, change fatigue can have a long-term negative impact on employees' emotional resilience. In this situation, employees tend to exhibit undesirable behaviours due to a lack of resources, which further limits their ability to cope with change. The ability to cope with change is largely determined by resilience. Resilience refers to a person's ability to adapt to difficult situations, successfully overcome them and recover from them appropriately. Resilient people can successfully adapt to constant changes in work requirements even in the presence of risk factors (i.e. factors that increase the risk of adaptability) and high vulnerability, such as physical health or previous life experiences. Resilience is therefore a highly individual construct, as employees have different risk factors and life experiences. Resilient people can successfully adapt to changing conditions even in the face of negative life events, risk factors and high vulnerability. People with low resilience may be less able to cope with risk factors. They need favourable conditions or must learn to increase their resilience. It is therefore important to understand resilience as a dynamic process that varies depending on the area of life and stage of life. 
It is therefore important that protective factors that can increase resilience are promoted within the organisation. An important aspect of this is a relationship based on trust. This should exist both among employees and betwe en employees and managers. Transparent communication is particularly important in promoting this. Why is something being changed? What are the benefits for the team and the individual?
Equally important are a broad spectrum of social and performance-related skills and abilities, as well as good social and socio-economic conditions. This means that employees' skills should be promoted so that they can reach their full potential. Flexible working models that do not neglect social life, as well as fair pay, can increase resilience and support employees in coping with the high demands associated with many changes by providing security in their private and professional lives.

Change fatigue is not a weakness, but a natural reaction to constant stress. Those who recognize it and take it seriously can take countermeasures and successfully shape change again. To do this, the organisation must keep a close eye on its employees and change processes. In agile project management in particular, it can be advantageous to have someone with a degree in psychology fill the role of Scrum Master. In their role as coach, moderator and facilitator, this person can provide the best possible support to developers, product owners and the organisation in order to avoid change fatigue and maximise the effectiveness of the team.