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This week I’m going to head us into unexplored waters. (Well, unexplored by me at least, until just this past year). We’re going to explore a little-known phenomenon called ‘reactance.’ An article in Wikipedia describes reactance as a response that occurs when a person feels that someone is attempting to limit their freedom of choice by telling them to do something, or just suggesting something to them. An extreme example: someone turns down a promotion they have lobbied for.

Reactance can look like resistance to change, resistance to being told or being sold, lack of cooperation – or defensiveness and defiance.

Without realizing it I dealt with reactance throughout my 45-year career as a business coach and leadership trainer. I came at it from the angle of “correcting without criticizing” and “consulting instead of dictating.” (See posts 6 and 7 at www.neilgodin.com for more on criticism) – and I offered the thought that all criticism is received as an attack by the other person – unless we have a specific coaching agreement – because we can’t criticize unless we first sit in judgment and assume that they did something wrong. This reinforces the power imbalance between the supervisor and the supervised, and provokes defensiveness and our newly discovered nemesis, reactance.

Our approach to correcting mistakes can help with reactance

Our respectful approach to correcting team members without demoralizing them has stood the test of time, and can help us deal with reactance as well. The idea is to focus on pre-empting knee-jerk, defensive, fight/flight reactions by treating mistakes as ‘learnable’ moments instead of ‘teachable’ moments – as opportunities for both the leader and the team member to learn and grow – not opportunities to fault-find, blame and criticize. I also learned that collaborative problem-solving (vs. criticism) enabled us to correct errors more effectively – and enabled us to actually strengthen relationships, not weaken them, in the process. These insights and practices can help us minimize the effects of reactance as well.

Reactance isn’t just about being told what to do, it’s also about telling ourselves what to do

In researching the literature on reactance, I came across a little trick that many psychologists play to overcome their self-reactance. Instead of thinking “I have to do” something, they reframe by saying “I get to do” whatever it is. This bit of verbal gymnastics keeps us in charge of our choices.

Resistance to change is nothing new (and we know what to do)

The ways in which we deal with change can also help us get a grip on reactance. We need to plan ahead – and communicate as much as possible in advance of change initiatives. In this way we can pre-empt the surprise factor that is a common trigger for reactance. Whenever possible, we also need to give affected team members freedom of choice as to how they implement their part of a change initiative.  In planning for change we need to anticipate and work to pre-empt the reticence, reluctance  and resistance we can expect to encounter.

Dealing with reactance is critical to employee engagement

I have forever asked my leadership training clients to bear in mind that no employee shows up ‘disengaged’ on their first day – obviously. It’s a process.  For example, do you have a team member who is particularly resistant to change (a hallmark symptom of reactance)? Ask yourself, “Did it start the first time they were asked for input only to hear nothing back? Was it the first time their team leader made an unfair decision, granting one person an early exit on one day, but denying  another member the same courtesy a week later? Was it being criticized unfairly…or being given unwanted advice? Was it an old-fashioned boss who criticized, scolded, lectured, harangued and dictated instead of consulting?” At some point fully one in every two employees respond to these demotivators by tuning out, turning off and coming to loathe going ‘back to work’ on Mondays.

A poignant example from home life…

Here’s a little anecdote that illustrates what reactance can look like in our home life. When I stumbled across the word reactance, one of the first people I shared it with was an old friend who shares my interest in human behavior. She nodded vigorously and said, “I know exactly what they mean. When my husband suggests something, no matter what it is, and no matter how good it could be for me, I actually say to him, ‘Oh no, why did you have to say that – now I can’t do it, even if I like the idea. I always thought it was just my stubborn streak.”

Yes, it was her stubborn streak, of course, but isn’t that just another term for reactance – her attempt to ‘protect herself’ from doing something which she likely would have done if she had discovered it for herself? Hmm. Could we set that up? For example, could he have left a magazine open with a sticky note reminding him to research something that he actually believes would be helpful to her? Perhaps a little well-intentioned deception like this could have helped him break through.

Your call to action

This week I encourage you to self-monitor – to be a participant/observer in your own life – looking for opportunities to pre-empt reactance when working with your team members and colleagues. Here are some of the behaviors that prompt reactance – and some of the things we can do to minimize its negative effects: