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Change fatigue: why one reorganization after another makes it worse
A new tool. A reorganization. A team day. A new consultant. Each one promised a fresh start, and each one worked for a while. Then the old problem came back, and people became tired and cynical. That is change fatigue. In this article we look at why it happens, and why the answer is not another change.
By Dirk Jan Versluis, registered psychologist (NIP). Updated 15 November 2026.
Contents
What is change fatigue?
Change fatigue is the exhaustion and cynicism people feel after too many changes in too short a time. They have seen so many initiatives come and go that they no longer believe in the next one. They comply on the outside and wait on the inside.
Most articles about change fatigue focus on pacing: fewer changes, better communication, more rest between initiatives. That helps. But it misses the most important question: why does a company keep needing new changes in the first place?
This article draws on Dirk Jan Versluis’s book Je bedrijf is ook een patiënt (Your company is a patient too, in Dutch, December 2026). Read the summary of the whole book in organizational trauma: why your company is a patient too.
The painkillers of business
When we feel pain, we do something with it. Many people fight their pain without ever listening to it. They take a painkiller. With acute pain that makes sense. But companies do the same with their pain, and their painkillers are clever little tricks.
- a new tool or system
- a reorganization: if people sit in different places, everything will change
- a team outing, a team-building day, an extra strategy session
- a new consultant who looks at the processes that keep running stiffly
- a new management model the CEO read about on holiday, to be implemented from Monday
None of these is wrong in itself. But when it really starts to hurt, people in companies usually do not feel the pain and look at what is behind it. They start managing. They step out of the field, because that is where the pain is, and look at it from above. From a control tower. From a high cloud.
A subscription to repeating the same moves
If there was loneliness, pain or powerlessness in that field, you can be sure it will not be looked at again. Then you have a subscription to repeating the same moves. Precisely because nobody steps in, nobody feels it and nobody faces it, the charge stays in the field.
That is the real source of change fatigue. People are not tired of change. They are tired of change that does not touch what is really going on. A painkiller works for about four hours in a person. In a company, for about four months.
How companies react to their symptoms
How do companies react to their symptoms? Usually quite primitively:
- They deny it. They would rather not know.
- They do a small intervention that lets them believe they did something about it. An ointment. A strategy day.
- They put it on one person, who supposedly is to blame. Sooner or later that person leaves, or goes home sick.
- They turn their attention to something else. A new project will give us fresh energy.
It is like what we do with a small child with a sore knee: a kiss on it, and it is gone. Love on a wound is a good start. But a kiss does not heal a broken bone. The bone still needs to be set.
Our reaction to a symptom is often a reflex, and it says everything. How you react to an unwanted symptom is probably exactly what you always do when you face a challenge in management or leadership.
Why strong entrepreneurs push through the pain
Strong entrepreneurs often push through pain instead of looking at it. They are transformers. Many of them know powerlessness, and that is exactly why they took matters into their own hands. They want to be free, and they get itchy from systems, hassle and thresholds.
Then they meet pain again in their own company, while they chose that freedom precisely so they would not have to meet it anymore. So they go into solution mode. They use their strength, go straight ahead and break through everything. And now they suddenly have to stand still, listen and feel. That is not their first nature. Read more about leadership and trauma.
What helps against change fatigue
Start with yourself. When you see a symptom in your company: what does it do to me? Can I look at it? Do I notice I want to get away from it after five seconds? Or can I stay with it for a minute, or even ten? Do I go into my head and analyze, or do I feel something: emotion, heaviness, weight in my body?
That is a sensory, experiential attitude, and you need it. Only after that do you ask what is wise. Then you may become solution-oriented. A helpful little sentence comes from the world of personal effectiveness: “Do I have to do this now?” Put the emphasis on a different word each time, and you ask a different question:
- Do I have to do this now?
- Do I have to do this now?
- Do I have to do this now?
- Do I have to do this now?
Some things cannot be solved right away. They first need time, space or feeling through. You never get there if you go straight into solution mode: pointing at someone to blame, launching an investigation, setting up a committee. Where it hurts, there is value. Start with the pain, and the next change may be the last one you need for a while.
At Triunify
Looking at what the changes are trying to fix
Before another reorganization, we help leadership teams look at what is really going on: where it hurts, what keeps returning, and what has never been said. With the ECA Leadership Framework we put the company on the table, so that the next change addresses the cause instead of the symptom.
Free and confidential, 45 minutes, online.
Frequently asked questions
What is change fatigue?
The exhaustion and cynicism people feel after too many changes in too short a time. They stop believing in new initiatives and comply on the outside while waiting on the inside.
What causes change fatigue?
Too many changes, but above all changes that do not touch the real problem. When reorganizations and new tools are used as painkillers, the same problem keeps returning, and people lose faith.
How do you reduce change fatigue?
Slow down, and look at the pain behind the problem before deciding what to change. Changes that address the cause last longer and ask less energy in the end.
Why do reorganizations so often fail?
Because they change the structure while the underlying tension stays in the organization. People sit in different places, but the same patterns move with them.
What can leaders do differently?
Stay with a symptom before solving it, notice their own reflex, and ask: do I have to do this now? Some things first need time and attention, not action.
Read also
Tired of changes that do not change anything?
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