Adoption Is Not the Outcome of Change Management
“Change can be planned. Adoption must be earned.”
We’ve all seen it happen. A well-structured change management plan is executed: communications go out, training is delivered, leaders send their messages, and the go-live date arrives with everything seemingly on track. The system launches, the project team celebrates, and on paper, the change is complete.
But a few weeks later, usage drops. Resistance shows up in the form of silence or workarounds. Leaders default back to familiar routines. The enthusiasm fades. The business moves on, but the change hasn’t actually taken hold.
The truth is, the change did land - it just didn’t stick.
This is where many transformation efforts fall apart. There’s a deeply rooted assumption that if change management is “done,” adoption will follow. But that’s rarely the case. Change and adoption are related, but not the same. One is a process. The other is a choice.
Change management helps prepare an organization to transition. It focuses on planning, communication, training, and readiness. These are critical components - but they are not sufficient. Adoption lives in a different space. It is about new behaviors becoming the norm. It is about people deciding, day after day, to do something differently. Adoption isn’t delivered. It is earned.
Treating adoption as a final phase in the project plan is one of the most common mistakes organizations make. Adoption is not a checkbox. It’s not a comms campaign or a training session. It is a relationship. It requires reinforcement, leadership modeling, cultural alignment, and a shift in how people define their roles and responsibilities. Until people see the change as their new normal - as part of how they work and think - you haven’t reached adoption. You’ve only reached implementation.
This article series is built on that distinction. It exists because many organizations continue to believe that more change management will lead to better adoption. In reality, we don’t get adoption by doing more of the same. We get it by changing the way we lead, support, and walk alongside people during uncertainty.
We get it by building trust, by co-creating solutions instead of broadcasting them, by having hard conversations about fear, identity, and control. We get it by challenging the behaviors of leaders who say the right things but do the opposite. We get it by recognizing that the existence of a tool doesn’t mean it’s being used meaningfully - and that technical readiness means nothing if emotional readiness is ignored.
Over the next nine articles, I’ll explore what it really takes to support adoption. Topics will include the role of courage in driving commitment, why tools are never the answer by themselves, how hallway conversations shape adoption more than town halls, and what to do when the greatest obstacle is the sponsor who’s supposed to be leading the way.
Let’s Talk
This is not a series about frameworks. It’s a conversation about what happens when the frameworks aren’t enough.
And I’d like to hear from you. Have you ever seen a project that had all the change management activities in place - but failed to achieve adoption? What do you believe was missing?
Let’s talk.