87% of organisations are underprepared for change, global research finds

New research from Insights suggests organisations may be mistaking experience of change for readiness, with the least-prepared businesses more than twice as likely to report falling productivity.

Nearly nine in ten organisations were not highly prepared for their most recent significant organisational change, according to global research published today by people development company Insights.

The Global Change Readiness Report, based on research among 880 senior HR and People professionals across 11 markets, found that just 13% of organisations prepared across four or more of the six areas examined. Almost half, 46%, completed only one or two forms of preparation.

That lack of preparation appears to have consequences for performance.

Productivity declined in 22% of the least-prepared organisations, compared with 10% of the most-prepared group. Across all organisations surveyed, 17% reported a fall in productivity during change.

Recovery was not always quick either. Among organisations where productivity fell, 41% took more than three months to return to their previous productivity levels, while a further 2% had still not recovered at the time of the survey.

Organisations may be underestimating how disruptive change will be

One of the more interesting findings is the gap between what leaders expected change to do to the organisation and what actually happened.

Before their most recent change programme, 39% anticipated moderate or major disruption to organisational performance. Once the programme was underway, 51% experienced disruption at that level.

This is despite organisations being anything but inexperienced when it comes to transformation. Half of those surveyed go through significant organisational change every two to three years, while another 30% experience it every four to five years. The average gap between major changes was just 3.2 years.

The report argues that repeated exposure can create a false sense of confidence: organisations become familiar with project plans, governance, communications and implementation without necessarily becoming better prepared for the human consequences of change.

The missing piece may be behavioural readiness

Insights describes the gap as one of behavioural readiness: whether leaders and teams can remain clear, consistent and constructive when change puts them under pressure.

The research found that employee engagement and communication planning were the most common areas of preparation, while behavioural leadership preparation ranked last. Only 43% of organisations included it.

That is notable because leaders themselves frequently change their behaviour when change hits.

Some 81% of HR leaders said they had observed senior leaders behaving differently during significant organisational change. Most of those shifts were positive, with 63% seeing leaders behave more positively, but 18% observed a negative change.

Perhaps more concerning is the awareness gap. Among leaders whose behaviour became more negative, only 57% were seen as aware that their behaviour had changed. More than four in ten were perceived as largely or completely unaware of the shift.

Dr Tanya Boyd, Thought Leadership and Insights Lead at Insights, said organisations could have a change plan in place and still be unprepared for its impact on everyday performance.

She argued that change readiness should be treated as an operating capability, with clearer decision-making and more deliberate preparation for the pressure placed on teams.

Clear communication does not necessarily mean people know what to do

The findings also challenge the idea that good change communication is enough.

Some 87% of respondents said organisational priorities had been communicated clearly during change. Yet 46% still experienced confusion about who had decision-making authority, either frequently or occasionally. Only 8% said they never experienced that confusion.

That distinction matters. Employees may understand the strategy, what is changing and why, but still be unclear about who can make a decision, how competing priorities should be resolved or where issues should be escalated.

The report recommends that organisations treat behavioural readiness as part of the core change architecture rather than a softer addition to the programme. That includes agreeing the behaviours expected from leaders, clarifying decision rights, identifying likely points of friction and tracking measures such as trust, alignment, fatigue and leadership confidence alongside traditional project milestones.

The research was conducted by Opinium in May 2026 among senior HR and people leaders in the UK, US, Canada, Australia, Singapore, Germany, France, Poland, Denmark, the Netherlands and Spain. All respondents worked for organisations with at least 250 employees and predominantly office-based workforces.

The Global Change Readiness Report is available from Insights: info.insights.com/change-readiness