Even though organizational change is a constant reality in today’s fast-paced business landscape, change is still met with skepticism and doubt for many within organizations. In fact, this constant change is leading a contagious cynicism among leaders, employees and stakeholders of change initiatives.

Cynicism involves loss of confidence, commitment and trust and it can lead to disengagement, reduce of productivity, innovation and ultimately if can have a huge negative impact in the success of new initiatives.

From a neuroscience perspective cynicism is developed in the brain as a result of constant negative prediction error signals. A prediction error signal is the difference between the expected outcome and the outcome received or the mismatch between expectation and reality. This mismatch could either be positive or adverse and it could therefore result in a release of a positive or negative signal from the brain.

Prediction error signals are fundamental to learning. If the error signal is positive the organism will be approaching and feeling motivated to the change (reward signal), whereas if the error signal is adverse, it will be avoiding the change and feeling demotivated (threat signal).

Ultimately if we are constantly exposed to negative error signals, we become more and more cynics. Constant change challenge the ability to predict the future and therefore during times of change we tend to have more negative errors signals in the brain.

As a result, employees become cynical towards change initiatives, assuming the worst-case scenarios and doubting the intentions behind them.

Leaders in charge of change and change managers needs to understand the science behind cynicism to lead teams through change with the brain in mind and strategic thinking.

For example, when managing change with the brain in mind is important to manage expectations in stakeholders from the very beginning to make sure the error signal is positive and the outcome is better than expected, so the brain can release a chemistry called dopamine, which is in charge of making us feel motivated and excited.

Another practical example of managing change by applying neuroscience knowledge is about moving from big to small. The bigger the program, the bigger the team, the bigger the time scale to deliver, the bigger the prediction errors are at all levels and the hardest to respond and adapt to change is. We should aim keeping the size of the error small.

In summary changes at any level (behavioural, organisational, environmental, procedural, biological, etc) will always produce a prediction error signal. Change managers, project and program managers plays a key role in managing expectations and making sure the error signal is positive or as small as possible. All this is possible by changing how we manage projects and making sure the “brain becomes our main stakeholder”.

PEPE© model offers a strategic framework based on neuroscience to help leaders in charge of change and people facing changes to reduce cynicism and to increase engagement and resilience during times of constant change.

About the author:  Tibisay Vera is a neuroscientist, the author of PEPE© model and the Co-creator of Neuroscience for Change certification. https://pepeneuroscience.com/ . She is also the founder of Sparking Performance, a neuroscience-based consultancy for managing change and the Director in UK of the International Academy of Neuroscience and Education, ANE.

Tibisay Vera has a MSc in Clinical Neuroscience with more than 20 years change management experience.

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In fact, some scientists argue that moderate levels of brief stress are actually necessary for the well-functioning of the plastic and adaptive brain and to build resilience.

On the other hand, chronic or long-lasting exposure to stress, challenge the systems and processes that maintain the balance and might cause physiological and psychological damage.

In the 1990’s Neuroscientist Peter Sterling proposed a model called “allostasis”, which establish that when environments are relatively stable and predictable, thriving would be achieved by trying to restore the original values; however when environments are unpredictable, uncertain and facing continuous changes, efficient regulation requires anticipation and an optimal predictive fluctuation can only be obtained by previous exposure and learning mechanisms, for example exposure to brief moderated to high levels of stress.

One of the most interesting facts we have found in brain research is that human brain seems to be wired to function well under short cycles of high then low levels of cortisol, adrenaline, noradrenaline and other hormones or neurotransmitters as it helps us to adapt, build resilience and to thrive under uncertainty.

In current environments we need to artificially re-create the “high and lows” of our neurobiology for the brain to be able to predict and anticipate the “error”. We need to expose ourself to stress and allow time to re-set. 

It is in the “valleys” and in the “reset” that the brain find adaptation.

The good news is we can make very practical interventions to make our neurobiology to work for us and help us thrive under uncertainty. 

For example, we can create habits for going out of our comfort zone during a short period of time, or we can create daily habits that support the “lows” as for example spending 10 minutes daily consciously jumping into day dreaming.  

The 8 dimensions of PEPE© model are designed to provide in a structured way practical strategies to help thriving during uncertain times. 

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Changing the status quo requires that our brain creates new connections and signals – a very energy expensive activity for the brain-. As a result, our very “hungry” brain needs extra glucose from our body to confront change. 

Stress is the primarily process our brain uses to go and outsource energy from our body by releasing adrenaline and cortisol, which in turn cause liver cells to release glucose into the blood. This extra energy can help an individual to confront change and uncertainty. Adrenaline and cortisol are part of our threat system.

On the other hand, “anticipation” is the process our brain uses to release dopamine, which is a neurotransmitter that also boost our brain with energy. Dopamine however is the biology release by our brain reward system.

Depending on how we manage the perception of change in ourselves and stakeholders and how we manage the balance of the brain reward system between anticipation and pleasure we can induce either chronic stress, demotivation and lack of engagement or we could promote wellbeing.

The main challenge we face when managing wellbeing during change is managing the fluctuations of adrenaline, cortisol and dopamine levels in the individuals’ brain who are facing change.

In order to manage wellbeing during times of continuous change and transformation, we need to allow the neurobiology to fluctuate between “highs” and “lows” or what we called “peaks and valleys”. During times of change, we are at risk of remaining at the “peaks” most of the time or not engaging enough to promote positive “highs” of stress.

The good news is we can make lot of interventions in the “peaks and valleys” of our neurobiology by adjusting how we manage change to help promoting wellbeing. For example, by managing change by small iterations rather than big chuck of change we are allowing the adrenaline and dopamine to fluctuate high and low.

Another great example in change management is the adoption of an agile style of methodologies, where during a short two-week period the team runs a sprint (peaks), followed by some time of reflection, learning and celebration (valleys) before engaging in the second sprint and so on. 

During the last 20 years neuroscientists have made a huge progress in understanding how we can increase wellbeing by positively managing our neurobiology.

Our Neuroscientist Tibisay Vera in collaboration with the @International Academy of Neuroscience and Education @APMG international and @Sparkling Performance are now taking all this research out of the laboratory and clinical practises into organizations and people’s life. Very exciting times ahead in 2023 for launching new tools and solutions for managing change.

PEPE© model is a structured and powerful solution based on neuroscience to help facilitating change and to support the positive adaptation to change as well as helping to increase wellbeing during times of change and transformation.

Subscribe to our newsletter if you would like to hear more practical ideas in applied neuroscience for managing wellbeing, resilience and engagement in a constant changing world, or follow Tibisay Vera on LinkedIn.

If anything, the brain is actually wired to resist change. However, the brain will adapt to change at any cost due to neuroplasticity (the ability of the nervous system to change its activity in response to stimuli by reorganising its structure, functions, or connections).

However, the process of adaptation could represent a very high price to pay to the brain and the body of individuals. It could result on “maladaptive plasticity”, such as stress, anxiety, addiction, demotivation, etc. From an organisational perspective this bad adaptation could lead to lack of creativity, innovation, risk taking, major financial losses and failure in achieving results from a proposed change. 

During the last 10 years a vast amount of literature have been written about how to promote resilience to facilitate the adaptation of change, however sometimes excess amount of resilience in individuals and organisations could actually lead to “maladaptive plasticity” as even thought resilient individuals are able to “bounce back” and positively adapt to change; their brains and bodies still have a high price to pay for the adaptation and in fact they are at higher risk of permanently remain in the “highs” of threat and reward rather than allowing the natural flow of high and lows to harmonically to coexist in individuals and organisations.

Latest brain research agrees that fluctuations in the brain and heart activity are associated to good health, high performance, creations of new thoughts, memories and high level of focus and concentration and therefore is a brain friendly way to facilitate the adaptation to change and to avoid the “maladaptive plasticity”

Fluctuations are the result of exposure to different mental states, thoughts, emotions, behaviours, actions, nutrition and general health.  More than ever, it is important to create environments that supports moderate levels of disruption, brief periods of stress followed by periods of calmness and reflections or peak levels of anticipation and excitement followed by periods of enjoyment at the present moment and pleasure rather than “only” focus on resilience.

The fast speed that changes occur at in modern life and the continuous and constant change that organisations currently are facing, narrows the variety of exposure to fluctuations and especially “resilient” individuals.

During times of change, it is very common for stakeholders and even resilient individuals to pay a high price for the adaptation to change, such as increase in cynicism, chronic stress, demotivation, seeking behaviours, addiction or decrease in levels of performance among others due to “maladaptive plasticity”.

PEPE© neuroscience model offers a structured and strategic solution to individuals and organisation to build resilience, engagement and wellbeing during times of change and transformation. What to know more?

If you would like to learn more about practical strategies to develop resilience in a positive way and to facilitate adaptation to change applying neuroscience, you can subscribe to our newsletter or you can follow us on LinkedIn.