ADKAR change management is one of the most useful tools a growing business can borrow from large organisations, and one of the most misused. Most owners meet it on a slide, nod at the five letters and move on. Then a new system, a new structure or a new way of selling fails to stick, and nobody can say quite why.
This guide takes ADKAR change management out of the training room and into the kind of business we work with every day: established, independent, with real revenue and a team that is busy doing the work. We will cover what the model is, how to use it as a diagnostic, and what to do this week if a change in your business has stalled.
Table of Contents
What ADKAR change management actually is
ADKAR was developed by Prosci. The model breaks change into five observable elements: Awareness, Desire, Knowledge, Ability and Reinforcement. Prosci describes it as a model for individual change, and that phrase is the whole point. Organisations do not change. People do, one at a time.
- Awareness: understanding why the change is needed.
- Desire: choosing to take part in and support the change.
- Knowledge: knowing how to change and what good looks like.
- Ability: putting the new skills and behaviours into practice.
- Reinforcement: sustaining the new way so people do not slide back.
The order matters. Each stage depends on the one before it. You cannot train someone into wanting a change, and you cannot reinforce a behaviour that nobody is yet able to perform.
That sequence is what makes ADKAR change management practical rather than theoretical. It tells you where to look first, and it stops you spending money on the wrong fix.
Why change stalls in growing businesses
In a business of twenty or eighty people, change rarely fails loudly. It fades. The new CRM gets used for a month, then half the team drifts back to spreadsheets. The new pricing is agreed in the leadership meeting, then quietly discounted on every call.
Owners usually read this as a people problem. Someone is being difficult, or the team is resistant to change. In thirty years of this work, we have found that is rarely the real cause. The symptom is poor adoption. The cause is almost always a missing stage.
Typical patterns look like this:
- The owner announced the change but never explained the business reason, so Awareness is thin.
- The team understands the reason but sees only extra work for themselves, so Desire is missing.
- People want it to work but were shown once, in a rush, so Knowledge is patchy.
- They know what to do but have no time, tools or practice to do it, so Ability is blocked.
- It worked for six weeks, then nobody checked, praised or measured it, so Reinforcement never happened.
Each of those needs a different fix. That is why sending everyone on another training session so often changes nothing. Training fixes Knowledge. It does nothing for Awareness, Desire or Reinforcement.
Using ADKAR change management as a diagnostic
The most valuable way to use ADKAR change management is not as a project plan. It is as a diagnostic. When a change is stuck, you find the first stage that is weak and you work there. Everything after that stage is a symptom.
Because the five elements are observable, leaders can see where progress stands and where it needs support. You do not need a survey platform to do this. You need honest conversations and a simple scoring sheet.
Score each person, not the team
Pick the change that has stalled. For each person it affects, score each of the five stages from one to five. Be specific. A score of two on Desire means you have heard them say, or seen them act as if, the change is not worth their effort.
Then look for the first score of three or below in each row. That is the barrier point for that person. If most of the team share the same barrier point, you have found the real problem in the change, not just an individual issue.
Ask the questions that reveal each stage
- Awareness: in your own words, why are we making this change, and what happens if we do not?
- Desire: what does this change mean for you personally, and what would make it worth it?
- Knowledge: talk me through exactly how you would do this on a real job tomorrow.
- Ability: what has stopped you doing it this way in the last week?
- Reinforcement: who notices when you do it the new way, and what happens when you do not?
The answers are usually more revealing than any dashboard. If three people cannot explain why the change matters, you do not have a training problem. You have a communication problem at the top.
Not sure what is really holding your business back? Book a thirty minute call and we will talk it through with you.
How to apply each ADKAR stage in a smaller business
ADKAR change management works in a business of fifteen people just as it does in a large corporation, but the effort sits in different places. Here is what each stage needs when the owner is close to the work and there is no dedicated change team.
Awareness: explain the business reason
Awareness is built by the people with authority, and in most independent businesses that means the owner. Explain the reason in commercial terms your team can check for themselves: the jobs lost, the hours wasted, the complaints received, the margin given away.
Say it more than once, and say it face to face before you put it in an email. A useful test: could the newest person in the team explain the reason for the change to a client? If not, Awareness is not there yet.
Desire: answer what is in it for them
Desire is personal and cannot be ordered. It depends on what the change means for each person’s day, status and security. Line managers matter here more than the owner, because people raise real concerns with the person they work next to.
Be honest about the cost of the change as well as the benefit. People trust a plan that admits the first month will be harder. They distrust one that pretends it will all be easy.
Knowledge: teach the real job, not the theory
Knowledge is where most businesses spend all their effort. Keep it close to the work. Short sessions using real client files beat a long demonstration of every feature.
Write the new process down in plain steps so people can check it later, and link it to the procedures you already have. If nobody can find the instructions a month later, Knowledge will quietly decay.
Ability: make room to practise
Ability is the gap between knowing and doing. It needs time, tools and a safe place to make mistakes. If a team is fully booked, a new process simply gets skipped.
Protect a little capacity for the first few weeks. Pair less confident people with those who have picked it up. Remove the old way where you can, so the new one becomes the easy default.
Reinforcement: measure it and notice it
Reinforcement is the stage owners most often skip, because by then they have moved on to the next priority. Pick one or two simple measures, check them weekly and talk about them in team meetings.
Recognise people who do it the new way. Correct drift early and calmly, before the old habit returns. Reinforcement is cheap, and it protects everything you invested in the first four stages.
A worked example: a new client onboarding process
Imagine a professional services firm of around thirty people that wants every new client onboarded the same way: one welcome call, one checklist, one shared folder. This is an illustration rather than a client story, but the pattern will be familiar.
Three months after launch, only a third of new clients are onboarded the new way. The owner assumes the team needs more training. An ADKAR change management review tells a different story:
- Awareness is high. Everyone can explain that inconsistent onboarding causes early complaints.
- Desire is mixed. Senior staff feel the checklist second guesses their judgement.
- Knowledge is fine. The process is simple and written down.
- Ability is low for the busiest people, who have no slot in the week for a welcome call.
- Reinforcement is absent. Nobody reviews which clients were onboarded properly.
The fix is not more training. It is a conversation with senior staff about how the checklist protects them, a protected hour in each diary for welcome calls, and a five minute weekly review of new clients. Three small changes, each aimed at the real barrier point.
Common mistakes with ADKAR change management
- Treating it as a one off launch. ADKAR describes a journey for each person. Some will move through it in a week, others in three months.
- Jumping straight to Knowledge. Training is visible and easy to organise, so it gets done first. Without Awareness and Desire it is largely wasted.
- Assessing the team as one block. Averages hide the individuals who are stuck, and one stuck manager can hold back a whole department.
- Running too many changes at once. Every change competes for the same attention. If people are moving through four changes at the same time, expect all four to slow down.
- Ignoring the owner’s own ADKAR. Owners need Awareness and Desire too. If you are not personally convinced a change matters, your team will notice.
If several of these sound familiar, the issue may be bigger than one change. It may be the way decisions are made and carried through across the business. Our earlier piece on building team independence looks at this from another angle.
Our guide to systemising a service business covers how to make new processes stick once they are agreed, which is Reinforcement by another name.
What to do this week
You do not need a change programme to start. Pick one change that has stalled and work through these steps:
- Write down, in one sentence, the business reason for the change and the cost of not making it.
- List everyone the change affects and score each of them against the five ADKAR stages.
- Find each person’s first weak stage, then look for the stage most of the team share.
- Choose one action aimed at that stage, not at the stage you find easiest to fix.
- Agree one simple measure and a date in two weeks to review it.
This is ADKAR change management at its most useful: a quick, honest way to find where a change is really stuck, and to spend effort where it will make a difference.
When the problem is bigger than one change
Sometimes the scoring exercise shows the same barrier across every change you try. Desire is always low, or Reinforcement never happens. That is usually a sign of a deeper issue in the operating model, the leadership structure or the way priorities are set.
That is the kind of problem The Diagnostic is built to find. It is a fixed scope engagement that examines commercial performance, operations and delivery, positioning and proposition, and digital visibility. It ends with a written diagnosis, a prioritised roadmap and a working session, and you own the output outright.
Where change itself is the issue, our operations and change services include ADKAR change management roadmaps built around your team. If you would rather talk it through first, book a thirty minute consult. It is a direct conversation about where the business is and what is not moving.
Ready to find the real cause and a clear next step? Book a thirty minute consult with AD Consults. If the work is not right for you, we will say so on the call.
Frequently asked questions
What does ADKAR stand for?
ADKAR stands for Awareness, Desire, Knowledge, Ability and Reinforcement. It is a model developed by Prosci that describes the five things each person needs for a change to succeed and last. The stages run in order, so each one builds on the one before.
Is ADKAR change management suitable for small businesses?
Yes. ADKAR change management is often easier to apply in a smaller business, because you can talk directly to every person affected. You do not need specialist software or a dedicated change team, just honest conversations and a simple way to score each stage.
How long does it take to move a team through ADKAR?
It varies by person and by the size of the change. Some people move through all five stages in a few weeks, while others take months. The useful question is not how long it takes overall, but where each person is stuck today.
Where does change most often stall?
In growing businesses we most often see change stall at Desire or Reinforcement. Owners tend to explain and train well, then move on before the new behaviour is embedded. Checking and recognising the new way for the first few months makes a real difference.
Can ADKAR change management help with a new software rollout?
It is well suited to it. Many software rollouts struggle with adoption rather than with the technology itself. Using ADKAR change management to check Awareness and Desire before training, and Reinforcement after go live, gives the new system a far better chance of being used properly.
Thirty years in business and marketing strategy, across Google, Samsung, Apple, Virgin and LEGO, and over a thousand independent businesses advised through NatWest.