Navigating Change at Work: How to Move From Reaction to Response
Change at work rarely arrives at a convenient time. It shows up mid-project, during team transitions, or alongside already full workloads. While most professionals know change is part of the job, knowing how to handle it is a different story.
At NextGen Center’s recent workshop, “Navigating Change at Work: From Reaction to Response,” founder Brian Alvo led a conversation focused on a simple but powerful idea: change is a skill you can build rather than just something to endure.
“The more effective you can get at change and your process of change,” Alvo shared, “the better off and more effective you’ll be for your teams and your leadership.”
This session broke that skill into practical steps you can apply right away.
Most leaders are already in the middle
Early in the session, participants were asked to rate how effectively they believed they would respond to an upcoming change.
Out of the group:
One person rated themselves a 10
Everyone else fell between a 5 and 8
That range says a lot.
Leaders are already navigating change with some level of awareness and optimism, but there’s still a gap between reacting in the moment and responding with intention.
“Our job is to help you close the gap,” Alvo said.
Why we react before we respond
If you’ve ever had a strong emotional reaction to a workplace change, you’re not alone. There’s a reason it happens.
“Biologically speaking, we view change as a threat,” Alvo explained.
When something feels unfamiliar or out of our control, the brain treats it as a risk. That’s when common reactions show up:
“I don’t have control”
“I’ve tried this before”
“They don’t know what they’re doing”
Over time, if those reactions go unchecked, they can turn into a pattern. Leaders start to feel like change is happening to them.
That’s where the shift begins.
The difference between reacting and responding
The core idea of the workshop was simple, but not easy: a reaction is automatic whereas a response is intentional.
“Your reaction is what’s going to happen from the stimulus… without any thinking,” Alvo said. “The responsive piece is creating more space between the stimulus and what you do afterwards.”
That space is where better leadership decisions happen.
But here’s the key:
“It’s not to eliminate the reaction or the flooding of emotions,” Alvo said. “It’s to work with it.”
Step 1: Name your assumptions
One of the most practical exercises from the workshop focused on identifying assumptions.
When faced with change, leaders often create a story quickly:
This is going to take too much time
This won’t work
This will create more problems
The problem is that assumptions are often treated as facts.
“We’ve got to test out our assumptions,” Alvo said.
A simple question can shift your thinking: What evidence do I have to support this?
Sometimes the answer is “none.” Other times, the evidence is outdated or incomplete.
Writing assumptions down creates distance. It also gives leaders a chance to revisit them later and see what actually happened.
As one participant noted, many assumptions never come true, and if you don’t document them, you lose the opportunity to learn from that.
Step 2: Understand your “filters”
Every leader interprets change through a set of internal filters.
Two key questions shape those filters:
Is this a threat or a challenge?
Do I have what it takes to handle it?
The answers to those questions often determine whether you react or respond.
“You can’t necessarily change the event,” Alvo explained, “but you can influence your filters by the way you think.”
This is where reframing becomes powerful.
Instead of asking:
Why is this happening?
What could go wrong?
Try:
What can I learn?
What are the possibilities here?
Step 3: Separate the story from the data
One of the most useful distinctions from the session was this: Negative reactions are often a mix of data + story + fear.
Past experiences play a big role. What worked, or didn’t work, before becomes “evidence” for what will happen next.
“If I have a story that’s like ‘last time this happened, all these negative things happened,’” Alvo said, “immediately our mind is going to go to the same situation.”
That’s natural and instinctive, but it’s not always accurate.
Leaders who can separate what they know from what they’re assuming are better equipped to navigate change without getting stuck in it.
Step 4: Know your change pattern
Everyone has a pattern when dealing with change.
For example:
Day 1: frustration or doubt
Day 2: perspective starts to shift
Day 3: back to normal execution
“Know your process,” Alvo said. “Know what you typically do, how long it takes you to navigate it, and then work through it.”
When leaders understand their own tendencies, they can shorten the cycle. They can move from emotional reaction to productive action faster and help others do the same.
Step 5: Create distance to support your team
When teams feel uncertainty, leaders set the tone. One way to create distance is by shifting perspective beyond the individual.
“What if our team had a voice? What if our company had a voice?” Alvo asked.
This simple shift helps leaders:
Reduce personalization of change
Focus on what’s best for the team or organization
Make more grounded decisions
This balances the human side of change instead of removing it.
Change is a skill, not a moment
A consistent theme throughout the workshop was this: Change is not a one-time event. It’s a process.
“Think about change as a process… change as a skill,” Alvo said.
Like any skill, it improves with practice:
Noticing your reactions
Questioning your assumptions
Adjusting your filters
Learning from past experiences
The goal is to strive for handling change more effectively over time, not handling change perfectly (there’s no such thing!)
Final takeaway
Most leaders already have a sense of how they respond to change. That awareness is a strong starting point.
The next step is building the habits that create space—space to think, to question, and to respond with intention.
Because in moments of uncertainty, leadership isn’t defined by the change itself. It’s defined by how you move through it—and how you help others do the same.
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