The Forgotten Perspective of Change Leadership: What Does an Imposed Change Do to the Leader?

Change leadership is almost always discussed from others' perspective: how a leader guides their organisation through change, how they communicate, build commitment, and ease resistance. Far less often do we ask what change does to the leader themselves. What happens when decisions have been made above them, the responsibility for implementation has been left to them, and their sense of self as a leader who is responsible for the decisions made, begins to waver?

An effective leadership team clarifies the vision, chooses the means for achieving strategic goals, and makes the necessary decisions within a given framework. Sometimes, the significant choices that shape the future are made at a higher level by the board or group management. What happens then to the identity of the business leader? In structural changes like these, the leader is placed in a dual role: they are expected to drive the change forward and stand behind it – while simultaneously living through that same change as its target.

The leaders who find this situation most conflicted are often those for whom loyalty and taking responsibility are core values. When you are accustomed to standing behind your word, it is hard to implement decisions that you weren’t involved in making yourself and whose meaning you have not yet had time to process for yourself. Commitment to what came before does not disappear in an instant – and it is precisely the most loyal leaders who may suffer most, because their values and their role are set on a collision course.

Sensemaking that is still incomplete

Change is not merely a rearrangement of structures. It is a reformation of meaning. In change, the shared interpretive framework that leaders previously relied upon fragments, and the leadership team's new, collective way of interpreting and understanding is rebuilt through shared experience and mutual dialogue.

The problem arises when a leader is required to implement change at a point where their own sensemaking is still unfinished. They act before they understand. At this stage, people become sensitive to word choices, weighing both what is said and what is left unsaid, and the leader's words are given interpretations they were never intended to carry. Change imposed from above also tends to produce a disposition toward suspicion of messages from senior management, with people looking for hidden agendas. This is not bad faith; it is the filling-in of an incomplete story.

An interesting – and perhaps surprising – observation is that leaders who have had to implement more difficult measures often appear to move forward through change more quickly than those who have faced only a few difficult decisions. The explanation may lie precisely in sensemaking: faced with broad responsibility, leaders have been compelled to quickly construct a coherent interpretation of the change, the future, and their own role. Those for whom difficult experiences have been only occasional are more easily left wounded by them – without the pressure that would have driven them to assemble a coherent story from a fragmented experience.

When identity is under threat

One definition of an identity threat is a situation in which something undermines the value, meaning, or enactment of one's identity. In change, the threat falls particularly on two things: the continuity of one's role, and control over who gets to define what kind of leader I am. When a leader suspects they will be left outside key decisions going forward, this is precisely what is at stake – a loss of control over one's own professional self-definition. In the leadership team, it surfaces as confusion about decision-making authority: what can I decide going forward, what is still within our hands?

When thinking about the future, a leader may find themselves waiting to learn what senior management's intentions are, rather than seeing themselves as an active builder of that future vision, someone who maps out alternatives, or someone who simply puts suggestions forward. The identity of a decision-maker has momentarily vanished. In their own eyes, the leader has become a bystander. The natural way to protect identity is to create distance from the organisation and weigh one's own commitment.

Rebuilding identity – five directions

Change can also be designed in a way that even strengthens identity – if the right kind of space is created for it. The leaders who have clearly rebuilt their identities through change are often precisely those who challenge others in the leadership team to see situations differently, to recognise opportunities, and to reclaim their own agency. How does one get there?

1. Allow time for sensemaking before implementation

A leader needs their own space to understand the change before they are expected to stand behind it. When the leadership team first builds a shared interpretation of what the change is about and what it means to each person, implementation is no longer left resting on an unfinished story. The question is not one of speed but of sequence: understanding before action.

2. Build your own story of the change

Identity is built in stories. Petriglieri and colleagues have shown that leaders need psychologically safe spaces in which uncertainty, loss, and a new role can be explored without having to immediately present a finished version of themselves. Such a space might be a confidential peer group, supervision, or the leadership team's own moment of reflection. A coherent story of the past, the present, and the future is what carries people forward.

3. Restore agency

The decisive shift occurs when a leader stops waiting for senior management to provide a ready-made direction and instead, begins to draw up options and put them forward themselves. Agency is not restored through demanding, but through asking: What do I see here? What options could I offer? It is important for the leader of the leadership team to balance telling, questioning, and listening – consciously inviting members into a builder's role, being actively curious about others' thinking rather than continuously offering their own views.

4. Strengthen collegiality and connection

Meanings are built in relationships and in dialogue. It is the mutual exchange among leader colleagues – not formal communication – that ultimately shapes how change is interpreted. When there is room in the leadership team to test interpretations against each other and share uncertainty as well, fragmented experiences begin to cohere into a shared, sustaining understanding.

5. Reconnect values to role

For loyal leaders, the pain of change often arises from the conflict between values and role. Rebuilding does not mean abandoning values but reconnecting them: responsibility can also mean honesty about what is still incomplete, meeting people in a difficult situation, and saying aloud what is not yet known. In this way, the very value that caused the conflict becomes the foundation of a renewed leader identity.

Finally: leadership is also about seeing yourself anew

Leading change is not only about guiding others through it. It is also about rebuilding the leader's own identity and thinking – often simultaneously, unfinished, under the gaze of others. The most impactful change leaders are not those who have been spared uncertainty, but those who have found through it a new, more coherent way of seeing themselves as agents. As a leader, you can begin by asking yourself: As I look at myself in this change – what kind of leader do I want to build myself into?

Sources

Jennifer Petriglieri. Petriglieri, J. L. (2011). Under Threat: Responses to and the Consequences of Threats to Individuals' Identities. Academy of Management Review.

Gianpiero Petriglieri. Petriglieri, G., Petriglieri, J. L. & Wood, J. D. (2018). Fast Tracks and Inner Journeys: Crafting Portable Selves for Contemporary Careers. Administrative Science Quarterly.

Anna Lupina-Wegener, van Dick, R., Haslam, A. (2026). From Identity Threat to Identity Gain: The Role of Identity Leadership in Helping Employees Negotiate Organizational Change. Journal of Change Management. This blog was written by our organizational and leadership development specialist Hanna Rainio. Hanna is inspired by supporting people and organizations on their path toward sustainable growth and renewal.