Use Storytelling to Jumpstart Your Next Change Journey

Large-scale organizational change comes in various forms: managing mergers and acquisitions, adopting new technology and ways of working, evolving operating models, strengthening cybersecurity… The list goes on. While a clear strategy is key for defining what’s changing and why, employees are vital for activating the strategy and making the change possible. Leaders need employees to own their role in whatever’s changing to ensure sustained adoption and success. Otherwise, the potential value of the change is at risk of not being realized.

In July 2025, Gartner HR Research found that just 32% of mid- to senior-level business leaders said the last change they led achieved healthy adoption among employees. How can organizations bridge the gap between strategy formulation and day-to-day implementation even when the plan isn’t fully baked? A practical place to start is with storytelling.

What happens when employees lack context

Leaders are pressured to accomplish change at lightning speed and global scale while ensuring employees stay informed and aligned to the path forward—even when the best path is still being defined. The urgency to get started on change activities often takes precedence over the time it takes to provide the context that enables employees to understand and activate the strategy. When leaders jump straight to managing tasks before aligning teams around the outcomes the organization is trying to achieve through the change, the journey to realize those outcomes can feel disjointed.

When employees lack strategic context around the change, here’s what often happens:

• It’s harder to get started. Without a compelling story to gain alignment and sponsorship for the change, the appetite for the change wanes quickly, as does the chance for activation and results.
• The launch is rushed before the organization is ready. When there are long pauses in between communications and related change activities, momentum can slow, making it harder to restart. Or worse, the experience of a rushed launch can cause employees to reject the change altogether, requiring leaders to re-launch it at a later date.
• Major changes are forced with minimal preparation or communication. When this happens, there’s a good chance that employees will not be able to adjust as quickly as change is happening, disrupting operations across the organization.

Use storytelling to jumpstart your next change journey

People love stories, especially when they feel like they can relate to the narrative, characters, or conflict. The challenge for leaders using storytelling to jumpstart change is to craft the contextual conversation about change upfront with employees, while continuing to work through the nuts and bolts of planning in the background. Although it can feel uncomfortable to tell a story while the change is still being shaped, the advantages typically outweigh the discomfort.

Most likely, employees already recognize that the change is needed. Storytelling provides them an opportunity to see themselves as part of the journey as it evolves, rather than feel like the change is happening to or around them. Storytelling also helps ensure that leaders and employees are heading in the same direction and feel prepared to move forward together. It offers leaders a productive way to assuage employees’ doubts, fears, or concerns about what’s changing and help them understand the role they play.

Once the change story is crafted, it becomes foundational to any future messaging. Here’s how meaningful stories can help create momentum during organizational change:

Stories rally around value. Too often, change communication focuses on mitigating impacts, rather than promoting the value that change brings. Effective change requires both. After all, people excited about solving problems and creating value.

Stories trump conjecture. Some leaders may not feel they can announce upcoming changes until something big is ready to be revealed. Chances are, if leaders don’t tell the story about impending change, people will gather tidbits from the grapevine and come to their own conclusions.

Stories set expectations. Employees want to know what’s changing and how they will be prepared, making it imperative for leaders to establish early and clear expectations for how employees will learn about upcoming change.

To jumpstart change, craft stories that cover all the bases:

• Provide the who, what, when, where, how, and why of change
• Demonstrate alignment within the organization for the change
• Serve as conversation starters that support leaders and managers in telling the change story
• Resonate as “human” and inspiring meaning from the perspective of people
• Include impactful visuals to be more engaging, memorable, and recognizable

Challenges to overcome when jumpstarting change communication

Thinking about jumpstarting your change story? Here are some common challenges you might face and tips to address them.

Feeling vulnerable. This is a natural; change is uncomfortable for everyone! What happens if you change your mind, direction, or plan?

Tip: Be realistic in the narrative and craft the story based on what you know and make it clear that there’s more to come. Employees will appreciate the transparency and inclusion.

Fearing a lack of alignment or commitment. Crafting the change story will surface points of misalignment. You may encounter potential challenges to adoption (areas of uncertainty and risk), while also sparking energy around what’s possible (alignment and support).

Tip: To use storytelling as an alignment tool, you need to know your audience. Identify must-have audiences to help craft the story (maybe even employees themselves), as well as audiences necessary for review and approval.

Not knowing where to start. Change is complex and often involves countless details. The team focused on change analysis and planning will need a creative partner for jumpstarting communication, including writers and designers who are both creative visionaries and strategic storytellers.

Tip: Recruit the right team to work on the narrative and bring the change journey to life. Keep them involved as the story evolves and plans for communication become more frequent and tactical.

Large-scale organizational change is an ongoing challenge. Leaders can better prepare teams by shifting their approach to how and when they communicate about change. If you’re leading a change journey, consider using storytelling to get a jump on the story while your team works out all the details.