Want change to stick? Start with the brain.

“Change fatigue” is often blamed when transformation stalls. While this term can be a handy catch all, the reality is that it’s usually the brain hitting its processing limits.  

At Papillo, we call it the Human Bandwidth Problem. This is the point where the brain reaches capacity and can’t absorb anything more. And there’s decades of neuroscience to back this up. 

The great thing is once you understand what’s happening in the brain, this human response to change becomes predictable. And it informs the way we should communicate through change to help make it stick.

To explain this, let’s look at two important natural brain processes that occur during change: 

1. The Brain Prefers the Familiar 

Firstly, our brains love predictability. Familiar patterns save energy and signal safety. So, when something new arrives - whether it’s a process, a structure or a system - the brain automatically must work harder. 

This ‘new thing’ can trigger a subtle threat response in the brain - often showing up as behaviours like: 

• hesitation 

• resistance 

• or slipping back into old habits. 

It’s not that people don’t want to change but it can take a while because their brain is saying: “Hold up - this is going to take more energy.” 

Very importantly, this type of reaction gets stronger when people can’t see why the change matters to them. In other words, if the brain can’t answer: “How does this affect me and why should I care?” …it simply won’t invest much effort in processing it. 

2. The Brain Has Cognitive Limits 

The second important brain science nugget is that our working memory can only hold so much. There are limits. This means that if demands keep rising and priorities keep shifting and messages keep coming (e.g. a work environment undergoing multiple types of change), the brain eventually hits overload.  

When that happens, the human brain does exactly what it’s wired to do: 

• It narrows focus to what feels controllable. 

• It strops absorbing new information. 

• And it defaults to familiar behaviours because they take less effort. 

Our brains are simply saying: “Won’t compute.” While many label this as change fatigue, really, it’s a predictable ‘brain’ response which shows up as:  

• irritability 

• avoiding new tasks or tools 

• “just get through the day” thinking 

• hesitation or withdrawal 

• and low tolerance for ambiguity.  

What Brain Science Means for Change Communications 

This is why communication plays such a key role in supporting organisations to successfully land change. It’s about helping the brain make sense of what matters. Effective change communication must: 

• Reduce the brain load 

Simplify, sequence, and cut the noise so people can absorb information. 

• Reduce threat responses 

Create predictability, explain what’s staying the same, and close uncertainty gaps so people don’t go into self-protection mode. This helps to build confidence about the new future state.

• Increase relevance 

Lead with what matters to people personally: how it affects their job, team, time, workload and customers so they pay attention and feel motivated to act. 

• Increase clarity 

Remove ambiguity so the brain doesn’t need to fill in gaps. Even if you can’t give every answer, you should give direction. 

The Bottom Line 

Change takes hold when people have the capacity, the space, and the clarity to understand what’s changing and what they need to do. If we design communication with the brain in mind, change becomes far more achievable because you’ve enabled the brain to process it. 

For helpful tips and guidance, check out our recent research ‘Making Change Stick: How Communication influences Behaviour’.