Successfully implementing a major operational transition—such as rolling out a digital data system or restructuring workflows—requires managing far more than logistics. While standard practice focuses on designing the process and updating standard operating procedures, these administrative steps are only a small fraction of the effort. Guiding staff through the emotional disruption of change remains the primary barrier to success.
Technical implementation is rarely where transitions fail; the bottleneck is human. During the 2026 Lab Manager Leadership Summit session, Industrial Innovation: Leading Through Economic and Regulatory Volatility, Scott Hanton, PhD, editorial director at Lab Manager, explained that change is a deeply human journey. To protect productivity, leaders must shift from managing checklists to supporting their teams through emotional transitions.
The critical role of empathy when managing laboratory teams
In corporate language, organizations often refer to staff as resources, treating scientists like equipment to be optimized in a spreadsheet.
Hanton sees it differently. "Pencils are resources. Your people's time is a resource. It might be the most valuable resource you have. But the staff are people. They have feelings, and they have needs, and they have perceptions, and they have fears. And if you want to align them, you've got to address those things."
Fears of change are deeply personal and often hidden. During the session, a participant shared that a team was excited about a relocation and new equipment, yet grew resistant as the delivery date neared. The manager discovered that the required training was scheduled at a foreign location. For team members who had never traveled internationally, passport requirements and foreign travel were paralyzing anxieties.
"I think it's really important that I took that for granted because I'm a big traveler, but they're not," the participant reflected. "It's good to ask about what [staff] fears are and see if there's anything that's hidden that you didn't see coming."
Securing buy-in requires active, empathetic listening to identify and validate these unspoken anxieties.
Shifting focus to the undecided middle during change
When introducing major disruption, teams typically follow the 25-50-25 percent rule of change adoption. Roughly 25 percent are early adopters, 25 percent are vocal resistors, and the remaining 50 percent represent a cautious, silent middle.
Managers often waste valuable energy publicly debating vocal resistors in an effort to win them over. Hanton warns that this is a strategic trap.
"You're going to have some early adopters who can see your vision of the benefit. You're also going to have some resistors. You're going to have some people who are going to say, no, or I won't, or I disagree," Hanton noted.
Rather than trying to convert these vocal opponents, Hanton recommends channeling leadership energy toward moving the undecided middle to the supportive side.
"If you engage in open public debate, argue with the resistors, everybody's watching, right?" Hanton warned. "You're giving the resistors a platform to convert those people on the fence to their side. Don't give them that platform. Spend your time and energy on the people whom you can convince."
When lab managers focus on convincing and supporting the middle 50 percent, those individuals naturally migrate to the supportive side. Once 75 percent of the team is aligned, positive peer pressure does the heavy lifting. The remaining resistors will either quiet down and adapt, or realize the culture no longer supports their defiance and make other career plans.
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Leveraging collaborative input to bypass administrative friction
Command-and-control tactics often fuel passive resistance. The most effective way to build buy-in is by inviting direct staff input. One participant shared how they successfully engaged manufacturing floor staff during a major documentation transition by asking them what could be fixed to ease the process.
Hanton highlighted the power of this approach. "There's a real elegance in what you suggested," Hanton responded. "One, it costs you nothing. Zero dollars. It costs you nothing from your reputation . . . All you are doing is asking for people's input on how we can make this better. And that reframing from 'I'm the boss, you're going to do it,’ to 'we have a problem, and I need your help' is super powerful."
For example, when transitioning to a digital notebook workflow, inviting bench technicians to help solve bottlenecks shifts the dynamic. The team becomes co-architects of the solution rather than passive recipients of change.
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Navigating the transition curve and preventing leadership waffling
Every change management process follows an emotional curve. It begins with anticipation, dips into confusion, and eventually bottoms out in the valley of despair—the point where the old way is gone, the new way is difficult, and mistakes are frequent. At this low point, the temptation for a leader to waffle is immense.
"Waffling is a whole lot of motion, it's a whole lot of words, it's a whole lot of energy, and where did I end up? I ended up right where I started," explained Hanton. This cycle creates chronic churn, fatigues staff, and severely damages the leader's credibility.
Hanton explained that waffling is often driven by a leader's inability to navigate the emotional lows of a transition. He noted that teams typically experience a distinct emotional cycle during change, shifting from comfort to sudden anxiety before hitting their lowest point. "And at that bottom point, it's called the valley of despair," Hanton added. "A problem that we all have as leaders is when it gets hard, we stop."
To prevent this, leaders must manage the transition with calm resolve. Acknowledge that the valley of despair is a normal, healthy part of the change process. Reframe the discomfort not as failure, but as a necessary transition phase toward growth. By standing firm in the valley, providing clear, consistent communication, and celebrating small victories, leaders give their teams the stability they need to climb the other side.
Utilizing collaborative lab leadership strategies to build long-term organizational value
Mastering laboratory change management is not just about executing a project on time; it is about protecting operational capacity and maintaining scientific integrity. When teams are stressed by constant shifts, error rates rise, compliance lapses occur, and valuable talent departs.
Deciding how to allocate leadership energy during a transition determines whether a laboratory emerges from disruption stronger or fractured. By focusing on the silent majority, dismantling top-down command structures in favor of seeking collaborative feedback, and managing the emotional dip of the transition curve, leaders can de-risk major operational changes. Leaders must also learn to project hope and perspective when guiding their teams through these trials.
"It's our job as leaders to maintain hope," Hanton shared. "We need to have a little more perspective. We need to be able to see a little farther than our teams do and be able to enunciate and communicate that hope."
Ultimately, the goal of leadership is to build an adaptable, psychologically safe team capable of solving problems collaboratively. When lab managers treat their staff not as resources to be optimized, but as partners in evolution, they build a resilient foundation that can withstand any economic or regulatory storm.
This article was created with the assistance of Generative AI and has undergone editorial review before publishing.
