By Darrel Popowich, Founder, Transformation CRAFT
October 30, 2025
Every project manager has lived this story.
The kickoff went well. The plan was sound. Sponsors nodded in agreement. Stakeholders voiced support.
But weeks later, cracks began to show. Sponsors grew distant. A steering meeting turned tense. What had started as alignment began to feel like quiet resistance.
The metrics still looked fine, but energy had shifted. Momentum was gone.
You’ve seen it. You’ve felt it. And you know it has nothing to do with the Gantt chart.
This is what happens when the invisible forces beneath a project—its culture and its human acceptance—start to slip out of sync.
Most transformations don’t fail because of flawed strategy or weak execution. They fail because the system underneath—the one that connects vision, people, and behavior—was never fully aligned to begin with.
When Stakeholder “Support” Masks Culture Clash
At kickoff, everyone agrees on the goal. But what looks like shared commitment often hides cultural misalignment—different assumptions about how decisions are made, how success is measured, and what “good” looks like.
Culture isn’t just the company’s values or slogans. It’s the unwritten rulebook that defines how work really gets done when the pressure hits.
Project managers live at the intersection of those cultural fault lines. One executive might come from a Command mindset—structure, control, and accountability. Another expects Optimization—speed, efficiency, measurable results. A third champions Engagement—collaboration, inclusion, and a relentless focus on the client.
Each of them genuinely believes they’re supporting the project. But their expectations pull in different directions.
So when tension rises, what began as enthusiasm turns into hesitation:
The Command leader demands more control.
The Optimization sponsor wants faster turnaround.
The Engagement stakeholder calls for more input.
It’s not sabotage. It’s culture clash.
Unless the project manager can name it, the team ends up trying to satisfy everyone—stretching thin, losing focus, and watching progress erode.
Culture sets the tone for every decision that follows. When that foundation isn’t aligned, even the best planning can’t compensate.
The Human Side of Change: Acceptance vs Announcement
Even when the culture is clear, another invisible force determines whether the project takes hold: Acceptance.
Most organizations mistake communication for commitment. They believe that if people heard the message, they’ve accepted the change.
That’s why so many change efforts follow the same pattern:
Tell people what’s coming.
Train them on new processes.
Promote the launch date—and expect adoption.
It looks logical—but it’s incomplete.
This approach treats people like systems to be updated instead of humans who must choose. It produces compliance, not commitment. People learn what to do, but they don’t believe why it matters.
The Ladder of Acceptance
Acceptance is emotional before it’s operational. It moves through stages—what I call the Ladder of Acceptance:
Deny → Deflect → Delay → Doubt → Debate → Discuss → Digest → Decide → Do → Demonstrate.
Each rung represents a shift in mindset—from disbelief to curiosity, to participation, to ownership. You know someone has truly accepted the change when they reach Demonstrate—when they’re showing others how to perform in the new way.
The problem is that most change management strategies are designed for efficiency, not humanity. They assume it’s the team’s job to “get on board,” rather than leadership’s job to guide them through the climb.
Project managers see the result: stakeholders who nod in meetings but stall in action, users who complete training but revert to old habits, sponsors who fade when the first issue appears.
A Human-Centered Alternative: See–Ask–Support–Invite
Instead of Tell–Train–Launch, a human-centered approach uses four verbs that work with the psychology of acceptance: See, Ask, Support, Invite.
- See – Help people witness the need for change themselves. Let them experience the customer frustration, the inefficiency, the risk of staying still.
- Ask – Seek their perspective before dictating solutions. Involvement creates ownership.
- Support – Remove barriers, provide resources, and make it safe to experiment and fail.
- Invite – Make participation a choice. Acceptance can’t be mandated; it must be earned.
This approach changes the emotional contract. People no longer feel that change is being done to them—they feel part of the success story being built with them.
When project managers apply this lens, resistance stops feeling like defiance and starts revealing information—insight into where the organization really is on the Ladder.
You can’t move people who feel unheard. But when they see themselves in the story, they climb on their own.
Where Culture and Acceptance Meet
Culture sets the stage. Acceptance determines whether the performance succeeds.
Culture defines what’s normal; acceptance decides what’s possible.
When these two are aligned, projects move quickly and naturally. Teams adapt. Stakeholders lean in. Users adopt. When they’re not, you see the opposite—confusion, defensiveness, fatigue.
The project manager’s power lies in seeing this pattern early—naming the cultural tension that’s creating resistance, and guiding people up the Ladder of Acceptance before momentum stalls.
That’s not just delivery. That’s leadership.
Looking Ahead: The Other Forces of Alignment
In my IPM Day 2025 presentation, “Why Most Transformations Fail—and How Leaders Can Get It Right,” we’ll go deeper into how Culture and Acceptance interact with the three other forces inside the CRAFT framework:
- Relationships – how to see relationship weakness before they crack under pressure,
- Focus – the discipline of doing less to achieve more, and
- Trajectory – how metrics tell you whether you’re actually moving in the right direction or drifting away from strategy.
Because projects don’t fall apart overnight—they erode quietly as alignment fades. The best project managers learn to see those signals early, realign them quickly, and keep transformation on course.
At IPM Day, I’ll show you how to do exactly that—how to see the system beneath the plan, and how to craft the alignment that makes every project hold.
Darrel Popowich
Darrel Popowich is a leadership coach, transformation consultant, keynote speaker, and former senior executive with over 25 years of experience leading enterprise transformations across industries. Darrel is the founder of Transformation Craft, a coaching and consulting practice that equips leaders and project professionals with practical tools to drive meaningful, people-centered change. Known for blending emotional intelligence with strategic execution, Darrel helps organizations turn stalled initiatives into success stories.
Previously, Darrel held several leadership positions at the Business Relationship Management Institute (BRM Institute), including Chief Visionary Officer, COO, Board Member, and Executive Council Member.
