Leading Change in Construction: Navigating the Complexities of Choice and Leadership

Change doesn’t start with strategy—it starts with choice.

In this Mini Series Part 1 of Activating Curiosity™, Ryan Ware breaks down the first step in building a stronger relationship with change: understanding how we make decisions and how those decisions impact others.

In the construction and AEC industry, change often feels imposed—new technology, shifting delivery models, or evolving business strategies. But before we can lead change effectively, we need to understand how we personally relate to choice, and how that shapes our response to change. 

This episode introduces the concept of choice architecture and explores how default decisions, habits, and past experiences influence leadership, communication, and engagement across teams.

Ryan challenges leaders to rethink how change is introduced—moving beyond forced compliance toward shared ownership and buy-in.

From daily habits to major organizational decisions, this conversation lays the groundwork for leading change with greater empathy, clarity, and intention.

This isn’t just about decision-making—it’s about understanding the human side of change.

What you’ll learn:

•  Why choice is the foundation of effective change management 
•  How “choice architecture” shapes behavior and decision-making 
•  The difference between first choice and second choice in organizations 
•  Why forced change creates resistance—and how to avoid it 
•  How leaders can create buy-in through empathy and communication 

Who this is for:
Construction leaders, project managers, and AEC professionals focused on leadership development, change management, and improving team engagement.

Chapters

00:00 Understanding Change Through Choice
12:16 The Ripple Effect of Choices
22:17 Navigating Personal and Professional Choices
25:08 Empathy and Change Management
31:41 Reflecting on Personal Choices

Overcast Innovations
Helping project teams coordinate building systems earlier for more predictable outcomes.

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Connective Consulting Group
Helping construction leaders simplify change, strengthen trust, and move forward with clarity.

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Transcript

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Ryan 0:58

How will I, now that I recognize my relationship with choice, how will I now start to have empathy and recognize how others might react to choice, might react to change? And what can you do to help them start to analyze and recognize their own relationship with choice so that they can begin to take steps of driving towards uh a change that they want and others want that will stick? And the bonus episodes over the next five to six, I want to focus on how to help you, as listeners, begin to analyze and understand what it means to build stronger relationships with change. So, in order to do that, we need to take some time during each of these bonus episodes to break the concept of change down into some components where we can analyze for ourselves what does it mean to me as a human? What might it mean to others that that change is going to impact as well? So for this episode, that means that we need to start with the first area. And that is called choice. You see, choice is this area that we can feel overwhelmed by and stuck on making decisions, or we can feel left out of. So I want to break choice down into a few areas that are, as an individual, a choice that you make that might only impact yourself or a small group, or a choice that you're making that has broader impact and could impact a lot of other people in how we think about that. Also, want to think through choice as it relates to business. So, as an executive, a leader within a company or director level, we can make choices that we know are right for the business, that are right for the individuals within the business as well as our clients. But we struggle during that change to understand that impact of that change since we've made choice one of what choice two, meaning all of the others involved in the change, have at their disposal. So let's start off thinking about choice as it relates to us as individuals. We sometimes will fight with ourselves in evaluating a decision. And in some cases, businesses or other parts of our life have put these things in front of us called nudges that help us be reminded to make a decision or what goes through what's called choice architecture, meaning that someone has laid out that choice for us and we just need to pick one. Think of it as it relates to healthcare and as we're going through that process now for many people of choosing which plan do you want? Someone's already chosen the plan options for the company, but some smaller groups of choices with a default potentially or a set it and forget it sort of mindset when it comes to healthcare is already predetermined. But you are given some form of choice. In some cases, let's pick on someone driving down the road. And we think as an individual, I gotta get home, I'm late to a meeting, so you're flying down the road. You've made first choice. You've said, my path, my time frames, my need to get somewhere is more important than everyone else's on the road. But everyone else now comes into second choice of how do they react to this? How do they have to move out of the way? How do they react when someone else reacts? Those are what's called a ripple effect of choice. So I know it's somewhat simple, but if we just think there are choices from the minute we wake up. What do I want to eat? What am I going to wear? And we sometimes get into choice fatigue. And just remove that from an option. We just again go back to setting it and forgetting it. So we can make a choice, like the driver and going at high speed and reckless driving that is now impacting other people. And we can think, how am I going to react to that as an individual? Who's seeing it? Uh, is it frustrating to me? Is it causing me to react in a way that I don't want to? Or on the flip side, you say, hey, this choice that I'm making over here, it just needs to be said once. I don't want to think about it anymore, and I'm going to pass that on to someone else. So choice is it's very valuable to us. We think, man, I want to make the choice of everything within my life. But we don't. We often don't do that anyway. There are shelves full of food in a grocery store. Yes, we're choosing, but what's on those shelves isn't a choice that we made. Uh, there were other choices involved, and we are impacted by those. But we can walk into the cereal aisle and feel overwhelmed and just not sure. Like, I don't know. Do I want to get out of default mode, or do I just grab the same thing that I've been used to? Because I don't want to make the choice the next morning on what is it that I'm going to eat. Again, choice is it's step one of change. And from an individual standpoint, I know that it can always feel like, hey, this change, I didn't, I didn't get to choose it in our own life. Something that's impacting your health or financially or whatever it is. And we look at that as this is happening to me. And I know I've mentioned that before. It's it's just an area that we struggle with because the first choice was taken from us. The first choice was taken from us with the reckless driver. We we now have to react to that. The first choice was taken from us on what options are available for the healthcare, for the 401k, for whatever part of your life that you're looking at. And then we have this other area where we're like, I just, I don't want to make a choice. I just need to forget about it. I have too many other things going on. So that's where choice, in understanding how we think about it, how do we analyze it? What do we have in that set it and forget it area? Like, when's the last time you looked at your car insurance or who you have car insurance through? And in the past, my father kept the same agent and the same insurance his entire life. I've switched every few years. I don't want to set it and forget it. It's something that I feel like I don't want to overpay for it. But there are many people who it's just easier to keep it. It becomes a pain to cancel. It's you got to call someone, you have to have a conversation with someone. So we just we stay in that mode because the the environment that we have to do that business in has told us that it's actually more difficult to walk away from it. So who's making the choice? If we aren't willing to look at these things that are sort of lying in default mode or set it in forget it area, like someone else is actually making the choice. That's why it is called choice architecture. That is why there are nudges. That's why there's reminders. Because we as humans, we are busy. But when we don't go back and reanalyze, like, I don't even know when I made that decision. I don't know when that choice was even made to try to understand how you're going to reassess it. Is it really what you want now? Like, has something so substantially changed that it's like, this is not even valid. It doesn't work, it doesn't function the way it needs to, and it's completely broken. Or it sits over on the side of like, well, it's, you know, not going to fix it because it's not 100% broken. But that doesn't mean that you don't run the analysis on it. You don't go in and try to understand, like, when might I need to make that next choice. So that's a discussion on kind of the first choice. And I know it's somewhat simple, but you you have to start to understand how you feel when someone else has made a decision for you, versus you've made a decision and sort of forgotten about it or haven't thought about it in a while. Because change is that moment where current situation is more painful than what the future can be. So, in order to step into that future state, you have to assess current, meaning choice of is this something that I no longer want, no longer want to feel a part of, or no longer serving me in a way that I need it to. So the other segment of choice is this area within our business. So you're now inside of an office and you have started to reflect on yourself how you think about choice. And let's say that you are not in a leadership level, you're not in an executive level, and those leaders are making choices in the business, could be new technology, could be something to do with the direction of the company, could be a merger and acquisition, could be anything small, even whatever the choices that's made for whatever reason by those executives, it does start to impact everyone else, including those outside the business. So we have to start to look at, again, as a leader, one, two, as someone who is having that change impacted on them, onto the second choice area of saying, okay, I did not make the first choice. And we can look at it and say, I am a victim of this. I didn't want it, I didn't ask for it, I don't think we need it. They didn't even consult me. That is an area that we've all been, and for the most part, a lot of people live in within corporations. So if you're sitting as an executive, if you're sitting over here as the leader, you have to understand that that is more than likely how other people feel. So as you begin to address the choice, if you look at it and say, I need to do this change, the first step is choice. How will you communicate it? How will you provide enough information to those that have to be engaged and moving the change forward that they don't feel victims of the first choice? You've got to give them that second choice to get them to understand their level of engagement into the change, into the area of how they're going to make a decision of helping and supporting the change that's about to happen. So within the industry, I can think of some major areas where new technology was coming in and just the reaction of the choice being made within firms. And whether that was shifting from hand drafting to AutoCAD or shifting from AutoCAD into Revit. And this change going from, you know, this technology to humans accepting it ranged all over the place within firms based off of your past, where you were in your career, whether or not you were even going to need to use it, or it just seemed different. So you were like, I've got to fight it, I've got to resist it. Because our mindset often goes to that. Like, I didn't make first choice, so therefore I'm going in resistance. And that is that area that I'm talking about. That's second choice. That's second choice of exploration for you as an individual, um, and understanding as a leader and executive of how you're going to handle that. How will you communicate? How will you get through that change management to support your team during the change? Another area might be merger and acquisition. That's happening more within the industry for architectural firms, small firms being acquired by larger firms, or merging construction with architecture and even more architecture and engineering firms. So this is going to keep happening. And those changes, while seeing from a business perspective, the humans on that other side, it's not always comfortable. Having been through some, the humans on that other side is something that is often forgotten about during the merger and acquisition. And if you want that buy-in, if what you're acquiring are the skill sets of those humans figuring out, okay, this is second choice for them. And what do I mean by second choice in that area? It is they're going to have to be involved in either switching over processes and technology and everything else that's going on, not just the IT department, how they're going to function as a team and a unit and a new process. Anything new that's impacting them will be under scrutiny. And that's that second choice that those individuals are going to make. How they feel first choice is impacting them and whether or not that aligns with their values or goals, they're going to think through that process. And I'm not saying businesses aren't aware of that. It's just what are you acquiring if you aren't figuring out those humans on the other side of that change? So let's also look at another area. And this has more to do with our daily habits. We're in the construction industry, how we we think about projects. And a lot of times we go through these designs, and there is a lot thrown at us from the very beginning. As architects and designers, you get a program, you you define what it is that you're you're building with the client, you begin making difficult choices. How you're going to build it, kind of structural system, what's the foundation? You're collecting data, and that's helping you get to that area of solution. But as you move through the project and the design, there are so many other decisions that you have to make. Choices that you'll be making on behalf of a client based off feedback that you're gathering. But there will be choices that you said it and forget it. There will be specification sections that you grab from the last project or some other project, and it gets inserted into the project. So this area of copying specifications as an example. Master spec only gets updated every so often. And if you are grabbing older specifications, then you're really talking about a cognitive shortcut. Again, it's it's it's this idea that you will go to a more default mode. You will go to something easier that you don't have to hit reset to take more action. It uses less energy within ourselves to do some of those things. And while that can be okay, and maybe that's a choice, it's again a shortcut that you are taking. It is giving up your own agency to make that choice. And we do it routinely within design. We do it routinely within this industry. Just go to the same methods, go to the same decision. And that's not really a choice. That's giving it up. But you're giving up the option of going through and assessing new manufacturers or gathering more information on other manufacturers to know did it even work last time? Like maybe something was wrong with that. Um, and I'm not aware of it because it wasn't brought to my attention, or something was different last time that now, if it's reused as is and not a lot of things are changed, could be major impact, could cause issues. But if we run in a default mode and we're we just don't have time, is what we often tell ourselves, to explore who's making the choice. You might have made the choice, I'm going to reuse a spec because I did like it last time. But you've given up that choice of exploring new manufacturers or exploring a solution that you just aren't going to find. And if our goal is that we want to design the best building for the clients and the augments and everybody that's in it, then exploration should be weighing pretty heavy on a choice of is that exactly what I'm wanting, or is it a byproduct of something else causing me to forego that choice, to pass on it, to simply say default's better than nothing? So change is not easy for anyone. But it's harder when we don't even understand how we relate to it, or how we feel when we make an initial choice versus someone making a choice and we are looking at it as a second area of choice and what our engagement will be, or whether or not it's something that we even want to be involved in. So trying to not oversimplify it, but if you don't start to analyze it, because no one likes forced compliance, I can almost guarantee that. But in most cases, people that I talk to not having a choice feels wrong. Because we've had choices every day of how we're going to address that death, of what kind of career do I want? Of where do I want to live? And you may want to be at that area of exploring it. You might want to take a step back. Just pause for a second and say, I don't remember, I don't remember, you know, how I made this choice. And you you can come on the other side of this assessment that you do for yourself around how you feel about some of the choices or what's sitting in default mode as you analyze them, and you can feel better about where you are now. But you didn't know that before without running through the exercise, without trying to understand, like, hey, how do I feel about choice? And what are some choices that I don't even remember making? And then back inside of your professional life and go back inside your business, just thinking, okay, there was a recent change that was made. How did I react to it? How did I feel? Did I feel like I was being forced to accept it with with no choice? And perhaps you were, which means, again, going back towards leadership and thinking about growing your leadership skills, how will you address that next step? If you want buy-in, if you want people to buy into what you're trying to do for the company, you have to figure out how are you going to get more buy-in? How are you going to give people this ownership of second choice? Again, bonus episodes are really to break down certain areas that I'm hearing in the industry or that I think it's something of value that should be shared. So we started with understanding our relationship with change. And if we want to build a stronger relationship with change, then we need to break it down into components. The choice is step one. It is step one from your own personal life to the decisions that you're making on a daily basis. You choose to stay into the habit and routine that you have, the set it and forget it mentality that you have on some things, or you analyze it and say, again, this no longer serves me. So to get to that next stage, to get to future state, I need to figure out what it is I want. But you can't get there if you don't analyze it. And inside a business, it's the same thing. It is figuring out how did we get here? And was this really what we want? Was this really a decision that that we made as a team? And if it wasn't, what are we going to do to make this better for all individuals involved? How will I, now that I recognize my relationship with choice, how will I now start to have empathy and recognize how others might react to choice? Might react to change. And what can you do to help them start to analyze and recognize their own relationship of choice so that they can begin to take steps of driving towards a change that they want and others want that will stick. And why this is so important is that 70% of all change initiatives they fail to meet their objectives. And it's typically not because the solution wasn't worthwhile or the process change or whatever it is that you're implementing, it's because we forget the humans and we don't connect them to the change because we've never figured out our own relationship with change. And I want everyone to understand because if you were to survey most people in companies, they're going to say, I'm gonna change. My team or division, we seem okay with change. But as a whole company, no, we're terrible at it. Well, something isn't true if that's what the majority of people think. So step one, we have to figure out what our relationship of choice is, how we think about it, how we work through it, how we analyze it, and how do we come back to it after years of set it and forget it. Step two, we have to understand how others might be impacted. We have to try to help others also understand how they react to choice. And if there is a major change happening within your team or company, it's okay to bring it up. Say, like, hey, before we start this change, shouldn't we actually understand how we are all feeling about the change? Shouldn't we have a conversation about it? If it's something that others have made the choice on, we would like to talk about the second choice. And we would like to get buy-in as large as we can because we believe in it. That it will be of greater impact. So choice is step one. Once you have understood choice and you build that next area of strength within change for yourself, you can start to understand control. And once you understand your relationship with control, you can then start to get a feel for what clarity actually means to you. And once you have that, then you can start to analyze how you have done in the past with commitment. Commitment to change. And did you even buy into your own change, let alone someone else's? But once you build that strengthening exercise with each of those areas and each of those steps, then you can get to curiosity. Then you can get to that area where you are in exploration mode, continuous learning, testing, and have a better understanding of yourself and the impact of the choices you're making. And you start to understand how others might feel as well as how they might react to choices. I hope that you're able to find some time to reflect on your relationship with choice as it relates to strengthening your relationship with change. And I hope that you're able to start to look at some of those things within industry that you are like, I think that might be in default mode. I think that might have been upset it, forget it. And we need to go back to exploring more information and data on it to know if we can't fix it or improve upon it. So I hope you stay well. Uh I hope you continue to find those areas that help you strengthen that relationship with chain and find ways to activate your curiosity. The Activating Curiosity podcast is brought to you by Connective Consulting Group, Connective Coaching, part of the Curiosity Building Experiences. If you enjoyed today's episode, don't forget to subscribe so you'll never miss a conversation. Share the podcast with your network. Help us bring more curiosity into the constructive industry. Interested in becoming a guest corresponding? Visit us at activatedcuriosity.bustrout.com for more details. Until next time, keep leading with curiosity.