Why Staff Need a Reason to Change Behavior
Your staff already know what to do and how to do it. So why are they still not doing it?
In this episode of Learning for Good, I break down why explaining the why is one of the simplest and most overlooked workplace behavior change strategies nonprofit leaders have available.
Nonprofit leaders pour energy into teaching their teams what to do and how to do it, then feel baffled when the new behavior never sticks. It is easy to assume the problem is the training itself, when the real gap might be something far simpler and far easier to fix.
▶️ Key Points:
00:00 How an Explanation Can Change Behavior
05:11 Ellen Langer's Research on Behavior Change and Compliance
08:38 Closing the Gap Between Staff Training and Behavior Change
Transform How Your Staff Show Up at Work
You’ve built the course. You’ve done the training. You’ve walked the team through the new process, maybe more than once. And still, nothing changes. People go back to the old way. The new behavior never sticks.
If this sounds familiar, you’re not alone. The good news is the problem probably isn’t your training. It’s not the delivery method. And it’s not your staff.
The missing piece is smaller than you think, and it’s hiding in plain sight.
It’s the word because.
So that’s what we dove into on episode 193 of the Learning for Good podcast.
Knowledge Doesn’t Change Behavior, but Neither Does Skill Alone
There was a time when I quit doing box jumps in CrossFit. I didn’t understand the reason for doing them. I couldn’t tie it to functional fitness (in my head; arguably, it does tie to functional fitness). And no one had explained it to me.
Then one day a coach mentioned how box jumps train “power” for other movements.
It all clicked. And I began doing box jumps again.
The “why” translated to action for me.
I already had the skill. I had the ability. I just didn’t have the why.
So when I learned why box jumps are important, my motivation shifted.
And I began doing box jumps again.
The Research is Clear: Explaining Why Changes Behavior
In 1978, Harvard researcher Ellen Langer conducted a study on the word “because.” Could explaining why change behavior?
She set the study up on a college campus at a copy machine, which in the 70s was a busy place to be. She asked people to try to break in line at the copy machine. She tested three different phrasings:
No reason given: “Excuse me, I have five pages. May I use the Xerox machine?”
A meaningless reason: “Excuse me, I have five pages. May I use the Xerox machine because I need to make copies?”
A real reason: “Excuse me, I have five pages. May I use the Xerox machine because I’m in a rush.”
When no reason was given, they saw 60% compliance. But, when the person gave a reason for breaking in line, they saw a 93% (meaningless reason) and 94% (real reason) success rate.
The jump from 60% to 93% happened simply by adding the word because…explaining why.
How to Bridge People from Knowing to Doing
Let’s apply this insight to the workplace. We are constantly asking people to do things.
Managers, you should coach your staff.
Fundraisers, you should maintain clean donor data.
Comms specialists, you should use AI.
Program volunteers, you should practice trauma-informed care.
But why?
Why should they do the things we want them to do?
If we aren’t explaining the why, there’s a gap between the knowing and the doing.
Picture two cliffs facing each other. On the left side, your staff knows what to do and how to do it. You’ve covered the content. The training happened. The skills are technically there. On the right side is where you actually need them to be: implementing those skills and behaviors consistently, in the moments that matter, without being asked. The gap between those two cliffs is real. You can’t just tell people to jump across. Without a bridge, they’ll default to what’s familiar. The why is your bridge.
When people understand why a change matters, something shifts:
They feel buy-in instead of resistance.
They feel motivation instead of confusion.
They persist when the new behavior gets hard…and it will get hard because behavior change is uncomfortable.
Without the why, you might see initial attempts, but the moment the new approach creates friction—and friction always comes—your staff will retreat to familiar ground. They’ll go back to what they’ve always done.
An Example of Workplace Behavior Change
Imagine a mid-sized nonprofit rolling out a new case management process.
The L&D team builds a solid training: clear steps, a job aid, a recorded walkthrough. Staff complete the training. Completion rates are solid. But three months later, about half the team has quietly reverted to their own documentation methods.
When the L&D leader investigates, she finds that staff understood the new process. They just didn’t understand why it mattered. No one had connected the dots between consistent documentation and the organization’s ability to demonstrate outcomes to funders, which directly affected the program’s budget. No one had explained that the new process wasn’t a compliance exercise; it was the foundation of the case for support.
When the L&D leader went back to each team meeting and spent ten minutes walking through that connection—what the data made possible, what happened when it was inconsistent, what funders were actually looking for—behavior started to shift. It wasn’t lack of skill. The training had taught them what to do and how to do it. It was the why that was missing.
This is the difference between training as a deliverable and learning as a strategy. One checks a box. The other changes behavior. And the thing that separates them, more often than not, is whether the why was built into the design from the start.
To learn more about the power of explaining why, tune into episode 193 of the Learning for Good podcast.
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