Why Don’t People Behave the Way You Expect at Work?
Priyanka Ayodele is a leadership and organisational development specialist and the founder of The Leadership Method. As a Chartered Manager and Associate CIPD member, she supports organisations through leadership development, coaching, and culture-focused work with managers and teams
Most organisations and managers think behaviour is simple. Someone is either engaged or they are not, they are either cooperative or difficult, or they are high performing or underperforming. But if that were true, behaviour would be more predictable, and it isn’t.
You can be clear with your expectations and still get pushback. You can also give people opportunities and still see them hold back, or you can even have capable people who just don’t step up in the way you expect. So, it’s probably not as straightforward as it looks.
We misread behaviour all the time
In most workplaces, behaviour gets labelled very quickly. If someone doesn’t speak much in meetings, they’re seen as lacking confidence or interest. If someone pushes back, they’re labelled difficult or stubborn. Then, we have others who disengage, and they are written off as unmotivated.
It feels like we are making sense of what’s happening, but most of the time, we’re just simplifying it. We focus on what we can see, instead of asking what might be driving it.
Behaviour is not random
Behaviour at work is not random. Most of the time, it is people trying to figure out where they stand. Not in an obvious way, but underneath it all, people are constantly working things out. They ask questions such as, “Where do I fit here?” “Do I have a voice?” “Do I have control?” or “Do I actually matter in this team?”
When these questions have unclear answers, behaviour starts to change.
How this will present in people
This is why you will see patterns, as we spoke about before. People staying quiet in meetings, is this because they have nothing to say, or is it because they’re not sure how it will be perceived? When people display pushback or challenging behaviour, this is not just attitude, it could be someone trying to hold onto a sense of autonomy or trying to have their voice heard.
What about disengagement? Is this laziness, or is it a disconnect between what someone is doing and what feels meaningful to them? Then, we have the person who overworks. This is not always ambition, but sometimes a way of proving value or avoiding being questioned.
When we look at it like this, the behaviour starts to make more sense.
Why this gets missed
The reality is, most managers are not taught to think about behaviour this way. The focus is usually on outcomes, such as targets, performance, and delivery.
Under pressure, it is so much easier to label what you are seeing than to slow it down and understand it. This is why behaviour ends up getting managed at surface level, while whatever is driving it underneath stays the same, creating an environment where change can never truly happen.
What to do instead
Instead of asking, “What is wrong with them?” it is worth asking, “What might be going on here?” Questions that can create a proactive culture are, “What feels unclear?” “What feels out of their control?” or “What does not feel safe to say out loud?” These questions don’t need to be overcomplicated, but when you start looking underneath behaviour instead of reacting to it, you tend to get a very different response.
If the same behaviours keep showing up in your team, it is usually not a coincidence. It is a sign that something underneath has not been addressed, and until it is, behaviour won’t really change, it will just show up in different ways.
Read more from Priyanka Ayodele
Priyanka Ayodele, Leadership and Business Specialist
Priyanka Ayodele (CMgr MCMI, Assoc. CIPD) is a Chartered Manager and Associate CIPD member and the founder of The Leadership Method. Her work focuses on leadership, team culture, and organisational development. Earlier in her career, she studied psychology and worked in mental health, which shaped her interest in how people experience leadership at work. Having experienced both poor management and the kind of leadership that helps people grow, she saw firsthand how much impact managers can have on someone's confidence and development. The managers who recognised her potential played a big part in shaping the leader she is today. That experience now influences the work she does at The Leadership Method
