Force Field Analysis

Driving forces push a situation toward the desired change. Restraining forces push back toward the current state.

Either kind can come from inside or outside the organization, and either can be rational or emotional:

• Driving forces might include customer complaints, a regulatory deadline, a sponsor's commitment or staff frustration with workarounds.
• Restraining forces might include fear of job loss, lack of skills, an incentive that rewards the old way, competing priorities or a system that does not yet support the new process.

The two lists are not mirror images. A restraining force is often a specific obstacle that can be removed, while a driving force is often a general pressure.

Force Field Analysis therefore makes both sides of a change visible in one picture, rather than focusing only on the case for change.

Lewin observed that many social situations, such as a team's output level or a group's working habits, stay roughly constant over time even though they are under pressure from many directions. He described them as quasi-stationary equilibria: the level fluctuates a little but stays where it is because the forces pushing up and the forces pushing down balance each other.

Two practical consequences follow:

• To change the level, the balance must change. A one-off push may move things briefly, but the level returns once the push stops.
• How you shift the balance matters. Adding driving forces tends to raise tension, because the restraining forces push back. Weakening restraining forces lets the level move with less conflict.

This is why Lewin's three-stage model starts with unfreezing.

Quasi-stationary equilibrium is therefore the idea that gives Force Field Analysis its purpose: it explains why stable situations resist change.

Harbourside Council wants its housing and benefits teams to share a single case record for each resident.

1. Define the change. Write the current state and the target state at the top of the page, in concrete terms.
2. List driving forces with the people affected: residents repeating their story, duplicated data entry, an audit finding.
3. List restraining forces: separate data-sharing approvals, different team targets, worries about workload, an old case system.
4. Score each force for strength (see the next section).
5. Check the picture. Ask whether any force is missing, duplicated or really two forces.
6. Choose actions. Start with the strongest restraining forces that the team can influence, then reinforce the drivers.
7. Assign owners and revisit. Forces change as the work progresses, so repeat the analysis at key points.

At Harbourside, the team's first actions were a joint data-sharing agreement and a shared target, not more messages about the benefits.

Run this way, Force Field Analysis turns a debate about whether to change into a plan for what to change first.

Scoring is a common practitioner addition; Lewin's own texts use no numeric scale. Teams usually rate each force from 1 (weak) to 5 (strong) and draw arrows of matching length.

Three cautions apply:

• Scores are judgments. They prompt discussion; they are not measurements.
• Totals do not decide. A higher driving total does not mean the change will succeed, because forces are not independent and do not simply add up.
• Strength is not priority. A strong force the team cannot influence may matter less than a moderate one it can remove.

Force Field Analysis scoring therefore works best as a way to agree priorities, not as a calculation.

The technique's strengths are its simplicity, its balance between support and resistance, and its focus on action.

Its limitations:

• Subjective inputs. The forces and scores reflect the views of the people in the room. Dominant voices or a narrow group can skew the picture.
• A snapshot. The analysis shows one moment; forces shift as soon as the change starts.
• Forces interact. Removing one restraint can strengthen another, and the simple diagram does not show these links.
• A thin version of Lewin's theory. Burnes and Cooke (2013) argue the workshop tool lacks the rigor of Lewin's field theory; Swanson and Creed (2014) add that forces shift and can reverse.
• Resistance as an obstacle only. Some restraining forces carry useful information about flaws in the change itself.

Force Field Analysis is therefore best used as a structured conversation, repeated over time and checked against other evidence.