This article deepens and expands the study of the three dimensions of resistance to change in employees: resistant thought, resistant feeling, and resistant behavior. It includes an analysis of the moderating effect of the employee's organization‐based self‐esteem on the influence of variables related to the management of the change process (i.e., involvement in the change—communication and participation) on each of these dimensions of resistance. The empirical analysis uses a sample of 143 employees who work in companies that embarked on programs of structural change in the two years prior to the current research being carried out. The results support the moderating effect of organization‐based self‐esteem on the influence of employee participation on resistant thought and resistant feeling, but not on resistant behavior. The results also suggest that resistant thought, resistant feeling, and resistant behavior have different antecedents related to the context of the change (employee involvement in the change and employee perceived benefits).

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This chapter deepens the study of the three components of resistance to change in employees: cognitive, affective, and behavioral. It includes an analysis of the sequential character of them, through the effect that the variables related to the management of the change process and to the change consequences for employees exert on each of these components. With a sample of employees who work in companies that have embarked on programs of change in the two years prior information gathering. Our results question the mediating effect of cognitive and affective resistance and, consequently, the sequential character of the three components of resistance. Results put forward that cognitive and affective resistance are conceptually different, have different antecedents, and exert different effects on the behavioral resistance. Moreover behavioral resistance is jointly determine by the cognitive and affective components of resistance to change.