As employees’ support for an organizational change is critical for its success, change agents require guidelines on how to initiate change recipients’ endorsement. Accordingly, there is a need for an evidence-based understanding of which communication behaviors drive positive versus negative change reactions, as well as about the psychological mechanisms that explain effective communication. To advance our knowledge about successful change communication, we tested how autonomy-supportive communication, autonomy-restrictive communication, and reflective listening are associated with change recipients’ reactions. Building on Self-Determination Theory, we also tested the mediating mechanism of the satisfaction of recipients’ psychological needs between change agents’ actions and change recipients’ reactions. In three studies, we explored how change agents can use their communication to enhance recipients’ change readiness, as manifested in increased energy-saving intentions. In Study 1, we separately examined the effect of each communication behavior on change readiness. We coded dyadic change conversations for autonomy-supportive (vs. autonomy-restrictive) communication and reflective listening. Results showed that autonomy-restrictive communication negatively impacted recipients’ change readiness. Study 2 used an online experiment to distinguish between the effect of change agents’ autonomy-supportive and -restrictive communication. We found an indirect effect of change agents’ communication behaviors on recipients’ change readiness via psychological need fulfillment. In Study 3, we investigated how change agents “in the field” responded to recipients’ expressed resistance. Findings indicated that change agents use more autonomy-restrictive than -supportive communication, suggesting that their communication typically undermines rather than facilitates recipients’ change readiness.

由于员工对组织变革的支持对其成功至关重要，因此变革推动者需要有关如何启动变革接受者认可的指南。因此，需要对哪些沟通行为驱动积极与消极的变化反应，以及解释有效沟通的心理机制有一个循证的理解。为了提高我们对成功变革沟通的了解，我们测试了自主支持型沟通、自主限制型沟通和反思性倾听如何与变革接受者的反应相关联。在自决理论的基础上，我们还测试了变革推动者的行为和变革接受者的反应之间接受者心理需求满足的中介机制。在三项研究中，我们探索了变革推动者如何利用他们的沟通来增强接受者的变革准备，这体现在增加的节能意图上。在研究 1 中，我们分别检查了每种沟通行为对变革准备的影响。我们为自主支持（与自主限制）交流和反思倾听编写了二元变化对话。结果表明，自主限制性沟通对接受者的变革准备产生负面影响。研究 2 使用在线实验来区分变革推动者的自主支持和限制性沟通的影响。我们发现变革推动者的沟通行为通过心理需求满足对接受者变革准备的间接影响。在研究 3 中，我们调查了“现场”变革推动者如何回应接受者表达的抵制。调查结果表明，变革推动者使用更多的自主限制性沟通而非支持性沟通，这表明他们的沟通通常会破坏而不是促进接受者的变革准备。