The $10 Million Data Project That Nearly Failed Because of Feelings
How I Discovered That Emotions Are Sidelining Your Innovation
Hey there,
I’m Meg Buzzi, and I help organizations navigate change with clarity, collaboration and joy. But that’s not where this story began.
Twenty-five years ago, I was a poetry MFA student at the Iowa Writers’ Workshop, distracted by the early internet. This was back when you couldn’t buy books online, when the web was this magical, wild space full of interesting personal content without the commercial overlay we know today. It felt like the future was being written in real time. I wanted in.
Like many liberal arts folks of my generation, I got lured into the first dot-com boom. The tech world needed people who could think critically about systems, and we thought, “Oh, this is just translation. This is just more language. We know how to do this.”
I was naive enough to believe technology was the answer to everything.
The root of my curiosity was simple: helping people connect to innovation that improves their lives and the collective.
The Moment Everything Changed
A decade later, I found myself leading a massive data integration project at UCLA - a $10 million effort to streamline the academic review process that had been broken and expensive since...always. We were reconciling 40+ legacy systems, trying to create a single source of truth for faculty data.
Technically, everything should have worked. We had the right tech, the right architecture, the right project plans.
But six months in, we were hemorrhaging requirements and couldn’t get clear priorities from our sponsors. Data stewards were dragging their feet. Central administrators were finding excuses to delay implementation. Bureaucrats who should have been our allies were creating roadblocks at every turn.
That’s when I had a lightning bolt moment.
**The problem wasn’t the data. The problem was that data is personal.**
Everything we were asking people to do - consolidate their systems, standardize their processes, make their work transparent - felt like a threat to their identity, their expertise, their sense of control.
When Data Gets Personal
Here’s what I discovered: Your most rational, analytical employees become completely irrational when you ask them to change how they manage “their” data.
The registrar’s office had one definition of “student status.” The graduate division had another. Health Sciences had a third. Each group was emotionally attached to their version because it represented years of careful work, institutional memory, and professional identity.
When we tried to create one unified system, it wasn’t a technical challenge - it was an existential crisis.
**People were terrified that standardizing their data meant exposing their practices to scrutiny, potentially being replaced by automation, or losing the unique value they brought to their organization.**
I watched brilliant professionals - people with advanced degrees, decades of experience - sabotage million-dollar projects because they were afraid of what the data might reveal about them or their processes.
The Hidden Emotional Cost of Innovation
Here’s what most leaders miss: your data stewards, your researchers, your process owners, your institutional knowledge holders are human beings with feelings. And those feelings can tank your most important initiatives when the feelings aren’t surfaced.
Fear of accountability. Fear of being judged. Fear of losing relevance. Fear of making the wrong decision and becoming “the bad guy.”
I call this the **Relational Infrastructure** of organizations - the invisible network of feelings, relationships, and personal stakes that actually determines whether your innovations succeed or fail.
Why I Do This Work
After 20+ years of helping organizations transform, I know we can have a far greater impact than we imagine when we lean into relationship, connection, and trust in our work environments.
The organizations that successfully implement new technologies aren’t necessarily those with the best technical resources. They’re the ones that understand the human side of change - that recognize when someone is pushing back on a new system, they’re often protecting something deeper than just their workflow.
I call myself a “change artist” because transformation isn’t just about implementing new processes or platforms. It’s about creating the conditions where people feel safe enough to let go of the old ways and embrace something new.
What You’ll Find Here
Through FIXCHR (my consultancy) and this Substack, I’m documenting what I’m learning about:
**The relational infrastructure of organizations** and how feelings drive (or derail) your biggest initiatives
**Why innovation and tech projects fail** - and how to design implementations that honor both technical requirements and human psychology
**The relationship between innovation and trust** - how psychological safety accelerates adoption
**Ancient wisdom for modern crises** - what indigenous cultures teach us about managing collective change
**The social fabric imperative** - why relationships are the insurance policy for all your other investments
The Pattern I Keep Seeing
Whether I’m working with government agencies, tech startups, or global nonprofits, the same pattern emerges: the technical stuff is usually the easy part. It’s the human stuff - the emotions, the relationships, the unspoken fears - that determines whether change initiatives succeed or become expensive failures.
Your data stewards aren’t being difficult. Your department heads aren’t resisting change out of stubbornness. Your bureaucrats aren’t creating roadblocks for fun.
They’re protecting something that feels essential to their sense of value and belonging.
My Question for You
As leaders, we’re constantly asking: “What new technology do we need? How do we drive adoption? Why isn’t our team embracing this innovation that will clearly make their lives better?”
But what if we started asking: “What are our people afraid of losing? How do we create enough safety for them to take risks? What story are our current systems telling about their competence, and how do we honor that while building something new?”
What if the key to successful innovation isn’t better technology - it’s better emotional intelligence about how humans experience change?
Let’s Get Real
I’m not here to sell you another change management framework or digital transformation strategy. I’m here to help you see the invisible emotional currents that actually move organizations, to surface the fears that are silently sabotaging your initiatives, and to co-create the conditions where your people feel safe enough to embrace the future.
The organizations that thrive in uncertainty aren’t those with the most sophisticated technology - they’re the ones that understand that innovation is fundamentally a human experience, and humans need to feel seen, valued, and safe before they can let go of what they know.
Ready to explore what’s possible when we prioritize relationship and design change that honors the full complexity of human experience?
Welcome to the chat.
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* Meg Buzzi is a systems change innovator, certified coach, and co-founder of FIXCHR consulting. With an MFA from the Iowa Writers’ Workshop and 20+ years leading transformation projects, she helps organizations navigate change by building the relational infrastructure that makes everything else possible. She’s based in Los Angeles and works with teams worldwide.*