There are lots of lessons from the recent shocking upset in the presidential election.

But senior executives can really benefit from insights that Donald Trump’s unexpected victory has for managing change. Here are four lessons leaders should heed in managing today’s changing, aging workforce.

1. Be skeptical about the judgment of elites

Every pundit from Maine to Monterey had Hillary Clinton elected as the next president. So did veteran politicians, Wall Street, and your local bookie. And they were all wrong!

When it comes to an aging workforce, problems retaining millennials, and emerging skill shortages, just because your leadership team isn’t implementing the major talent management changes needed to sustain growth, doesn’t mean they’re right.

I was working with the senior leaders of a major professional services firm recently. Like me, they’re mostly old white guys, and I could see their resistance to making serious changes in the company’s culture and operations to retain more high-potential women and minorities in key roles. Just because these veteran leaders think they can continue to grow their business without making big changes doesn’t mean the firm will be able to keep growing.

What assumptions about your critical talent base and leadership pipeline are you making that could be threatening your company’s future?

2. Connect emotionally with the people who really matter in making your change real.

Clinton won the popular vote count by well over a million ballots. But she failed to get the support of people where it really mattered – in Pennsylvania, Wisconsin and Michigan. She spent much more time in Florida and North Carolina, states she could actually afford to lose.

Do you know for sure who your key stakeholders are in making your change initiative work? Are you investing your time and resources in the right places to get the results you want?

And are you “finding the feeling” with the people who really matter? Not only do you need to identify the key players needed to make your changes a reality, but you also have to connect with them on emotional level, showing why your new initiatives are important to them. In certain key states, Trump was clearly better than Clinton in connecting emotionally with the voters he needed to win. In an era of communication and activity overload, unless you connect emotionally with the right people, meaningful change won’t happen.

3. Don’t assume Big Data is your silver bullet for driving meaningful change.

Democrats clearly had more resources invested in analyzing the presidential election, targeting voters and linking this information to field operations. Yet, they failed to communicate accurately what was really happening in Wisconsin, Michigan and Pennsylvania.

Analyzing data about market opportunities or the state of your business is still a young science, which can provide insights but not definitive answers. Using predictive analytics to guide decisions related to managing change is risky business with limited ability to accurately forecast the future.

“Even with the best models, it is difficult to predict the weather more than 10 days out because there are so many small changes that can cause big changes,” says a Yale researcher who studied why the election polls were so far off.

If data modeling and predicting outcomes are key drivers in your decisions around talent management and organizational change, be careful about failing to recognize the limitations and possible faulty assumptions underlying your models. In retrospect, those supporting Hillary Clinton put too much faith in the power of data collection and the math behind it. This proved to be extremely costly.

4. Don’t underestimate the incredible power of the “status quo” in a world demanding change.

Anyone paying attention knows the employment market has changed dramatically in the last two decades, primarily due to globalization and new technologies. These macro economic forces are taking away U.S. jobs that will never return. Yet, there is an incredibly strong desire to recreate or sustain the status quo, i.e. “Make American Great Again!”

Almost every leader implementing change must deal with the powerful undertow of maintaining – or recreating – the status quo. Hillary Clinton seriously underestimated this desire to keep things as they were – bringing jobs back – to create better economic opportunities for voters who feel incredibly vulnerable. Leaders who misjudge the power of retaining the status quo are much less likely to successfully implement innovative solutions that will shape tomorrow’s workforce.

Four lessons from the presidential election that will help you implement innovative solutions for a changing, aging workforce:

1. Be skeptical of what the power structure around you is advocating. They may be clinging to outdated assumptions. Challenge those assumptions!

2. Focus on connecting emotionally with the people who really matter in creating the outcomes you want. Clinton failed to do this in Pennsylvania, Michigan and Wisconsin.

3. Don’t assume “big data” and accompanying analytics hold the answer to all important talent management questions underlying your business.

4. And always respect the powerful pull of the status quo. Anticipating resistance to change – and dealing with it directly – is a critical competency for any leader today.

Contact me to explore how I might help you manage the difficult organizational changes needed to develop and retain a highly-skilled workforce in today’s competitve talent environment..