First, there's inadequate engagement or equipping. Champions are recruited casually, receive little in the way of training or toolkits, and feel they’re being ignored. As a result Champion commitment and activity wither before having any impact – with perhaps a few brave souls pushing on, feeling increasingly unsupported. There’s a ‘double whammy’ here. Not only is change endangered by ineffective Champions (not their fault), but influential individuals have experienced first-hand that their organisation cannot be relied on to support its people through change. Others will watch and draw their own conclusions, even if the Champions say nothing.
Second, we've seen a belief that if Champions are in
place, nothing else need be done. At its
worst, we’ve seen major disconnects between committed champions and
disengaged operational management; business leaders abdicating their
responsibility to drive change; and overloaded champions desperately trying to deliver
ongoing day-to-day responsibilities and move the change initiative forward. The results are predictable: burnt-out,
disillusioned Champions and change hitting the buffers. The risk here, too, is a reaction that says Champions don't work, that it's all about leaders leading.
The lessons seem obvious, but also seem to need
restating. If people need to be engaged
and equipped for a change journey, how much more do those tasked with guiding
them on the journey. And, Champions are simply not an alternative to organisational leaders playing their role – it’s 'both / and'.
An engaged and well-equipped community of Champions,
working in tandem with organisational leadership can be wonderfully
powerful. To deploy ill-equipped and un-supported
champions, working in isolation, is to hang some of the organisation’s best
people out to dry. 
