Behavior Change Wheel (Michie)

Susan Michie's Behavior Change Wheel (BCW) synthesizes 19 frameworks into one unified model. At its center: COM-B (Behavior requires Capability, Opportunity, and Motivation). Surrounding it are nine intervention functions: education, persuasion, incentivization, coercion, training, restriction, environmental restructuring, modeling, and enablement. The BCW's diagnostic power forces identification of which COM-B component is the barrier before selecting an intervention—most behavior change failures result from misdiagnosing barriers (providing education when the problem is opportunity, or incentivizing when the problem is capability).

When to use it

When designing any behavior change intervention—personal, organizational, or product-level. When previous change attempts have failed and you need to diagnose why. When choosing between education, incentives, environmental design, or other approaches. When building health, wellness, or productivity products.

How it can help

When any desired behavior isn't happening, use COM-B diagnostically: Is it Capability (does the person know how?)? Opportunity (does the environment support it?)? Or Motivation (do they want to?)? Most organizations default to education and incentives, when the barrier is often environmental opportunity. If employees aren't using a new tool, the issue might not be training but that the tool requires five clicks where the old one required one. The BCW prevents misdiagnosis by forcing systematic barrier identification before intervention selection.