> It should be safe to be vulnerable
The number one cause of stress for me is that management did not protect me enough. When I changed something, it would have some minor knock on impact that upset someone (sometimes someone very junior), who would go and see a director, who would go and see the MD and then I would get career threatening back room deals going on that I was not party to. If you are going to get someone to come and push the company forward at sub-boardroom level, make sure your directors are 100% committed to the changes.'You can't make an omelet without breaking eggs', make sure you are ready to accept broken eggs. Make sure when petty stuff is brought to senior people they divert it straight back to the project sponsor (or whoever). Make sure individual managers know this change is happening, and it is their job to allow it and make their staff happy with it.
There is nothing worse than when you are in the heart of a technical change, than to find out you are in trouble with the boss because a secretary in another dept is sad that you changed their UI.
Worse still when you are passed over for a promotion because the MD is concerned that you upset a few people, when it wasn't your job to manage the people side in the first place.
Transparency is part of the answer, but in the situation I describe it actually becomes a matter of giving people far too much info, so they can't claim they were not consulted! This is counter-productive too.
Senior managers need to take a very firm line with passive-aggressive behavior that is trying to stop change, or not start the change off to begin with.