People engage in many actions that can bring about change. But not all of them are truly proactive. First, change can be evoked unintentionally, for a negative as well as a positive outcome. This is not proactive behavior. Second, people can engage in cognitive restructuring by psychologically reframing or reinterpreting situations. This can be useful and beneficial, as when a threat is reconstrued as an opportunity, or a situation of high stress is viewed as controllable. It can also be detrimental, as when managers deny the existence of real problems, or convince themselves of the viability of an untenable strategy. This, too, is not proactive behavior, because it changes perceptions without changing reality.