In 2005, I met my coach, mentor, and dear late friend, Tim Dalmau, after being tasked with turning around a violent, unruly, and unproductive workforce in Melbourne, Australia. Upon asking for a full account of my assignment, Tim and I engaged in several discussions, uncovering multiple logical fallacies embedded within the challenge I was facing.

This essay captures the essence of those initial conversations, as well as the subsequent ones, about culture change. I have aligned our points to their corresponding formal fallacy definitions. The term non sequitur—Latin for “it does not follow”—is often used to describe such fallacies in logical reasoning. The main takeaway is this: starting with incorrect beliefs about culture, or using flawed reasoning, means that desired culture change simply does not follow. To achieve cultural transformation, another, more robust approach must lead.

Overview

Organisational culture plays a pivotal role in shaping the behaviours, beliefs, and practices within a company. Culture is not just slogans on the walls or corporate jargon; it influences how people think, interact, and engage with their work. Yet, culture is a complex adaptive system, not easily altered or controlled. Many leaders mistakenly believe that by tweaking visible elements of the organisation, they can fundamentally change its culture. These misunderstandings often arise from logical fallacies—errors in reasoning that lead to flawed approaches.

By understanding these logical missteps, leaders can better grasp why their cultural change efforts frequently fail. I provide everyday examples of these fallacies to show how easily we can be misled by them in trivial situations that may not carry much consequence. However, when these fallacies are applied to something as complex and abstract as culture, and especially to the difficult endeavour of changing that culture, the consequences can be significant.

Understanding Organisational Culture

Before diving into the specific fallacies, it’s essential to define organisational culture. Culture consists of multiple layers, from visible artefacts like symbols and language, to deeper, unconscious assumptions about how things should work. Craig Lundberg’s model helps explain this complexity by dividing culture into four levels:

1. Artefacts
2. Perspectives
3. Values
4. Unconscious assumptions

The surface-level elements like behaviours and rituals are just one part of a much larger whole, which also includes deeper norms and beliefs.

One key issue is that leaders often treat organisational culture as though it were a static object that can be directly altered by modifying one of its layers—typically the visible one. In reality, culture is dynamic, evolving through complex interactions between employees, leadership, and external factors. Changing culture requires a deep understanding of these layers, and it cannot be achieved by addressing only the visible parts. The five fallacies discussed below each stem from the failure to appreciate this complexity.

1. Hasty Generalisation Fallacy

A hasty generalisation occurs when someone draws a broad conclusion based on limited or insufficient evidence. In the context of organisational culture, this manifests to believe that changing a few visible artefacts (such as employee behaviours or company symbols) will change the entire culture.

For example, imagine a retail company that decides to introduce “Casual Fridays” across the whole of the retail outlets because the CEO had visited one outlet that had taken this approach and had a big improvement in their staff attendance rates. A year later, the CEO was disappointed that there had not been an improvement in attendance rates across the business. He was surprised that, in some outlets, the attendance had gotten worse. That what worked in one location would work universally across all outlets did not follow.

This fallacy equates superficial manifestations with deeper cultural issues, overlooking the complexity beneath. In the same way, a hasty generalisation such as, “politicians are corrupt”, unfairly generalises all politicians as corrupt and fails to consider that a number might act with integrity. Such, hasty generalisation leads to flawed reasoning and poor decision-making. Effective culture change requires addressing the deeper values and assumptions, not just visible artefacts.

2. False Cause Fallacy

The false cause fallacy assumes that because one event follows another, the first must have caused the second. In cultural change efforts, leaders often fall into this trap by believing that changing superficial elements of culture (such as behaviours or espoused values) will automatically lead to deeper cultural transformation.

For instance, an organisation might create a new mission statement and expect that this will result in a shift in employee attitudes and productivity. But just because the new mission statement precedes a cultural shift does not mean it causes one. The deeper, often unconscious assumptions that guide employee behaviour remain unchanged, leading to a disconnect between the new mission and the day-to-day realities of organisational life.

A real-world example of this fallacy is when a football supporter says, “I knew it was going to be a tough match, so I wore my lucky socks for the game and my team won!”. Just because the team won while wearing the socks, it does not follow that the superficial socks caused the victory. Similarly, leaders who focus on superficial cultural elements without affecting underlying values or unconscious assumptions are engaging in a false cause fallacy.

3. Confusing Cause and Effect

Confusing cause and effect is a common fallacy where one assumes that changing one factor (culture) will automatically resolve broader issues. In organisational contexts, leaders often treat culture as both the cause of, and the solution to, their problems. This is a misunderstanding of how culture operates as an outcome of other factors, such as leadership, organisational structure, and external pressures.

Consider a situation where a company experiences poor performance. Leadership might conclude that the issue lies in the culture, believing that if they can instil a more productive or innovative culture, performance will improve. However, this overlooks other potential causes, such as ineffective leadership or outdated processes. Focusing solely on culture as the cause or solution to organisational issues can lead to wasted efforts and missed opportunities for real improvement.

Imagine your incredulous reaction if you heard someone say, “Wearing glasses makes your eyesight worse because many people with glasses have poor vision”. You would instantly recognise it does not follow that wearing glasses (cause) worsens vision (effect) but that it’s exactly the other way around: people with impaired vision (cause) wear glasses (effect).

Yet, many leaders view culture as the reason (cause) for a plethora organisational issues (effects). Not only is this a gross oversimplification, but it is also confusing cause and effect: plural and diverse unseen and unconscious social forces (cause) which create the organisation’s culture (effect).

4. Fallacy of Composition

The fallacy of composition occurs when one assumes that what is true of a part is true of the whole. It’s a form of over extrapolating a biased sample, a practice that scientific study scrupulously attempts to avoid. In large organisations, sub-cultures often exist within different departments or teams, shaped by specific roles, leadership styles, or geographical locations. The mistake arises when leaders assume that one sub-culture reflects the culture of the entire organisation.

For example, the marketing department of a company might have a highly collaborative and innovative culture, but the finance department could be more hierarchical and rigid. Assuming that the entire organisation operates with the same values as the marketing team would overlook these important differences. When leaders attempt to apply cultural changes uniformly across all teams, they risk alienating departments that function differently.

As an everyday instance of this fallacy, I took my three-year old daughter to the beach in Far North Queensland, Australia. She asked if there were any sharks in the sea. I walked into the water with her wee bucket and filled it with seawater. I peered into the bucket and said, “Nope”. My three-year-old looked at me as if I had gone crazy and, yet, this is the same error well educated executives often make: yes, I had taken a sample of the sea but it does not follow that my bucket of seawater was an unbiased microcosm of the whole sea.

5. Reification Fallacy (Hypostatization)

The reification fallacy occurs when an abstract concept is treated as if it were a concrete, tangible thing. This is particularly the case where people lapse into metaphor. In organisational culture, this fallacy emerges when leaders treat culture as if it were a physical entity that can be directly manipulated through interventions such as workshops or new policies. In reality, culture is an emergent phenomenon shaped by relationships, practices, and shared meanings—not something that can be engineered like a machine.

For example, some leaders may believe that by instituting new values or introducing team-building exercises, they can “fix” the culture. This oversimplifies the nature of culture, treating it as a static object that can be controlled through specific actions. However, culture is fluid and evolves based on complex interactions between people and their environment. Treating it as something that can be precisely engineered ignores its complexity.

As an everyday example, I am often told by someone that they want to have more confidence or that they want have more love in their life. I’ll ask, “Is that one extra litre of love or two?”. They look at me, rightly, with incredulity but they are the one’s confusing the noun, ‘love’, with the internal processes and external behaviours of loving and being loved in return. In NLP, this process of turning verbs into nouns is called nominalisation.

‘Culture’ is another nominalisation. When leaders say that the want to have a better culture and then reduce it to a set of visible actions or policies prescriptions, they fail to capture its deeper, dynamic nature. Leaders who engage in this fallacy risk implementing changes that fail to resonate with the lived experiences of employees.

Avoiding Cultural Change Fallacies

Avoiding these formal fallacies requires a nuanced and flexible approach to cultural change. Leaders must recognise that culture is not a static entity that can be altered with superficial interventions. Instead, it is a dynamic system influenced by deeper assumptions, values, and behaviours.

One of the most important strategies for avoiding these fallacies is to ensure that any cultural change initiative involves deeper engagements with employees. Leaders should focus on addressing unconscious assumptions and values through dialogue, reflection, and shared experiences. Rather than imposing a top-down change, they should model desired behaviours and foster an environment where new cultural norms can emerge organically.

Leaders must also be wary of overgeneralising from sub-cultures or assuming that visible changes will lead to deeper transformation. By taking a holistic view of the organisation and recognising the diversity of its sub-cultures, leaders can develop more effective strategies for long-term cultural change that resonate with the entire organisation.

Final Thoughts

Changing organisational culture is no simple task, and leaders often fall into logical traps that undermine their efforts. The five fallacies outlined—hasty generalisation, false cause, confusing cause and effect, fallacy of composition, and reification—highlight the common mistakes made when trying to engineer cultural transformation. By recognising these formal fallacies and the flawed assumptions they generate, leaders can approach cultural change with a more realistic and effective strategy.

Ultimately, culture is an emergent and dynamic system that cannot be controlled through surface-level changes. Successful cultural change requires a deep understanding of the layers that shape behaviour, a willingness to engage with employees, and the flexibility to adapt to evolving circumstances. Leaders who avoid these fallacies will be better positioned to create meaningful, lasting cultural change.