Dubai, UAE | originally written to be published on 12 May 2026

As I continue exploring stakeholder agency, I found that Ikebana offers an unexpectedly elegant lens to corporate life. For the first 5 articles one principle at a time: I will be focusing on how its architecture is intentional: shin(真), the main line representing aspiration; soe (副), the supporting line that creates relational balance; hikae (控), the grounding element; ma (間), the purposeful space between forms; and kaki (花器), the vessel that holds the arrangement. This week, I start with the Shin (真) translating as the Truth. As the longest and most visually dominant line in the arrangement, it traditionally symbolises aspiration, often interpreted as a connection to heaven or ultimate truth.

Last Sunday morning, I attended my second ikebana class since 2021, this time with my friend Cara Nazari, CEO of the American Chamber of Commerce in Dubai for whom it was a first. The session was led by Harue Oki, the Ohara School of Ikebana Sensei in the UAE. That Sunday workshop was a special one because we had the opportunity to work with a dancing allium, a blush English garden rose, and delicate supporting flowers.

What struck me was how fitting the dancing allium was as the central subject of this reflection. Unlike the conventional upright allium, this cultivated variety is intentionally shaped into movement and asymmetry, carrying both its history and its distinctiveness visibly in its form. It felt like an unexpectedly apt metaphor for organisational life, where individuals arrive not as blank slates, but already shaped by prior experiences, environments, and ways of seeing the world.

That small moment prompted a larger question: how do organisations create the possibility for individuals to flourish in their own form? Organisational research has long suggested that performance is not simply a function of individual capability, but of context, relationships, and structure (Edmondson, 1999; Weick, 1995).

The Dancing Allium and the Employee in their Own Form

In traditional ikebana, shin (真) is the defining element around which the arrangement takes shape. In our composition that Sunday, that role belonged to the dancing allium, a cultivated variety valued precisely for its curved, sculptural form rather than conventional straightness. That detail feels particularly relevant to organisational life.

As leaders we often forget that like the dancing allium, employees do not arrive as blank slates waiting to be shaped entirely by the institution. They come already formed by prior experiences, professional cultures, mentors, industries, strengths, habits, and ways of seeing the world that have shaped their distinctive contribution.

From a stakeholder agency perspective, this matters because employees are not passive recipients of organisational design, but internal stakeholders with the capacity to interpret, adapt, influence, and shape outcomes (Emirbayer & Mische, 1998; Freeman, 1984). Organisational psychology similarly suggests that individuals are more likely to thrive when autonomy, competence, and authenticity are preserved rather than suppressed (Deci & Ryan, 2000).

This is not simply a cultural preference. In environments defined by uncertainty, transformation, and complexity, organisations increasingly depend on differentiated thinking, adaptive judgement, and perspectives that do not merely replicate one another.

Cassandra and the Shin-ful Temptation to Ignore Truth

Both Cassandra and the allium carry something already formed, sometimes in ways that are not immediately appealing. The dancing allium, for instance, arrives with its unconventional curved form and unmistakable onion-like scent, and yet remains entirely capable of shining in its own term when enabled.

In Greek tragedy, Cassandra, daughter of Priam of Troy, appears as the bearer of truth that goes tragically unheard. In Aeschylus’ Agamemnon, she foresees violence and catastrophe with devastating clarity, yet remains powerless to persuade those around her (Aeschylus, 2009). Her tragedy is not that she lacks truth, but that the system around her lacks the willingness, humility, or capacity to recognise it. Cassandra feels. I cannot help but wonder how differently the Trojan story might have unfolded had Cassandra’s warnings been meaningfully considered.

Within organisations, that parallel feels strikingly relevant, albeit far less dramatic. Employees are not passive recipients of managerial direction, but stakeholders capable of interpretation, judgement, and meaningful influence (Emirbayer & Mische, 1998). Many of us have experienced what it feels like to carry a perspective, concern, or insight that goes unheard simply because it arrives in an unfamiliar form. Equally, we know how profoundly affirming it feels when we are genuinely heard.

Perhaps that is one of the more shin-ful temptations of leadership and institutions alike: not the absence of talent, but the failure to recognise value and grooming them when it arrives in unfamiliar form. Seemingly, organisations increasingly recognise the strategic importance of diversity as strategically valuable (McKinsey & Company, 2025). The deeper question is whether they are structurally equipped not merely to embrace and groom these differences.

Industry 5.0 and the Return of the Human

This reflection feels particularly relevant at a time when organisations are being asked to rethink their relationship with people altogether. The efficiency-centred logic of Industry 4.0 brought extraordinary advances in automation, optimisation, and digital transformation. Yet its human implications have often been more ambiguous, with people at times reduced to resources to be managed, measured, and made more efficient.

Industry 5.0 proposes something more ambitious. The European Commission (2021) frames it as a shift toward industrial models that place human well-being, resilience, and sustainability alongside technological progress and productivity. In this vision, people are no longer merely inputs within a system, but active contributors whose creativity, judgement, lived experience, and distinctiveness create value.

This is precisely where stakeholder agency becomes especially relevant. If employees are understood not as passive recipients of organisational design, but as stakeholders with the capacity to interpret, influence, and shape outcomes, then leadership must evolve accordingly. In my view, human-centred organisations are not simply those that include diverse people around the table, but those structurally capable of recognising, hearing, and constructively engaging with the ultimate truth of the Shin, elevating individuals with their strengths. In an increasingly complex world, that is not simply a cultural aspiration. It is a strategic necessity.

Next: Soe (副), the supporting line that creates relational balance

Reflecting on this, I realise that some of the most meaningful examples of stakeholder agency in practice have not come from theory alone, but from my personal lived experience. Through my work with the American Chamber of Commerce in Dubai, I have observed something particularly instructive: committees operating within the same institutional framework can look and feel remarkably different under different co-chairs. The structure may be shared, but the experience of participation, contribution, and stakeholder engagement can vary meaningfully depending on how leadership creates space, invites perspective, and channels collective energy.

Perhaps this is one valuable starting point for human flourishing in organisations: not the elimination of difference, but the disciplined stewardship of it. The dancing allium did not need to be straightened to become valuable. Its distinctiveness was the point.

That observation leads naturally to the next principle in ikebana: 副 (soe). If shin represents the individual in their own truth and form, then soe asks a different leadership question altogether: what kind of leadership enables individuality to contribute meaningfully without overpowering it? What does leadership look like when its role is less about imposing shape and more about creating relational balance, proportion, and the conditions for others to flourish?

My next article will explore this concept, I hope you enjoy reading on.

Aeschylus. (2009). Agamemnon (P. Meineck, Trans.). Hackett Publishing. (Original work published ca. 458 BCE)

Deci, E. L., & Ryan, R. M. (2000). The “what” and “why” of goal pursuits: Human needs and the self-determination of behavior. Psychological Inquiry, 11(4), 227–268. https://doi.org/10.1207/S15327965PLI1104_01

Edmondson, A. C. (1999). Psychological safety and learning behavior in work teams. Administrative Science Quarterly, 44(2), 350–383. https://doi.org/10.2307/2666999

Emirbayer, M., & Mische, A. (1998). What is agency? American Journal of Sociology, 103(4), 962–1023. https://doi.org/10.1086/231294

European Commission. (2021). Industry 5.0: Towards a sustainable, human-centric and resilient European industry. Publications Office of the European Union. https://op.europa.eu/en/publication-detail/-/publication/468a892a-5097-11eb-b59f-01aa75ed71a1

Freeman, R. E. (1984). Strategic management: A stakeholder approach. Pitman.

McKinsey & Company. (2025). Women in the workplace 2025. McKinsey & Company.
(Note: if you specifically cite a McKinsey 2025 report, we should align the exact title you referenced. If your point is broader performance/diversity, McKinsey 2023 may be academically cleaner.)

Weick, K. E. (1995). Sensemaking in organizations. Sage Publications.