Workshop «The Art of Storytelling»

   Three hours in a room hung with paintings about the people a fast-growing city overlooks, spent learning how to hold a room yourself. There are twenty seats, in a private gallery in Tân Sơn Hòa — the ward beside Tân Sơn Nhất airport, a short ride from central Ho Chi Minh City.

   Simplifi Leadership runs the afternoon in partnership with 22 Gallery. Your facilitator is Bala Subramanian, a Distinguished Toastmaster (DTM) and CBT-certified executive coach who spent 18 years in senior leadership roles across Asia before founding Simplifi. He has trained more than 5,000 people and describes his own style as direct, practical and framework-free — a sounding board with an edge rather than a lecture.

   The backdrop is «The Invisible Life», the solo show by Vietnamese painter Nguyen Quoc Dung (Nguyễn Quốc Dũng, b. 1983), whose oil paintings follow migrants, transgender lives and the strain that urbanisation puts on ordinary people. His work has been shown by galleries including Hatch Art Project.

   What the session covers:

• — building narratives that land, using triggers and structure that hold a room;
• — speaking with presence in front of large groups;
• — moving past the fear of public speaking;
• — carrying confidence and authority in the way you speak.

   It is aimed at leaders, founders and senior professionals who want more clarity and weight when they speak. No art background is needed — you bring the honesty, the coach brings the structure. Light refreshments are served throughout.

   The session is conducted in English.

   Seats are limited, so book ahead through the registration form.

   If you have been putting off the work on how you speak, an afternoon among these paintings is an unusually good place to start.