Exile Solutions

07/04/2026

From the other side of our training engagements.
Working with National Sporting Associations in SG

26/06/2025

A common established model of the stages of team evolution by Bruce Tuckman postulates that teams first Form, then Storm (negotiating through conflict situation), establish Norms before Performing.

However, in multi-cultural or pan-asian work environments, I have found the Storming and Norming stage may be reversed as teams differ to etiquette and need to established shared values first before they are comfortable to engage in conflict negotation.

Was a pleasure to work with Dyson Singapore during to explore aspects of how culture and inclusiveness will shape team dynamics.

10/08/2024

Priviledged and honoured to be able to work side by side with former National Athlete and WSF Level 3 Coach Della Lee to run the 2nd SG-Coach Level 1 Coaching Course for Squash!

Kudos to all our participants for completing the journey towards better coaching!

(https://www.ultimatesquasher.com/)

07/05/2024

This post serves as a reflection of 10 years journey when I left the education sector to wander in the desert of entrepreneurship and self-employment.
As of today, eXiLe Training Solutions has been incorporated for 10 years already.
In this time, I've been privileged to work with many people who have journeyed with me: some were friends and acquaintances I roped in to join in my crazy adventures; others began as work partners and soon became close friends.

Together, we have established a sustainable coaching and leadership practice to conduct regular team-building programs, coaching development courses, leadership and management training.

We have also built a dynamic combat sports coaching team (Exile Training Cadre) that delivers a wide range of combat sports, self-defence programs to schools, community organisations as well as government.

At this point, I want to share some of the impetus behind eXiLe.
Why brand myself and team with a name that sounds rather desolate and seems to signal desperation?
Well.... in many of the heroic tales that we grew up with, the protagonist often ends up having to journey through harsh desert landscape.
Whether he has been exiled there by circumstance or by choice, he now needs to navigate his way through the wilderness and to find his own promised land.

To me, being in 'exile', meant that I had to learn to be comfortable navigating my life and career in a desert beyond the usual prescribed social conventional paths.
I had to develop competencies that might not be recognized and accredited in the 'mainstream' in order to remain relevant in a volatile, uncertain, complex and ambiguous environment.
And yet, exiles are not rebels-- we are not seeking to overturn the status quo;
Rather what we are looking for is inclusion and integration back into the community, that though we are set apart from, we have helped to grow because we challenge its perception of what it accepts as reality.

To:
TK Chua, Andy Chong, Ivan Siow, Josephine Poh, Jickson Huan and all the other trainers that have worked with us on both indoor and outdoor projects.
A big thank you for the journey! Here's to our next 10 years!

06/05/2024

We are 10 today!

09/02/2024

14/09/2023

We previously worked with the Singapore Taekwondo Federation to develop their L1 Coaching Curriculum and deliver 2 runs of the face-to-face portion of their course.

With the continual evolution of TKD as a combat sport, Singapore Taekwondo Federation is also continuing to evolve and level up their coaches.
Our team has just gone to print for the final content for SG-Coach (Full Integration) Level 2 course which will be delivered in the near future!

We will be working with more National Sporting Associations in designing their coaching content and working with them on coaching development!

30/06/2023

2018 was when I first started working with various National Sporting Associations (NSAs) as a Curriculum Developer and Integrator.

My previous background in Physical Education as an educator as well as the later years overseeing policy and curriculum development for Character and Citizenship Education made this a natural fit for me.

I liked the challenge and mental gymnastics of manipulating content into a coherent whole i.e. throw me your hard-copy manuals, assorted pdf and MS Word documents, random training video footage, etc. Then sit down with me over coffee and tell me your pain points.
After that I go pore over everything, drink more coffee and then work with my team to turn everything into a unified format that has a neat start and end: a coherent scheme of work, full set of presentation slides that have the same visual look, a set of learner guides and summary deck for presenters.

But more than the mental gymnastics and cerebral challenges, what I really, really enjoyed was working at the ground level with coaches and the various people involved in sports development. My passion has always been in martial arts / combat sports; and to be able to connect with coaches from all disciplines and work to develop sound coaching programs has been my privilege and joy.

So in 2018, in addition to the content development work I did; I also embarked on my journey as a Coach Developer. And again this was a new experience for me. As a coach, I was used to looking at athletes through my eyes as a coach; now I was looking at coaches through the eyes of a coaching mentor.

This was a subtle but very powerful and also challenging mind-shift.
And to be honest, it took a lot of learning and re-learning in order to calibrate myself as I toggle between Curriculum Developer and Coach Developer while working with NSAs.

Now 5 years later, I have finally fulfilled all the various criteria I needed.
And today, I celebrate my journey with all the partners, comrades and coaches that have walked this journey with me!

29/05/2023