Category Archives: Update

Musings, Reflection, Update

Twenty-Six Years, Quietly — A Pause Before Stepping into 2026

On9 Systems quietly turned 26 this year.

There was no launch.

No campaign.

Just a pause.

On9 began in 1999, in a very different landscape. Since then, the work has taken many forms — technology, product, facilitation, coaching, community. Titles changed. Contexts shifted. The work kept asking for attention.

On9 as a Living Practice

This year, I began seeing On9 less as a company and more as a living practice.

Some seasons were about growth.

Others about contraction.

Some about survival.

Many about listening.

Like a tree, much of the real work happened underground — in relationships, missteps, patience, and time.

What stands out is not progress, but continuity.

A Memory That Shaped the Work

In 2013, I wrote a short piece titled How I Choose to Work. It didn’t feel like a turning point then — more like a clarification after years of fatigue and misalignment.

What I was really naming was a boundary.

A choice to stop doing work that required me to shrink myself.

A choice to work at a human pace.

A choice to prioritise honesty, relationships, and learning over speed or appearance.

Looking back now, that piece feels like the quiet beginning of the On9 practice as it exists today.

What the Work Taught Me

Over time, clients and collaborators reflected back lessons no framework could teach:

  • transformation cannot be rushed
  • learning cannot be outsourced
  • presence matters more than performance

The work that endured was rarely the most impressive. It was the work where people felt seen, where tension could be named, and where learning unfolded at a human pace.

The Manifesto

The On9 Systems Manifesto (2025–2035) is not a declaration of ambition.

It is a commitment to continuity:

to do the right work, at the right pace, with the right people.

Standing at the Edge of 2026

As 2025 closes, I’m less interested in acceleration and more interested in alignment — between how I work, how I live, and how I show up.

Learning continues, but it keeps pointing to the same place:

How we work is inseparable from who we are becoming.

That feels like enough to stand on as we step into 2026.

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Update

Twenty-Six Years, One Update

On9 Systems started in November 1999 with curiosity, code, and the feeling that there had to be a more human way to build things.

I didn’t know then that the next two decades would take me through product leadership, UX, mobile, Agile, capability building, community work, serious play, and hundreds of teams across Southeast Asia and beyond.

This site refresh marks a turning point.

It gathers everything I’ve learned from:

The biggest shift is internal:
I no longer see myself as someone who “helps teams do Agile / Product / UX better.”

My real work is creating the conditions where people learn, connect, and choose better ways of working together.
Across systems.
Across cultures.
Across whatever emerges.

This update is also a quiet thanks to everyone I’ve worked with — founders, managers, product teams, communities, and friends across SG, MY, ID, TH, VN, TW, PH, JP and beyond.
You’ve shaped the coach I’ve become.

Here’s to the next decade of On9 Systems:
More connection.
More clarity.
More play.
More work that breathes.

— Michael

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Manifesto, Update

🌿 THE ON9 SYSTEMS MANIFESTO (2025–2035)

A manifesto for the next decade of work, practice and community

1. We begin with the human system.

Tools matter. Frameworks help.
But people change when the environment invites them to —
when they feel safe, seen, and capable of facing complexity together.
Everything I design begins with this truth.

2. Practice over performance.

We learn by doing, sensing, reflecting and trying again.
Not by pretending to have the answers.
My work honours emergence, experimentation and the slow craft of mastery.

3. Start with self-leadership.

Teams grow when individuals grow.
Leadership is an inside job:
awareness → presence → choice → action.
Every programme I design begins with this arc.

4. Make space that makes people braver.

Whether through facilitation, coaching, or serious play,
my role is to design containers where people can:
explore, disagree, stumble, realign — and still stay in the work.

5. Connection is the real infrastructure.

Systems are built from relationships, not charts.
Trust, clarity and candour move organisations
faster than any method or transformation roadmap.

6. Communities move learning further than companies.

From ProductTonic to PTL to circles and unconferences —
communities create the conditions for shared growth,
courageous conversations and long-term resilience.

7. Play reveals what seriousness hides.

Cowtopia and other games exist because
fun lowers defenses,
chaos shows truth,
and play lets us see ourselves — and each other — more clearly.

8. Show, don’t tell.

I model the values I teach:
transparency, inquiry, humility, and the courage to walk away
when a system is not ready for learning.

9. Work with context, not against it.

Every team, every culture, every system is unique.
My work adapts:
to power, maturity, constraints, edges, timing.
There is no one-size-fits-all — only what is possible here and now.

10. Stewardship over scale.

The next decade is not about growing bigger,
but going deeper —
crafting learning environments, leadership journeys,
and communities that last.

The Invitation (2025–2035)

To everyone I work with — leaders, teams, communities, friends:

Let us keep creating spaces of clarity, connection and play.
Let us meet complexity with presence and courage.
Let us build systems that help people grow into themselves
and into each other.

The next decade begins with a simple question:

What wants to emerge when we learn, together, with intention?

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