Spirituality and Career

About This Gathering

The Apartment Café is a women-centric community space designed to feel warm, familiar, and welcoming — just like being invited into someone’s living room. Each month, we set up a shared table with baked goods and drinks contributed by the women attending. Everyone brings something small — whether homemade or picked up along the way — and together we create a relaxed, café-style atmosphere. We pour coffee, make a plate, settle in, and talk.

Theme

This month we explored how to pursue professional aspirations while staying rooted in our values, intuition, and inner gentleness. How do we remain steady and kind in environments that can feel competitive or demanding? How do we aim high without losing the parts of ourselves that feel most sacred?

Details

Discussion Summary

Led by Bayan interviewing Emily.

We often hear in corporate that you need to be tough and selfish to survive in a corporate environment. I always thought there was another way — a way where you don’t have to compromise your morals, your light if I may say, and still maintain your professionalism.

For this particular reason, we co-hosted our monthly gathering with the wonderful Emily Chew. She needs no introduction, but to say a few words about her: Emily is Head of Sustainability at GIC, where she leads the Sustainability Office in deepening GIC’s capabilities in sustainability-related research, analysing fast-evolving themes, and examining their implications for investment. Prior to GIC, she held senior ESG leadership roles at Morgan Stanley, Manulife Investment Management, and MSCI Inc., working across Australia, mainland China, Hong Kong, and the United States. She holds an MBA from the University of Oxford and Bachelors of Laws and Arts (Honours) from the University of Melbourne.

But Emily is more than her professional CV. When I opened by asking her to introduce herself without mentioning her job or titles, her answer was quietly powerful: “I am a person who seeks light and who is growing.”

She shared how she found her way through a career shaped by many mentors and allies — and by its fair share of challenges. She spoke about the art of meeting people where they are: power suits for investors, hair down and jeans for engineers. Not performing different versions of herself, but communicating in the language each audience understands. The same person, differently expressed.

We had many more conversations that afternoon — ones I imagine you’ll only fully appreciate if you come to one of our gatherings yourself.

Photos