Dr Loretta Chen, PhD, a mulitihyphenate figure in the media, education, publishing, performing arts & cultural scene for over two decades, hops on a quick but jam packed conversation with On Call host Paulo on the future of storytelling, finding its value in leadership, and sifting through the noise to tell stories that matter.

This On Call with Insignia episode is part of a series featuring speakers from the NOVA 2025: SG60 Edition event co-hosted by Smobler, the New York Stock Exchange, Gemini, Nifty Gateway Studio, and Skadden.

Timestamps

(00:18) Significance of SG60 for Loretta;

(01:38) Power of Storytelling in Leadership;

(03:43) Evolution of Storytelling for Leaders;

(05:57) Role of Technology in Storytelling;

(06:57) Emerging Technologies for Storytelling;

(09:24) Future of Storytelling;

(10:45) Advice on Storytelling for Leaders;

(11:51) Blind Leadership Questions;

(14:00) Epilogue: What is Smobler?;

About Loretta

A multifaceted and influential figure in the media, education, publishing, performing arts & cultural scene for over two decades, Dr Chen was the People’s Choice for Nominated Member of Parliament and has been the International Consultant to the Kingdom of Bhutan since 2011. She is a passionate advocate for social equity – challenging the status quo through artistic, literary and entrepreneurial avenues. When the Metaverse came into play, Dr Chen envisioned a unique opportunity to shape social narratives with technology. Through her latest venture, Smobler, Dr Chen aims to create a Metaverse for Good to drive positive change, promote inclusivity and leverage emerging technologies to empower and inspire audiences across the globe. Dr Chen is part of the AWS Women Founders Program, UBS Project Female Founder, a Top 100 Women of the Future, Forbes and Asia’s Most Inspiring.

Directed by Paulo Joquiño

Produced by Paulo Joquiño

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Directed by Paulo Joquiño

Produced by Paulo Joquiño

The content of this podcast is for informational purposes only, should not be taken as legal, tax, or business advice or be used to evaluate any investment or security, and is not directed at any investors or potential investors in any ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Insignia Ventures⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ fund. Any and all opinions shared in this episode are solely personal thoughts and reflections of the guest and the host.

Transcript

Significance of SG60 for Singapore

Paulo: It’s quite interesting that this edition is called SG60, celebrating 60 years of Singapore. I was just wondering, for you, what does this particular moment mean for you?

Loretta: Singapore has come a long way. We’ve gone from a third-world to a first-world country in such a short amount of time. And I think, if anything, SG 60 really reminds us of what the spirit of innovation and the can-do spirit can do. I think we have a sense of strength and resilience and just being able to rise above. Just look at what we’ve been able to build in Singapore in such a short amount of time. 

I think for us in Smobler, because we are headquartered in Singapore and still partly Singaporean, what I love to capture is the fact that we want to celebrate our culture. And I think you can also see from our backdrop, we’re really celebrating our culture and our heritage, but we’re also at the cusp of all these technological changes. 

We are really looking forward to the next 60 years. And for me, Nova is really a celebration of where culture meets code, where tradition meets innovation, where industry meets innovation. And so we’re trying to bring all of these movements and tie them together. So we’re really excited to be able to do this in the Nova 60 edition right here.

The Power of Storytelling

Paulo: I really appreciate that intersection between culture and technology and how that’s evolved. And I think a word to sum it up is really storytelling. What does that word mean to you in particular?

Loretta: So many things. First off, I don’t know if you even know my background, but my background is as a theater director. So storytelling is so close to my heart. I think fundamentally, all nations need a narrative. If you look at it from a macro perspective, all nations need a narrative. 

For instance, Singapore. We were a fishing village. We had Sang Nila Utama discover us, and then he discovered a lion with a fish tail. And so you have the story of the Merlion. While it may seem like a fictitious story, I think what is important is that every culture and society needs storytelling. Why? Because it anchors us. It gives us a sense of roots. It gives us a sense of shared common histories and stories. That’s what we tell our families as well. Think about it, mothers tell stories to their children at night, bedtime stories. And why do we tell stories? Because it’s also how we impart our values. It’s how we impart tradition. It’s how we impart our views and perspectives of the world. And so storytelling is what really gels societies together. 

And then, fast forward to me being a theater professional, I think storytelling is really the ability to drive the entire team towards a shared common vision. Especially if you think about the theater, it’s something very ephemeral. It’s here today, gone tomorrow, and yet you get people to basically move to the sound of a single drum, drawing from different perspectives and yet sharing the same vision. 

And that is what I take to being a leader as well. Because oftentimes, what you need to do, even to put an event together or put an entire team together, is really about getting people to understand the shared vision and shared mission, while also celebrating all the diversities and nuances and color that make up a great team. And yet being able to make reality happen from that one shared conversation. So yes, storytelling is the invisible glue that I think holds people, societies, and communities together.

Paulo: It’s a day-one foundation, definitely. For any organization or any effort, whether it’s a theater production or a large company.

Loretta: Exactly. So even big corporations, you have a vision and a mission. They’ll go for retreats. Why? Because we really want to be able to tell the same story. You’re absolutely right. So I think it’s a great place to start. I think every CEO needs to be a great storyteller.

Evolution of Storytelling in Leadership

Paulo: And as a leader yourself, how have you seen the modes of storytelling evolve for leaders? How have you seen that change over the years?

Loretta: That’s such an interesting question. I think back in the day, you’d have it very top-down, right? It was institutional. This is the big narrative that we want everyone to follow. But I think increasingly, especially when we’re in emerging tech, when AI and blockchain technology first came up, we see that today’s narratives are really being co-created. Folks don’t like to be told what to do from the top down. They really love the idea of co-creating, which also makes sense for us as a segue into why we are doing gamification and blockchain. Because it encourages the creative economy. But we’ll leave that in the parking lot for a while. 

What it really is, is that today people want a sense of ownership in the storytelling. It’s really about co-creation. Just look at what social media is. The younger generation today wants to feel like they have a part to play in the storytelling. We see the rise of influencers, right? If you look at traditional narratives being broken down, back then, you’d have big industries or big film industries, like Hollywood for example. 

But even today, all of these big machinery and industries are being broken down because today, just right behind us, we have folks taking content from their mobile devices. 

Back in the day, if you wanted to do this [podcast], it would be a multimillion-dollar production. It’d be shot on film with a 50-person crew, which we do have. But today, if you just hang onto your mobile device, everyone is a co-creator. But that in itself is a challenge as well. Because when you have multiple perspectives and multiple stories, the challenge for a leader is to unite these stories. 

It’s not just the storytelling or the narrative that is crucial, but how do you begin to create a cogent narrative when everyone has a voice and everyone has a story? And you want to celebrate that and yet be able to tell a cogent narrative because otherwise, you’d have the breakdown of trust, which is also a crisis that we see happening today. So I think the role of a leader today is incredibly challenging. You have to be a master storyteller and also be the great cheerleader that brings the entire team together.

Paulo: I really like that concept of the leader having to suture and unite the different threads of different stories being told within the organization with something that unifies everybody.

Technology’s Role in Modern Storytelling

Paulo: How are you seeing technology help leaders in that regard?

Loretta: Yeah, so let’s talk about the boons of it. The boons of it is definitely the fact that it makes it more accessible, it makes it quicker. Things are happening at the speed of light, literally. You see now AI is really helping in storytelling. You see us being able to tell narratives quicker, faster, right in front of you, 24-hour news. 

So I think all of these things have really expedited storytelling and us getting news right here, right now, at our fingertips. But the bane of it is that you begin to see the rise of counter-narratives or counterfeit narratives or the ability to have fake news. I’m sure you hear this a lot, so I’m not going to belabor the point. You’re going to see the rise of folks suturing distrust through the use of powerful narratives. We have lots of chatbots. 

Like I said, there’s always a flip side to the coin. And I think with all of these powers that we now have, with technology being able to be a great storyteller, we have to deal with all the fallouts and all the banes of that technology.

Challenges and Opportunities in the Creator Economy

Paulo: And I wanted to go back to that point, which you parked earlier, about the creator economy, and what drew your interest to this particular area. And how does it go back to your whole idea of hopefully reaping the boons of these new technologies for storytelling?

Loretta: Let’s take it back a little bit in time. I grew up in an era where you had institutional narratives. So I was really thankful to have been given an ability to have a platform to either be part of publishing or to read the news, to be in institutional media. But back then, you had to be like the chosen few. 

If you think about it, in fact, growing up as an Asian female, you probably felt unwanted or ugly or not part of the norm because everyone that you’ve seen in Hollywood is blonde, blue-eyed, and tall, and did not even reflect Asian culture. But that was how dominant media was back then. And of course, we’ve seen an evolution. 

There’s greater diversity and inclusion. In fact, Netflix recently released a report to say that they have predominantly more multicultural content than heteronormative white content. So it’s already a deviation from that. So the whole idea was really to empower generations because when I grew up, I didn’t see a lot of diversity. 

All the books that I read growing up were like Snow White. Where was the Asian girl? I remember the first book that had representation, and that’s one of the reasons why I write books, is because I read The Woman Warrior by Maxine Hong Kingston. That was a fun book that had an Asian character in the dominant culture. 

So I think I had the privilege and ability back then to go hunt down all of these writers, collaborators, and content creators, and deliberately collaborate with them and then begin to tell stories and create platforms to do that. 

That, of course, inspired me to take that into my technology company when I established it, to recognize that we need diverse content. Now technology enables that and empowers everyone to be a content creator. 

So that was literally what got me interested because whoever had media back then, it was the haves and the have-nots. And so I really wanted to be able to engender, empower, and make storytelling more accessible to all. And this is where we are today.

Paulo: Technology has really flattened the landscape and made things a lot more accessible, democratized.

Loretta: Democratized the access to communication and creation.

Paulo: And how do you see this moving forward? You talked about where it is today, how do you see it moving forward?

Loretta: Increasingly it’s going to be a very complicated, nuanced landscape. I think now, of course, you have generative AI coming into play, right? Like I said, with every boon, there’s always a bane. The more and more great content that is able to be created far faster, cheaper, and better, we also have the bane of having to deal with the fallouts of fake news.

Increasingly, what we need is more media literacy, more nuance. I think there really has to be a greater emphasis on character, on truth and honesty. And that really is, I think, the challenge of the 21st century and technology these days. Because these lines of what reality and fiction are becoming increasingly blurred.

Paulo: Do you have your own mindset on how to sift through that, or something that you practice?

Loretta: For me, because of my education background, a lot of it is education. It’s a lot of awareness. It’s a lot of being able to be open to perspective and listening to all sides. That often for me as a CEO, as a founder, as a content creator myself, the key is to always have an open mind, but to also always have a strong moral compass, to not be fixed on one way of doing things. But having that strong sense of character and values is incredibly important in this very fractured landscape.

Advice for CEOs on Storytelling

Paulo: On that note, do you have any piece of advice for other CEOs out there who are also trying to figure out how they can improve their storytelling, especially within the organization?

Loretta: For most CEOs, it is true. Increasingly, interpersonal skills, communication skills, and storytelling skills are really important, right? Most times we often think that the balance sheet is really important. Of course, it still is. All of these metrics are important. 

But increasingly, because of the power of technology and the fact that everyone now wields that power, it’s so important that CEOs know how to be a cheerleader. They know how to be a great storyteller. They must also know how to be able to put themselves out there and lead by example. And there’s something to be said when the CEO or the leader wants to talk, right? 

There is so much more power in authentic communication, and people want that, especially as we begin to see more and more AI in generative technology. People do want what is genuine. I still want the lead. These human interactions are going to be that much more important.

Blind Box Leadership Questions

Paulo: What is the most memorable piece of advice you’ve received?

Loretta: What is the most memorable piece of advice you’ve received? This one, I need to credit one of my professors, K. K. Seet. He was a professor and he always reminded me that what people do to me is their karma, and how I respond is mine. Which always reminded me, again, going back to leading with character and honesty and integrity. I think that’s really important. To always be mindful of how we interact with other people.

Paulo: The last time you failed as a leader?

Loretta: Oh my goodness. All the time. As a leader, I think the first thing you have to admit is that you’re going to fail every single time.

Paulo: What was the latest one or the most important one?

Loretta: The latest one, I would say, was when I founded my company. It was meant to be a project over COVID. I had no idea that we would get funded and be on route to being bigger. So at the start, the founding team was really assembled to help a team of individuals who had lost their jobs. And so one of the things that I had to quickly learn was that not every individual is meant to be startup material. And I had put up with that for far too long. 

So I think one of the things that leaders need to be able to call out is that if it is the wrong fit, it is the wrong fit. If there are red flags, to have the courage and tenacity to speak up and deal with conflict early. Because I knew in my head what had to be done, but in my heart, I had let it seep for a little bit too long. And so again, that’s one of the best pieces of advice that I’ll give a leader: sometimes you need to be courageous and do the right thing, especially when it’s difficult.