The Skill Vietnam Must Master to Compete Globally | Merianne Sontillanosa of Connect Better

As Vietnam expands its role in international finance, technology, tourism, and professional services, much of the public discussion focuses on capital, regulation, infrastructure, and investment. These elements matter, but they do not operate by themselves. Every agreement must be explained. Every proposal must be presented. Every partnership depends on people understanding one another well enough to establish trust.

This made my conversation with Merianne Sontillanosa at the Vietnam Financial Forum 2026 particularly relevant. As the founder of Speak Better and Connect Better, Merianne works at the intersection of language, professional communication, networking, and technology. Her work reflects a simple principle that can easily be overlooked during conversations about economic development: a country may attract global interest, but its people must still be able to communicate their ideas clearly enough to convert that interest into action.

Merianne has lived in Vietnam for almost fourteen years. Originally from the Philippines, she has worked with hospitality teams, managers, students, language centers, technology companies, and professionals across several Vietnamese cities. Although she periodically works in Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City, she chose to base herself in Da Nang.

Her reasons were both practical and personal. She spoke about the relational nature of Vietnamese people, particularly in Central Vietnam, as well as the convenience of living in a city where most destinations remain relatively close. Da Nang offers many of the professional and lifestyle advantages of a major city without requiring residents to spend several hours moving between meetings, workplaces, and homes.

The city’s scale is often treated as a limitation, but it can also strengthen relationships. Professional communities overlap. People encounter one another repeatedly at conferences, workshops, business gatherings, and social events. A person met at one event may become a client, collaborator, or friend several months later. In larger cities, networks can become fragmented across districts and industries. In Da Nang, the distance between communities is often smaller.

This relational strength is important as business becomes more technological. Artificial intelligence, digital platforms, and automated systems are changing how people exchange information. Yet technology does not eliminate the need for human connection. It may increase it.

The more transactions become automated, the more valuable genuine conversation can become. A person may use artificial intelligence to write a proposal, translate a message, or prepare a presentation. The eventual decision, however, may still depend on whether another human being trusts the person delivering it.

This is where Merianne sees a significant opportunity for Vietnam. Vietnamese professionals are often strong relationship builders. They understand hospitality, loyalty, and the importance of personal interaction. These abilities can become major advantages within international business, provided they are supported by clear communication.

Language remains one of the most immediate obstacles.

English continues to function as the dominant shared language across much of international finance, tourism, technology, education, and trade. This does not mean that English should replace Vietnamese or that everyone must speak like a person from London or California. It means that professionals increasingly need the ability to communicate with partners who may come from dozens of linguistic backgrounds.

Merianne was careful to distinguish clarity from accent reduction. She does not believe accents should be erased. Accents carry history, identity, and culture. A Filipino accent, Vietnamese accent, French accent, or Scottish accent is not inherently a communication problem.

The problem occurs when pronunciation prevents the listener from understanding the intended meaning.

This distinction is essential. Many language learners spend years feeling embarrassed about sounding foreign, even when their speech is clear. Others possess large vocabularies and strong grammatical knowledge but struggle to make themselves understood because important sounds disappear.

For Vietnamese speakers, final consonants can be particularly challenging. Sounds at the ends of words may be shortened, softened, or omitted. This can create confusion in ordinary conversation, but the stakes become higher in professional environments.

A missing plural sound may alter the meaning of a sentence. A dropped consonant may turn one business term into another. Numbers, dates, products, legal clauses, and technical descriptions must be communicated accurately. In a contract discussion, one small sound can carry a rather expensive amount of importance.

Merianne emphasized final “s” sounds because they can indicate plurals, possession, or grammatical relationships. The issue is not academic perfection. It is practical meaning. If a client cannot distinguish between one product and several products, or between one contractual term and another, the conversation may become unnecessarily risky.

This problem is not unique to Vietnamese learners. Native English speakers also modify, shorten, or drop sounds depending on regional dialect. A person from Liverpool, Glasgow, Texas, or rural Ireland may speak perfectly natural English and still need to adjust pace or pronunciation when speaking internationally.

People who live abroad often discover this without formal instruction. Their speech gradually changes. They slow down slightly, articulate key sounds more carefully, and reduce highly localized expressions. They do not necessarily lose their accents. They develop a broader communication range.

This is a valuable distinction for international professionals. Clear communication does not require imitation. It requires awareness.

The speaker must consider the listener.

This may involve reducing speed by ten or fifteen percent, pausing between important points, emphasizing final sounds, avoiding unnecessary idioms, and checking whether the other person has understood. These adjustments are not signs of weaker English. They are signs of stronger communication.

Merianne’a work through Speak Better developed from years of helping individuals make these adjustments. Her goal is to help people improve their spoken communication more efficiently, particularly in areas that create immediate gains in intelligibility.

Learning a language can take decades. Merianne mentioned individuals she first trained more than ten years ago who continue working with her online after moving overseas. This reflects the reality that language development is rarely completed. Vocabulary changes, careers evolve, and new contexts create different communication demands.

A hotel employee may begin by learning how to greet guests and explain services. Years later, the same person may need to lead meetings, negotiate contracts, manage complaints, or present to international executives. The language challenge grows alongside the career.

This is why professional communication training must extend beyond general English lessons. A person can perform well on a language examination and still struggle in a real meeting. Academic exercises often emphasize grammar, vocabulary, and controlled responses. Business interactions require flexibility.

Professionals must explain ideas that may not yet be fully formed. They must respond to unexpected questions, clarify misunderstandings, and adjust their message while observing the reactions of others. They must sometimes disagree without damaging the relationship.

These abilities involve language, but they also involve judgment.

The Vietnam Financial Forum provided a clear example. International investors and financial professionals arrived from major global centers such as London, Dubai, New York, and Singapore. Vietnamese businesses and institutions needed to explain how they fit within the country’s developing financial ecosystem.

This requires more than memorized introductions.

A founder must explain what problem the company solves, why the market opportunity exists, what support is required, and how the business connects with potential partners. A government representative must communicate policy in language that international investors can understand. A client-facing employee must answer questions with enough clarity to inspire confidence.

When communication is weak, good ideas can appear less credible than they actually are.

This is one of the hidden costs of unclear speech. The listener may underestimate the speaker’s knowledge because the message is difficult to follow. A highly capable professional can appear uncertain simply because pronunciation, pace, or organization creates friction.

The responsibility does not rest entirely with the speaker. International listeners should develop patience and cultural awareness. Global business involves different accents and communication styles, and expecting everyone to sound the same is neither realistic nor desirable.

Still, professionals benefit from learning how to reduce avoidable confusion. The goal is not linguistic conformity. It is communicative access.

Merianne’s emphasis on articulation connects closely with public speaking. Many people assume public speaking confidence comes primarily from personality. They believe some individuals are naturally expressive while others are destined to remain uncomfortable.

In reality, confidence often grows from repeated evidence that the message can be delivered successfully. When speakers understand how to organize their ideas, use their voices, pronounce key terms, and respond to the audience, anxiety becomes more manageable.

Clarity provides a form of confidence.

A professional who trusts their ability to explain an idea is more likely to participate in meetings, approach potential partners, and speak at industry events. Someone who fears being misunderstood may remain quiet despite possessing valuable knowledge.

This has implications beyond individual careers. If a large number of capable people hesitate to contribute in international settings, the organization loses access to their ideas. The country may also lose opportunities to present its talent effectively.

Communication training can therefore support economic participation. It allows more people to enter conversations that influence investment, partnerships, employment, and policy.

Merianne’s second company, Connect Better, addresses what happens after the conversation begins. It combines digital contact sharing with an event and community platform. Instead of relying on printed business cards, users can exchange professional information through a digital bracelet connected to an online profile.

During our interview, Merianne demonstrated the system by tapping the bracelet against my phone. Her profile opened immediately, providing access to contact details and social media links. The information could be saved directly, reducing the familiar post-conference problem of discovering several business cards without remembering which conversation belonged to which person.

The demonstration also created a slightly comic moment because Merianne had arrived at a major networking event without printed cards. In most traditional business environments, this would be viewed as poor preparation. For the founder of a digital networking platform, it was closer to product confidence.

Her position was simple: she no longer needed paper.

The bracelet is the visible element of Connect Better, but the platform extends beyond contact sharing. Event organizers can use it to provide schedules, speaker information, announcements, live comments, and audience questions. Attendees can view the agenda and participate through the same environment.

This responds to several common problems at professional events. Printed programs become outdated when schedules change. Announcements may not reach everyone. Audience questions are difficult to coordinate. Attendees collect contact details but rarely organize them effectively.

A digital event hub can centralize these functions, allowing organizers to make changes as the event unfolds. This does not remove the need for personal interaction. It supports it.

The relationship between Speak Better and Connect Better is therefore stronger than the names initially suggest. One helps people communicate their ideas more clearly. The other helps them maintain the relationships that emerge from those conversations.

Professional networking frequently fails at one of these two stages.

Some people attend events and exchange dozens of cards without having a meaningful conversation. Others have excellent discussions but fail to follow up. Technology can simplify the exchange of information, but the person still needs the social skill to begin the relationship.

This is why a digital bracelet cannot replace communication ability. It can transfer a phone number in seconds, but it cannot explain why two people should remain connected. The profile may contain a polished biography, but the conversation creates the memory.

The strongest networking occurs when technology and human presence support one another.

This reflects a wider pattern in contemporary business. Digital tools are excellent at reducing friction. They make it easier to schedule meetings, translate messages, share information, and record contacts. Yet many professional opportunities still depend on qualities that remain difficult to automate: curiosity, trust, timing, empathy, humor, and the ability to listen.

Merianne repeatedly returned to people skills because she believes these will remain important even as artificial intelligence expands. This view contrasts with the fear that communication training will become unnecessary once machines can translate speech or generate polished writing.

AI can help people communicate, but it cannot assume full responsibility for the relationship. A translated sentence may be accurate and still feel inappropriate. A generated presentation may contain the correct information without reflecting the concerns of the audience.

Human communication involves more than transferring content. It involves interpreting context.

A speaker must sense whether the listener is confused, impatient, interested, or unconvinced. The next sentence may change in response to a facial expression or a pause. Negotiation depends partly on information, but also on what remains unspoken.

Cross-cultural communication increases the importance of these judgments. Different cultures may interpret silence, directness, formality, disagreement, and eye contact differently. A communication style that feels efficient in one country may feel abrupt in another.

Vietnamese professionals entering wider international networks need to understand these differences, but international partners also need to understand Vietnam. Adaptation should occur on both sides.

Merianne’s own background helps position her within this exchange. The Philippines and Vietnam share certain relational qualities, including strong family and community orientation, yet their linguistic histories differ. English is more widely embedded within education and professional life in the Philippines, which has helped many Filipino professionals develop careers in international service industries.

Merianne’s work applies parts of that experience within Vietnam while respecting the distinct Vietnamese context. She does not present one national model as superior. Her aim is practical: help people communicate clearly enough to participate fully.

Da Nang may particularly benefit from this kind of training. The city is attracting more international conferences, technology companies, investors, tourists, and foreign professionals. Each new connection increases the number of cross-cultural interactions taking place in workplaces and public life.

The city’s relational culture provides a strong foundation. Hospitality and warmth encourage people to begin conversations. Professional communication skills help those conversations lead somewhere.

This distinction is important. Friendliness opens the door, but clarity helps build the partnership.

Vietnam’s economic ambitions will require professionals who can move comfortably between local and international environments. They must understand Vietnamese expectations while communicating with people from different backgrounds. They may need to explain a local business model to a foreign investor, lead a multilingual team, or represent a Vietnamese company at an international conference.

Technical expertise alone will not guarantee success in these situations.

An engineer must explain the technology. A founder must communicate the business case. A financial adviser must clarify risk. A manager must give feedback across cultures. A government representative must make policy understandable to people unfamiliar with the system.

Communication becomes the bridge between knowledge and impact.

Merianne’s work also demonstrates that entrepreneurship often begins by observing recurring frustrations. Speak Better emerged from years of watching professionals struggle to convert language knowledge into clear speech. Connect Better responds to the imperfect systems people use to maintain relationships after events.

Neither problem is dramatic. They are ordinary points of friction that appear repeatedly in professional life. Yet this is where useful businesses often begin.

A small problem repeated thousands of times becomes a market.

People lose business cards. Speakers remain misunderstood. Event schedules change. Attendees forget names. Professionals hesitate because they lack confidence in their English.

The entrepreneur sees the repetition and asks whether the process can be improved.

Merianne’s approach combines training and technology, but the deeper purpose remains human. She wants people to speak with greater clarity and connect with less friction.

This feels particularly relevant during a period when economic development is often discussed through large numbers. Conferences celebrate investment values, market growth, infrastructure plans, and the number of international participants. These figures create an impression of scale, but the work eventually returns to individual interaction.

Someone must introduce the company.

Someone must explain the idea.

Someone must ask the question clearly enough to receive a useful answer.

Someone must follow up after the event.

A financial center is built through policy and capital, but it is also built through conversations.

The Vietnam Financial Forum brought global professionals into Da Nang to discuss the country’s future. For that future to develop, Vietnamese organizations will need more people who can represent their work confidently on the international stage.

This does not mean erasing accents or copying foreign communication styles. It means developing enough control over language to make expertise visible. It means speaking at a pace the listener can follow, pronouncing critical terms clearly, and organizing ideas in ways that cross cultural boundaries.

It also means preserving the relational qualities Merianne admires in Vietnam.

Globalization sometimes encourages professionals to adopt a standardized corporate persona. Speech becomes polished but impersonal. Networking becomes transactional. Business cards are exchanged without genuine interest.

Vietnam has an opportunity to develop international communication without losing the warmth that makes its professional culture distinctive.

Clear speech and human connection should reinforce one another.

This may be the central idea linking Merianne’s two businesses. Speaking better is not about sounding impressive. Connecting better is not about collecting more contacts. Both involve reducing the distance between people.

A person speaks clearly so another person can understand.

A person exchanges contact information so the conversation can continue.

Technology supports the process, but the relationship remains the point.

As artificial intelligence becomes more capable, some professional tasks will become faster and easier. Documents will be generated, meetings summarized, and languages translated in real time. Yet the ability to create trust across cultures may become even more valuable because it will distinguish human interaction from automated exchange.

Vietnam is entering a period in which more international professionals will be listening. The country’s businesses, founders, students, and institutions will have opportunities to explain what they are building and why it matters.

The challenge is ensuring that the message arrives clearly.

Merianne Sontillanosa’s work addresses that challenge from both sides. Speak Better helps people find the words and deliver them effectively. Connect Better helps ensure the relationship does not disappear once the conversation ends.

Between those two moments lies much of professional life.

We speak.

We connect.

And, when both are done well, something new becomes possible.