Community Service Sydney

PMM - Pack4Dignity Charity Day

Assertive Communication: 1 Day Session in Sydney

## Details **Overview** **Assertive Communication: Speak Up with Confidence, Not Conflict"** A hands-on 1-day workshop teaching professionals to communicate assertively, set boundaries, and handle tough conversations calmly." **Ready to secure your spot? 🎯 Register now and complete your payment securely via Stripe Checkout!** [Click Here](https://buy.stripe.com/8x2bJ1aam1YGeG4aeg2oE43) **The Details** **Duration:** 1 Day \| 8 Credits **Delivery:** Classroom / Virtual **Language:** English **Includes:** Course Completion Certificate **Refreshments:** Lunch, snacks, and beverages will be provided during the session *** **You Have the Right Idea. You Just Never Say It Out Loud.** You've sat in the meeting knowing exactly what should be said — and said nothing. You've agreed to something you didn't have time for, again. You've watched someone else take credit for your idea because you delivered it too quietly to claim it. This isn't a confidence problem you can't fix. It's a communication style — and styles can be learned. This one-day, interactive workshop teaches you the difference between staying silent, snapping under pressure, and saying exactly what you mean — clearly, calmly, and without guilt. No personality overhaul required. Just practical tools you can use in your very next difficult conversation. *** **Is This You?** * "I know what I want to say, but I freeze up or soften it until it's meaningless." * "I say yes to things I don't have the time or desire to do." * "I either avoid conflict completely or I lose my composure when it happens." * "I want to be taken seriously without coming across as aggressive." * "I struggle to set boundaries, especially with dominant personalities." If any of that sounds familiar, this workshop was built for you. *** **What You'll Walk Out Knowing How to Do** **Module 1 — Understand Where You Stand** Learn to distinguish assertive, passive, and aggressive behavior, recognize how your tone and style land on others, and pinpoint your own current communication pattern through self-assessment. **Module 2 — Build the Confidence Behind the Words** Understand what's really driving your hesitation, build a steadier inner confidence, and learn to recognize your personal triggers before they take over a conversation. **Module 3 — Say It Clearly, Say It Right** Master "I" statements, tone, timing, and body language — and learn to balance empathy with firmness so you come across as clear, not cold. **Module 4 — Handle the Conversations You've Been Avoiding** Learn to receive criticism and navigate disagreement without losing your composure, give and receive feedback constructively, and stay grounded when things get emotionally charged — practiced live through role play. **Module 5 — Set Boundaries That Actually Hold** Learn to identify and communicate your boundaries, hold your ground with dominant or aggressive personalities, and practice assertive negotiation and refusal techniques. **Module 6 — Bring It Into Your Team** Learn to foster open dialogue and trust, influence colleagues without formal authority, and use assertiveness to strengthen collaboration and leadership. **Module 7 — Leave With a Plan You'll Actually Use** Build a personalized assertiveness action plan, get real peer feedback, and take home a daily checklist to keep the habit alive after the workshop ends. *** **Why This Works** ✔ Practical exercises, role play, and peer feedback — not just theory ✔ A personalized action plan you leave with, not just notes ✔ Techniques you can use in your very next hard conversation ✔ Taught in a single, focused day — no long course to drag through *** **Who Should Attend** * Team Leaders and Supervisors * Managers and Executives * HR and People Managers * Project Coordinators and Client-Facing Professionals * Anyone who struggles to say "no" or express themselves confidently *** **Train Your Whole Team, Not Just One Person** One assertive communicator on a team helps. A whole team that can raise concerns, give feedback, and hold boundaries without conflict dragging on for days — that changes how the team actually works. **Bring this course to your organization, including:** * Content shaped around your team's culture and communication challenges * Scenarios built around your team's real dynamics, not generic examples * Delivery in-house or virtually * Group pricing for teams of any size **📩 Reach out at [corporate@mangates.com](mailto:corporate@mangates.com) to build a session around your team.** **Stop Rehearsing What You Should Have Said** Register now and walk out with the confidence, language, and boundaries to say what you mean — the first time. info@mangates\.com \| \+61 \(0\) 2 80155605 ***

Community of Practice 🗣️ - Human Hearted Sydney 🌻

Join our monthly Community of Practice (COP) where we discuss the ideas of Human Heartedness: a secular approach to life that promotes empathy and social connection based on cultivating our human social potential. Each meeting we discuss these concepts and how they can help us in practical ways to live better, happier, and more fulfilling lives. The meeting is followed by an optional lunch together nearby. This is a great opportunity to meet like-minded people and find your local community! ⏰ **When:** Sunday September 13th at 11:00am 📍 **Where:** Darling Square Library, Level 1 - Ideas Space 2 (see directions) 🎟️ **Cost:** Free 🧑‍🦱 **Who should come:** anyone looking to meet new people and build connections with like-minded Sydneysiders. We’re queer-friendly and welcome people from all ages and backgrounds :) **About Human Heartedness:** The modern world’s focus on competition and materialism makes it easy to feel isolated and overwhelmed. The collapse of traditional sources of meaning like religion and local community intensify this so that we’re often left with a lack of meaning and purpose. We can try to fill the void with money and success—or to numb it with drugs and technology— but nothing seems to work. Human heartedness reminds us that the path to living well doesn’t come from money and power, but from building on the best in our own human hearts. Our human social potential. It points to a better way: to build in-person communities that build on our innate social potential and inherent value as humans. By building good relationships and social connections, we can live a more fruitful and fulfilling life (and help others to do the same). We can move from struggling alone to flourishing together. Following the human hearted way offers a secular, inclusive, forward looking solution to the meaning crisis of our times. **About the Community of Practice (COP):** Our human hearted community of practice (COP) offers a friendly welcoming environment in which we support and encourage each other to live more human hearted lives. Our goal is to build a community that supports us all to live more meaningful and fulfilling lives. We welcome you to join us in exploring together how to live better lives. [Learn more about Human Heartedness and our other events here!](https://linktr.ee/humanheartedsydney) *Human Hearted Sydney is sponsored by Humanists Australia which kindly funds our activities and keeps events like this free. Consider donating to Humanists Australia to show your support for community-building in Sydney and beyond. All our events are governed by [Humanist Australia's Code of Conduct](https://bit.ly/ha-conduct-pdf).*

Sydney MongoDB User Group - September 2026

RSVP over on Luma! [https://luma.com/q4gace6n](https://luma.com/q4gace6n) Event Details: Come connect with fellow developers, tech enthusiasts, and the curious-minded for an evening exploring the best practices and real-world use cases powering modern apps with MongoDB. Whether you're building your first project or scaling to millions of users, you'll walk away with practical insights, fresh ideas, and a great group of people to swap notes with. ​Grab a drink, meet the local MongoDB community, and see what's possible when you build with the right database. See you there! ## ​**Agenda** ​**17.00:** Arrival & Networking **18.00:** Welcome **18.10:** MongoDB Atlas Search under the Hood 🔍 **18.40:** Your LLM Is Burning Cash. MongoDB Might Be the Fire Extinguisher 💰🧯 **19.10:** Pizza & Networking **20.00:** Event Close ​----- ## ​Session Details ​**MongoDB Atlas Search under the Hood** 🔍 Luke Thompson, Chief Architect, Clarifresh ​Let's explore the newly open-sourced service MongoT, a Java sidecar application which runs alongside the C++ MongoD service providing additional search capabilities. We'll take a quick look around the codebase, spin it up and show how real Atlas Search queries turn into Lucene index searches. Bio: Luke Thompson is a software architect and passionate coder building software by day and by night. He applies his talents, such as they are, to make things as good as they can be. ​ ​**Your LLM Is Burning Cash. MongoDB Might Be the Fire Extinguisher 💰🧯** Jinu VM, Advisory Solutions Architect, MongoDB ​Every token you send to an LLM costs money and most teams are sending way more than they need to. Bloated context windows, redundant retrieval, and poorly managed memory are quietly driving up inference costs and slowing down response times, all while making your AI *less* accurate, not more. In this session, we'll dig into how smart context engineering and memory management can put out the fire. You'll learn how MongoDB can serve as the backbone for leaner, smarter AI applications. From efficient vector search and retrieval strategies that cut down on unnecessary context, to persistent memory architectures that let your LLM remember what matters without re-sending it every time. **What you'll walk away with:** * ​Why bigger context windows aren't always better (and often cost you accuracy *and* cash) * ​Practical patterns for structuring memory: short-term, long-term, and episodic * ​How vector search and retrieval-augmented generation (RAG) can trim your token spend without sacrificing quality * ​Real-world architecture patterns for building cost-efficient, context-aware AI applications on MongoDB ​Whether you're building agents, chatbots, or RAG pipelines, this session will help you rethink how you manage context so your LLM budget stops going up in smoke.

🍜Asian Background Social: Lounge Asia Sydney (Easy English) 6pm

⚠️ EVENT UPDATE: THIS WEEK’S EVENT CANCELLED Unfortunately, this Saturday’s Lounge Asia Sydney event on August 29 has been cancelled. Our next event will be held on Saturday, September 5, from 6:00 PM to 9:00 PM at the same venue, Harts Pub. We apologise for the inconvenience and hope to see you next week. 😊 Please RSVP again for the September 5 event. 🌏 Make new international friends in Sydney. Come alone, practise your English, and enjoy a relaxed social night. 😊 A friendly meetup for networking, language exchange, and real conversation. **Why People Love Lounge Asia** 🍜 **Asian-focused** event 🤝 Many guests come alone 💬 No need for perfect English 🌏 No games or forced introductions — just enjoy the conversation ━━━━━━━━━━ **How to Join** 1️⃣ Tap "RSVP" on this page (1 ticket per attendee) 2️⃣ Show your Meetup QR code at reception 3️⃣ Collect your name tag and start meeting people ✅ Early RSVP is free ✅ RSVPs made within 24 hours of the event start time are $5 ✅ Limited capacity — please RSVP early Early RSVP is the best way to save your spot and join for free. Many people attend alone, so don't worry if it's your first time. ━━━━━━━━━━ ⚠️ IMPORTANT: TONIGHT’S RULES ⚠️ 🎟️ A VALID TICKET IS REQUIRED, BUT ENTRY IS SUBJECT TO HOST APPROVAL One ticket per guest. Guests on the waitlist cannot enter. A ticket does not guarantee entry. If entry is refused, you will receive a full refund. Please DM Michael, the main Lounge Asia organiser. Local hosts are not responsible for refunds. 🪑 SIT IF EMPTY Please take a seat if you see one to help create more space. 📧 SHOW SCREEN AT DOOR Have your confirmation profile/tickets ready for Chris & Kev. NO WALK-INS. THANK YOU! ━━━━━━━━━━ **How to Find Us** 📍 Venue Harts Pub 176 Cumberland Street, The Rocks, NSW 2000 ⏰ Time Saturday from 6:00pm – 9:00pm 🚶 Getting There 5 min walk from Circular Quay Station. 8 min walk from Wynyard Station. Easy to drop by after exploring The Rocks. Our Lounge Asia organisers will be there to welcome you 😊 ━━━━━━━━━━ 🍺 Please Support the Venue This event is free or low-cost because the venue supports our community. Please purchase at least one drink during the event. Your support helps us keep organising events at great venues. ━━━━━━━━━━ 💚 Please Be Respectful Lounge Asia is a friendly social event where everyone should feel comfortable and welcome. 🚫 This is NOT a pickup or dating event. Any anti-social behaviour or those who make others uncomfortable WILL BE removed immediately. 🚫 Any harassment, unwanted attention, MLM / crypto / religious recruitment, or anything that makes others uncomfortable. Organisers reserve the right to refuse entry or ask anyone to leave. 🪪 A valid government-issued photo ID is strictly required for entry. No photo ID, no entry. Driver's licences must be issued by the government of the country where the event is held. 📸 Photos and short videos may be taken for community and promotional purposes. If you prefer not to appear, please let an organiser know when you arrive. ━━━━━━━━━━ Lounge Asia is already growing in Australia and is now expanding across Asia — Japan, Thailand, Vietnam, Malaysia, and Singapore. Our goal is simple: More friendship, more understanding, and more genuine connections across cultures. 📱 Join the Lounge Asia Australia WhatsApp Group Stay connected with the Lounge Asia community after the event. ✅ Hear about upcoming Lounge Asia events ✅ Meet local and international people ✅ Stay connected with people you meet ✅ Receive community news and event updates [👉 Join the WhatsApp group:](https://chat.whatsapp.com/CJV5i6FQMc7DVXezkJUUib) 📱 Instagram: @_lounge_asia 🎥 Watch Event Video: [\[WATCH EVENT VIDEO\]](https://youtu.be/tNak_cu9CXw?si=xiObPWs86vc93N18) 🎁 BECOME A FOUNDING MEMBER (VIP) We are building an official app to connect our community safely! Join the VIP list for early access and priority invites to special parties. 👉 [\[Join the VIP List here\]](https://forms.gle/T2KukvgEiGWEz3VR9) ━━━━━━━━━━ 🌏 Come say hi! Hey, come hang out! 来一起玩吧！ 一起來聊天吧！ 気軽に遊びに来てね！ 편하게 놀러 와요! มาเจอกันนะ! Tới chơi nha! Tara, sali ka na! Yuk, gabung! Хамтдаа цуглацгаая! Komm einfach vorbei! Jom join kita! See you at Lounge Asia!

Welcome to the next 2026 AWS Sydney Well-Architected Meetup!

Hi Architects, Welcome to the next 2026 AWS Sydney Well-Architected User Group Meetup! Each month we cover off AWS best-practices across all pillars and give away drones - lots of drones 🥳 **Please also note that AWS Security now requests a company name and company email where it is available. If you are a student, please list your institution and your student email address at that institution 👍** We'll be announcing more speakers on [https://well-architected.me](https://well-architected.me/) and previewing presentations during the coming weeks - our speakers and details this month include: * **Shilin Wu, Principal Solution Architect — VeloDB / Apache Doris** **Cost-Efficient Real-Time Analytics on AWS: Storage-Compute Separation with Apache Doris** Real-time analytics have a reputation for being expensive — you pay for fast storage you barely use, and for compute that sits idle overnight. This session walks through VeloDB / Apache Doris's storage-compute separation architecture on AWS, showing how to push warm data down to S3 while keeping sub-second query latency on the data that matters. We'll round off with a **live demo** querying billions of rows against S3-backed storage, soattendees can see the latency-vs-cost trade-off in action rather than on a slide. * **Mystery Speaker** **Generative AI Cost Optimisation** Cost Optimisation is essential but with all the anecdotal stories of massive token budget blowouts, staying on top of Generative AI best-practices is essential to avoiding these scenarios. This month's menu will include: * Pizzas * Beer: Nastro Azzurro * Wine: Big and red 🤤 So come join us at 5:30 for a 6pm **SHARP** start, followed by beer, wine, pizza and friendly networking after our talks :-) Tired of Linkedin’s "thought leadership”, spam and advertising? Join https://well-architected.me/ , the AWS community built for architects, developers and cloud professionals. * Connect with experienced AWS practitioners * Preview upcoming AWS Meetups and relive past content * Create and review beautiful AWS case studies in minutes * Prepare for AWS certifications with curated quizzes * Show your manager and reports you’re well-architected (Please note that by registering to attend you agree to your details being shared as and where required with Amazon Web Services and AWS Well-Architected User Group partners)

Drummoyne Toastmasters Meeting @ Club 5 Dock

Join us to Develop 'YOU'. Improving your confidence, leadership skills, public speaking and communication skills are all benefits that could have a great impact on your personal life and career. Members of Toastmasters find unlimited opportunities for personal and professional growth and development. Joining Toastmasters could change your life. Great time, great venue, great Club. Supporting you in: * Giving prepared speeches * Talking “off the cuff” * Giving evaluations * Telling jokes and stories * Chairing meetings * Meeting management skills * Handling props * Using audio-visual equipment This is a place where you will: Continue to grow; Enhance your social skills; Be entertained; Laugh...... and HAVE FUN! Our meetings are held at **Club Five Dock RSL**. To **confirm your attendance** please RSVP or email your details to **president.drummoyne@toastmastersD70.org**

Unhurried Conversations at the Pub

In an unhurried conversation, there is time to think differently and connect with people in a refreshing way. Unhurried isn't always slow. It offers a pace where people find it easy to join in and not feel crowded out. And listening can be as satisfying as talking. We use a simple meeting format to make this happen. https://www.unhurried.org/ This newly created event is at a new venue, the Keg & Bew Hotel at Surry Hills. We meet on the 2nd floor around 6:15pm. Food and drinks are available, before and after, on the ground floor and roof top.

Passion to Purpose: Learn to Host Small Events and Test Your Business Idea

**A 4 Week Program for Women Ready to Share Their Ideas with Confidence!** Have you ever thought: * I'd love to run my own workshop. * I'd like to see if people are interested in my idea. * I enjoy helping others, but don't know where to begin. * I'd love to build a community around something I'm passionate about. If that sounds like you, we created this four-week program for you. Instead of spending months planning, you'll learn how to test your idea by hosting a small, welcoming experience where you can learn from real conversations and genuine feedback. Whether your interest is wellness, creativity, business, personal interests, food, gardening, fitness, education or another topic you enjoy, hosting can be a practical way to explore your idea while building confidence and connecting with others. **What You'll Learn** * Week 1 — Discover Your Passion and Purpose Explore what genuinely interests you, who you enjoy helping and how your interests could become a simple community experience. * Week 2 — Design Your First Hosted Experience Learn how to turn your idea into a simple event that people would enjoy attending. * Week 3 — Build Confidence as a Host Hosting is a skill that improves with practice. We'll share practical ideas that have worked well through Morgaia's own community experiences. * Week 4 — Test, Reflect and Grow Bring everything together by planning your own small hosted experience. **Who This Program Is For** This program is ideal for women who: * have an idea they'd like to explore * enjoy bringing people together * want to build confidence speaking with groups * would like to develop leadership and communication skills * are considering creating future workshops, events or community experiences * want to learn in a friendly and supportive environment No previous hosting experience is required. **What You'll Receive** * Four interactive group sessions * Practical worksheets and planning templates * Opportunities to learn alongside other women * A supportive community where questions are encouraged * Practical ideas you can apply at your own pace **What to bring** * A notebook/journal + pen * An open mind **Contribution**: $5 **Meeting point** The Sorrel Cafe & Kitchen https://share.google/UdizTCl7qcKVNrbUG **Check out our Sister Meetups** Glow Up and Go Sydney - Yoga and Mind-Body Movement [https://www.meetup.com/glowupandgosydney](https://www.meetup.com/glowupandgosydney) Sydney Eats Walk Social Life [https://www.meetup.com/sydneyeatswalksociallife](https://www.meetup.com/sydneyeatswalksociallife) This event is brought to you by **Morgaia**, a welcoming community for women 40+ who want to build healthy habits, enjoy gentle movement and connect with like-minded women. Learn more at [www.morgaia.com](http://www.morgaia.com/). **About Morgaia** Morgaia encourages women to keep growing, learning and building confidence through community experiences. This program shares practical ideas, personal experiences and lessons learned from hosting community events over time. Every participant is encouraged to adapt what they learn to suit their own goals, interests and circumstances. Whether you choose to host one event or continue developing your ideas beyond the program, you'll leave with more confidence, practical knowledge and a clearer understanding of your next steps. Come along, meet like-minded women, and discover how hosting can be a practical way to explore your ideas, grow your confidence, and create meaningful community connections. **Important Information** This event is an educational community program that shares practical experiences, ideas and general information. It is not business, legal, financial, medical or psychological advice. Individual experiences and outcomes will differ, and participants are encouraged to seek professional advice where appropriate for their personal circumstances.

Colour My Life

Unwind this year at the Library and bring some colour into the world. A perfect balance of mindfulness and creativity, colouring is a perfect way to de-stress and relax. Build friendships and make connections in a warm and welcoming environment. All colouring pencils, textas and designs will be provided or you are more than welcome to bring your own supplies. Suitable for all skill levels and abilities. This program is best suited for adults but supervised children may also attend.

On the Degradation of Art and the Public Conscience

**On the Degradation of Art and the Public Conscience** **A philosophical talk by YouTuber, artist and budding science fiction writer Nikola Pavkovic** **What does a civilisation reveal about itself through the art it creates?** Art is not merely decoration. It is an expression of values: of what we consider beautiful or ugly, heroic or contemptible, worthy of admiration or deserving of ridicule. Every culture produces art in its own image and, in doing so, reveals something about its conception of man. This talk will examine the proposition that the degradation of modern art is not an isolated aesthetic phenomenon but the reflection of a deeper degradation in the public conscience. What happens when beauty becomes embarrassing, greatness becomes suspect and sincerity gives way to irony? When the artist ceases to present a vision of what man might become and instead celebrates fragmentation, ugliness, nihilism or despair? We will explore the relationship between **philosophy, art, morality and politics**, tracing the historical forces that have transformed our artistic culture and asking whether the decline of artistic standards has accompanied a corresponding decline in our moral ones. We’ll consider the capture of artistry not merely within universities and cultural institutions but across the wider machinery through which art is produced, funded, judged and celebrated. Yet decline is never total. There are artists who refuse it. By examining these exceptions, we can ask what their survival tells us about the possibility of another artistic culture: one concerned again with beauty, achievement, seriousness and the elevation rather than diminution of the human spirit. Finally, we will confront the most important question: **If you reject the culture being offered to you, what are you prepared to create in its place?** Presentation followed by open discussion, disagreement and debate. **On the second Monday of the month, Philo Agora has a speaker on a philosophical topic and a Q&A and discussion after. On the fourth Monday we meet again for open philosophical discussion.** Philo Agora's format is a talk for 20 minutes starting at 7:15 for 7:30. The presenter then answers any questions of clarification from the floor. We then take a break of 5 minutes for more coffee and to mull over the talk and discuss it within small groups. The microphone is then passed around the audience for comment, opinion, and often counter argument to a maximum of 3 minutes. The presenter is then given a 5 minute right of reply. We usually finish up at 9pm. The cover charge is $5 for the talk. There are tea and coffee facilities available in-house. Sam Alexander - Convener (0457 749 310)

Honest Feedback - Say It, For Real

How often do you really say what you think? We all have opinions. About someone's work. Someone's outfit. A friend's behaviour. A business. A restaurant. Even ourselves. But how often do we actually say what we mean? Instead, we soften the truth, say what we think people want to hear, avoid awkward conversations, give five-star reviews we don't really mean - or keep our thoughts entirely to ourselves. And when someone finally gives us honest feedback we become defensive, dismissive or defeated. What if we got better at both sides of the equation? "**Honest Feedback**" is an evening of playful simulations designed to help you become better at giving, receiving and using honest feedback. We'll explore what happens inside us when we're asked to tell the truth - the desire to look good, avoid looking bad, protect someone's feelings, protect ourselves, or simply keep the peace. Because honest feedback isn't about being brutally honest for the sake of it. It's about creating enough awareness, courage and trust to discover what is actually useful, and then deciding what to do with it. Imagine having the confidence to ask, "What do you really think?" and the ability to hear the answer. Imagine being able to tell someone what they genuinely need to hear without tearing them down. Imagine how much improvement in our careers, relationships, businesses and everyday lives if we could do both at will. **WHO THIS IS FOR** * people who want to become better at communicating what they really think and feel. * people who struggle to give feedback because they don't want to offend, upset or disappoint others. * entrepreneurs and professionals who want better feedback from customers, colleagues, clients or the people around them. * and anyone who wants to just be more honest! 🎟️ Register to attend: https://www.trybooking.com/events/landing/1634825 Ticket includes drinks, snacks and a vegetarian meal. **ABOUT** **Utopia Rising** delivers unconventional social experiences for self-improvement seekers looking to broaden their network or simply be inspired by life again. It’s a party reimagined - alcohol-free, featuring healthy plant-based food.