PERSONAL STATEMENT- Leonardo Wainer- Running for media coordinator

Dear ISST community,

First, I would like to express my gratitude for your trust in the past two years of work during my time at the Executive Board. The role of Media Coordinator required flexibility and focus due to all changes that have been taking place in the world.  These two years were filled with learning experiences, and it was instrumental for understanding of how the society works and what are its needs.

The work as Media Coordinator is an intense and demanding role. During this term the Executive Board was much focused on spreading the Schema Therapy message with efficiency in an ethical manner. Taking into consideration that the world keeps evolving and the way that we connect changes, it was in 2021that the EB members launched the ISST Instagram Page. Our Instagram page has over 2000 followers and this number keeps increasing. To assist our communication, Jonee James Patoc was hired as Social Media Assistant for the ISST. As society and social media evolves the ISST needs to be in touch with these developments and this hiring is a step in that direction. 

During this term, the ISST held the 2021 Virtual Summit and the 2022 Inspire. Both conferences received much of my attention as Media Coordinator. I assisted the EB and Event’s Committee with the advertising and coverage of those events. Working alongside with all the EB members we were able to hold successfully the first hybrid conference that the ISST has ever held. 

One of my challenges and roles as Media coordinator was to assist ISST in the development of the new and improved website. This work took several meetings and hours of work. Unfortunately, due to some important discordances with the web developers the decision of terminating the partnership with them was made. As I understand and the entire EB agrees, the website renewal is an endeavor that is of great importance with great relevance to the continuous development of the Schema Therapy Society. Members of the Executive Board and the admin staff are working on hiring developers to provide the membership the website that will support all of its needs. A task force has been implemented and meetings are occurring every week to provide the website that will fit all the needs of the membership.

For the next term, if elected, I will continue working to ensure that the society has a presence on all continents, facilitating access to ISST’s media resources for all therapists seeking information and expertise in our area, especially with the aid of social media. I aim to assist in the renewal of the ISST website and its mobile version, so members will have a more friendly experience and will be able to find the resources easily. 

Finally, I would like to, again, thank the membership and the many people within ISST for all the work that is put into it every day. I only wish for the growth and development of Schema Therapy understanding how important and effective our model is.