Taisia Slobodjanuk

About Taisia

Creating my career as an international business woman, becoming the founder and leader of Expat Psychologist in The Netherlands and Switzerland, by studying psychology and completing my MBA, has been my biggest achievement so far. A huge personal achievement for me is having had the opportunity to travel to over 65+ countries, and counting. I will forever be grateful that this journey of life has been so gentle and generous to me.

Expat Psychologist grew to be one of the leading expat-focused services in the Netherlands with several locations throughout the country. With the dream to help expats all over the world, I also expanded my reach to Switzerland. I takes pride in not only being a great role model to other psychologists but also in providing high-quality client-focused services to anyone who finds it challenging to adapt to a new country. 

Being a good leader is very important to me. My idea of leadership involves a subtle tango between identifying my own personal strengths as a leader, and the needs of people I wish to lead. So, my goal as a leader is to be the best of myself in modeling the values that are important to me, like emotional intelligence, and to simultaneously lead my employees and colleagues to grow into the best versions of themselves. 

One of my goals was to complete my MBA in International Healthcare Management. I am very excited to incorporate what I have learned about management and building sustainable relationships with what I have already learned over the years from managing my wonderful team of Expat Psychologists. I wish to grow even further in my role as a leader for people that help me to run my practice and to provide qualified support for many expats.

I want to stay on the top of the list of being an Expat Expert. It’s a title I take a lot of pride in, because it feels like the culmination of all of my experiences, hardships and determination that brought me to where I am today. It motivates me to keep reaching for something bigger than myself – I am actively working towards expanding my amazing and qualified team and the company to all over the world to fully accommodate the expat community and the internationals in their journey to fulfill their truest potential. And, of course, to provide psychological help to anyone who needs it!

Expat expert – how it begin

One of my earliest memories of growing up in the orphanage was being very short and small.  From a young age, I had decent manners and was generally an easy, lively, and obedient kid, except that I was a very curious kid and would stop at nothing to explore! There was a large window that I really wanted to look out of, and I tried and tried but could not reach the windowsill. But one day, when I was finally able to, I was surprised to see a big beautiful yard! This experience started a journey in my head; I imagined being free as a bird, leaving the place and discovering the enormous world out there.

There was something so fundamental about this memory, and how sad I had felt when I could not reach that window. It was as though I already knew that the world had a lot to offer to me, and I just could not wait to see it all for myself. I think this was the beginning of my “plan to action” to explore the world, but also set the stage for many of my goals and values in life. I believe that these goals took me out of that orphanage and brought me many years later to Syria, Netherlands, Belgium, Nigeria and Switzerland, where I got to enjoy the hospitality of the people from all over the world, and where each of these countries became a pivotal moment that provided me with new perspectives and opportunities that guided my decisions and my growth to date. 

I am grateful to have been able to visit so many countries in this world, and not only experience their culture, but also develop new perspectives and viewpoints to better understand and help people in my work-life. So, my desire to travel inspires me to help more people, and vice versa! Some people live to work, and some people work to live- but I get the best of both worlds.

My greatest passion is people. And, I am grateful that I get to follow my passion not only in my work life, but also in my personal life: Whenever I travel and see how different parts of the world and cultures live, and whenever I help people in my work, especially ones that struggle to find someone who understands them well, it brings me great joy to be able to help people.

Everyone deserves to be happy!

Through my travels and experience being an expat, I have seen many views on mental health. The message I want to get out there to anyone reading is that seeking help is brave. There exists such a widespread negative stigma when it comes to therapy, but I believe that reaching out to a professional for help is one of the most courageous things you can do for yourself to start improving your life. 

My wish for the mental health industry from the start has always been that everyone, including and especially people from third-world countries would be able to receive the psychological help they need! Everyone deserves to be happy, right?