We are Greeks, both local and international, and International friends, who have co-founded and who now co-lead the SIZ-Hellas.
THE CORE TEAM
Maria Scordialos, The Living Wholeness Institute, Athens & Pelio
Odyssesas Velentzas, Process Makers, Athens
Nikos Rovakis, Process Makers, Athens
Maria Bakari, Synergy~Συνέργεια, Rhodes
Vanessa Reid, The Living Wholeness Institute, Pelio & Canada
THE CO-FOUNDERS OF THE SIZ
Maria Scordialos is a co-founder and steward of The Living Wholeness Institute, the Art of Hosting Meaningful Conversations, Hara Practice Limited; and Axladitsa Avatakia, a place of learning in Pelion, Greece. Maria is an experienced process designer and facilitator, working with the principles of self-organisation and participation in order to create the conditions where both individual and collective learning and discovery can emerge. Maria has worked in strategic management positions and since 2000 has co-created strategic participatory learning opportunities in Europe, North America and the Middle East. She is a co-founder of SIZ-Hellas and a core team member.
Maria Bakari is an organisational psychologist, social entrepreneur and researcher. Her work and life journey is holding many gifts and powerful experiences in the fields of life-long learning, education, leadership, systemic change, creativity and innovation, intercultural understanding and teamworking. She is passionate about listening, articulating questions of resonance and mid~weaving the interconnected ways through synergy, humanity and authenticity. Having 4 years of living, learning and practicing leadership skills in the U.K. and many international collaborations in Europe and globally, upon return to Rhodes, Greece she set up “Synergy”, a social enteprise and playground for collective creativity which aims at fostering support, cultivating personal and interpersonal potential, inspiring passion and organising organic learning spaces in co~creative and playful ways. She is a co-founder of SIZ Hellas and a core team member.
Vanessa Reid is an architect, writer, systems thinker, practice leader and social innovator. She works with pioneering leaders, citizens and social innovators in Canada, Europe and the Middle East to move skillfully through transitions and life-cycles ~ and towards discovering deeply sustainable ways of living and working. Vanessa is the former executive director of Santropol Roulant and innovative Montreal-based organization founded and run by young people that re-imagines social services as a catalyst for social change by working with food and intergenerational relationships. As executive publisher of ascent magazine and timeless books, she pioneered the organizational practice of “conscious closure”. Vanessa writes about the wholeness that is borne from a seemingly broken world, is the founder and creative director of the studio of the extraordinary and the Conscious Kitchen and is a co-founder of the Living Wholeness Institute and SIZ-Hellas, where she is also a core team member.
Sarah Whiteley is an author, poet practice leader and action researcher of systemic transformation, subtle artistry and conscious evolution. Co-initiator and Steward of the Art of Hosting, co-founder of the systemic learning centre Axladitsa Avatakia, Greece, co-founder of the Living Wholeness Institute and SIZ-Hellas and most recently, founder of Conscious Evolution, Sarah tracks the process of intentional evolution and hosts the conscious evolution of people, groups and practices including their revolutionary movements. Through writing, hosting and artistry, she tracks the process of intentional evolution and host the conscious evolution of people, groups and practices including their revolutionary movements.
FOUNDING CONVERSATIONS
Also part of the co-founding and the seeding of the original idea of SIZ – which was birthed in a conversation around a cafe table in Athens in 2011 – are Pavlina Proteou and Lucas Fulling and Fillipo Addaril, the latter two of whom are both from the Euclid Network.
OUR STEWARDS of THE ART OF PARTICIPATORY LEADERSHIP (AoPL)
Our pattern of hosting the AoPL trainings is to bring together our Greek core team with friends from abroad whom we love and trust and who bring different skills, perspectives, experiences, approaches and cultures to the mix.
Maria Scordialos (Greece), Odysseas Velentzas (Greece), Vanessa Reid (Canada), Nikos Rovakis (Greece), Yitzhak Mendelsohn (Jerusalem), Anton Vaklov (Bulgaria), Matthieu Kleinschmager (Belgium), Kieron Concannon (UK/Ireland), Mark Taplin (UK), Mary Thym (Larissa), Sarah Whiteley (UK), Bénédicte Rousseau (Belgium).
The SIZhellas 