Interview with UPAD: psychological support for influencers in the digital age

We interviewed Carlos Rey and Fernando Callejo, from UPAD, expert psychologists in helping influencers.

With the new times come new forms of psychological assistance adapted to the technological environment in which we live immersed.

One of the areas in which this is noticeable is in the type of professional profiles that seek support from experts in behavioral science. For example, today there are psychologists who are experts in helping influencers: social commentators, culture disseminators, nutritionists, fitness specialists, etc.

In this case, we interviewed two psychologists who have been working with influencers for years, providing them with support tailored to the type of needs and problems they have in terms of their way of living and working, where the boundaries between the private and the public are often too ambiguous. They are Fernando Callejo and Carlos Rey, the founding members of UPAD Psicología y Coachinga psychological assistance center located in Madrid.

Interview to UPAD: this is the psychological support for influencers

UPAD Psicología y Coaching is characterized by the fact that, in addition to offering therapy, its psychologists offer help to professionals under pressure due to the characteristics of their work: athletes, creative profiles, and, in addition, influencers.

Precisely in this last area of intervention we will focus here, through an interview with the founding members of UPAD, Fernando Callejo and Carlos Rey, psychologists with extensive experience in psychological support services for needs and problems related to professional life.

How did you experience the arrival of the first influencers to your practice? Is it a recent phenomenon?

The truth is that we have been working for several years with different influencers, because although it seems that the phenomenon is current, there are already many people who are dedicated, for some time, to advise or advise the public on healthy habits such as food or fitness, among others. I remember perfectly when the first of them arrived and told me: "Fernando, I have decided to dedicate myself to the world of YouTube and social networks".

He was a professional tennis player who decided to change his life, as he said, to bet on himself and his dreams. Today, after a great work of personal growth, he is a recognized influencer who advises people on their diet and physical activity, always seeking to generate well-being and satisfaction in all those people around him.

These new Internet-era leaders are characterized by their powerful personal branding. When it comes to organizing the activities and tasks of daily life, do you think it can be problematic not to establish clear boundaries between personal and professional?

One of the difficulties that many influencers often encounter is the ability to learn to differentiate their private life from their public (professional) life. Over time, by generating guidelines, such as schedules and tasks, they tend to merge their personal and professional lives.

Most of them try to present their personal life through the networks to show the world that they are not so different from the rest, but that they simply do all this to achieve their dreams.

This does not mean that there are no problems when it comes to defining boundaries, especially when there are relationships. Dating an influencer can sometimes mean for the other person that their private life is exposed to the public, or rather, to the followers of the YouTuber's or Instagramer's social media accounts. Therefore, it is essential to find a balance where both the influencer and his or her partner define what can and cannot be public.

What kind of problems or characteristic needs have you noticed that influencers tend to present, in terms of their professional development?

Most influencers are looking to be more effective and more organized, as their lives are often full of unforeseen events. We work on their ability to manage their time by organizing it according to their priorities.

They often want to carry out a large number of tasks, but they do not have the time to complete them, and of course, time is a variable that we cannot change. It is 24 hours, both for them and for the rest of the people.

It is essential to teach them to organize their time to rest, work and dedicate space to leisure or personal relationships. Poor management often leads to periods of stress and anxiety that prevent them from achieving the goals they want to reach.

On the other hand, we also work on their communication, as it is a fundamental skill, since their work depends on it. To this end, we develop assertiveness strategies and work on affirmations and self-dialogues. Learning not to enter, or rather, to "pass" absurd discussions with people they do not really know (the so-called "trolls", whose only purpose is to discredit the work that influencers do), is usually one of the most common jobs with them.

Finally, another common topic is the relationship. Getting used to being with a person who dedicates more than 75% of the day to work and to expose his or her life in the different channels of social networks is sometimes complicated.

This type of work requires being "online" and on the move at all times, and of course, can lead to conflicts with the partner. For this we work on Emotional Intelligence, it is essential to learn to manage emotions to generate healthy relationships.

And in terms of needs in their private life, is there any characteristic element that tends to occur in many of the influencers? Perhaps something related to the lack of privacy?

The most characteristic thing is usually having to stop in the street to take a photo with a follower. Beyond that, our work is aimed at them deciding how they want their privacy to be.

You have to think that every day they receive public and private messages, and they are not always very positive messages. Learning to channel that information is crucial to generate emotional stability and strong self-esteem.

Does the fact that most influencers are very young make them more likely to experience emotional ups and downs due to their work?

Human beings come into the world without an "instruction manual" so it is logical to experience ups and downs on an emotional level. The problem often arises when they define who they are in terms of public opinion, that is, when they "give away" their power to the public to define their Self.

This difficulty usually attacks their self-esteem directly until they learn to design their own image. During this search they experience all kinds of emotions until they learn to manage them.

In the case of young people and post-adolescents with thousands of followers on the Internet, what role do parents play? Many of them probably don't even understand very well what social networks, YouTube... are.

We have encountered all kinds of parents, to be honest. At the beginning, the most common are parents who don't understand much about social networks and when their children tell them what they want to do, they don't see it clearly and prefer their children to do something else.

Other parents worry, as is logical, about everything that entails their child making his or her private life public. With the passage of time and seeing the success they have had on YouTube or Instagram, parents tend to support their son or daughter, and even, on occasion, participate in the videos that influencers post on their networks.

From your perspective as psychologists, is helping an influencer to maintain a healthy self-esteem similar to helping the average Spaniard?

At UPAD Psychology and Coaching we treat each user in a personalized way without making comparisons or similarities with other clients. When working on the development of self-esteem or self-confidence we use tools and strategies that we adapt to each person we work with.

We believe in the individual's responsibility to decide how they want to define their own concept of "healthy self-esteem". From there, we do our work to give meaning to what they do to accompany them in their personal growth and professional development. It doesn't matter what status a user has, whether it is high, medium or low.

Each person who comes to our center of psychologists in Madrid, or online, decides how big their problem is and when they want to change to solve their difficulty. Above all we are human beings, with our strengths and weaknesses. And from there we work towards a great goal: development.