Executive Committee Roles

President

The President oversees the running of EMWA, including:

EC Management: contributing to and driving agenda content for EC meetings (in-person, virtual and ad hoc); understanding and facilitating each EC officer’s responsibilities and workload; helping to find candidates for EC positions.
Head Office (HO) co-ordination: conducting the annual review of HO services; co-ordinating any changes to the service provider; maintaining regular contact with HO.
Finance and constitution: maintaining awareness of EMWA’s financial situation; defining and driving forward EMWA’s business and communication strategy.
Conference: chairing relevant conference sessions; participating in the conference opening (and other relevant) speeches; assisting (as needed) with conference organisation; preparing text for the conference invitation and brochure.
Journal and website: writing the President’s Message for each issue of the EMWA journal and providing website content as needed.
Other activities: developing and maintaining partnerships with related professional organisations; promoting the medical writing profession through presentations, discussions and press releases; along with all EC members, taking responsibility for maintaining all governance documents and ensuring copies are stored in the document repository.

Role currently held by: Katrin Zaragoza-Doerr

President-Elect

The President-Elect assists the President (and Past President) and, in their absence takes on the role of the President. The President-Elect’s role includes:

Supporting the President: providing support to the President and taking the lead on these roles in the President (or Past President’s) absence.
Supporting EMWA groups: being the EC point of contact for some of EMWA’s groups and initiatives, providing support to them, and representing them (as necessary) at EC meetings.

Contact email: president-elect@emwa.org

Role currently held by: Namrata Singh

Conference Director

The Conference Director is responsible for overseeing conference organisation, including:

Pre-conference: liaising with HO for conference and venue planning; overseeing preparation of conference-related materials (brochures, flyers, delegate pack, etc.) and having final approval; forming and leading a conference steering committee (as needed); collaborating with HO and the Education Officer to establish the programme of events; leading discussions on conference registrations, preparing conference-related surveys.
During conference: attending conferences, checking conference facilities; overseeing conference activities, being a key point of contact during the conference.
Post-conference: debriefing with HO and the EC, presenting survey results to the EC; suggesting any changes to future conferences (venues, programme, etc.); liaising with HO to identify future conference locations.

Contact email: conferencedirector@emwa.org

Role currently held by: Jules Kovacevic

Education Officer

The Education Officer is Chair of the EPDC and manages the EMWA Professional Development Programme (EPDP). Responsibilities of the Education Officer include:

EPDP: leading the EPDC in managing the strategy, content, quality assurance and organisation of EMWA’s workshop and webinar programmes; planning workshop programmes to be run at EMWA conferences; ensuring topics are relevant to members’ needs and keep abreast with new developments in medical writing; supporting workshop leaders and webinar presenters; setting standards and monitoring quality; developing EPDC documentation for workshop leaders, webinar presenters, and EMWA members; devising a strategy to keep the EPDP relevant for EMWA members.
Interactions with HO: developing the schedule for EMWA conference workshop programmes; running the webinar programme; ensuring EPDP content is provided for the conference website; providing timely information for presenters (including workshop leaders) and webinar participants; maintaining the database of workshop information.
Other activities: advising on the potential impact on the EPDP of any projects being discussed by the EC; liaising with the Conference Director on the conference workshop programme and the EPDP pages of the conference website; selecting new members of the EPDC and proposing successful applicants to the EC for appointment; ensuring there is an effective webinar team to support the EPDC.

Contact email: education@emwa.org

Role currently held by: Andrea Palluch

Honorary Secretary

The Honorary Secretary is also the registered Company Secretary for EMWA. Responsibilities of the Honorary Secretary include:

EMWA-related documents: regularly reviewing the Articles of Association, Rules of the Association, policies and procedures, and all other official EMWA documents to ensure they reflect the current practices; co-ordinating updates to these documents for EC approval.
Monitoring HO: conducting an annual review of HO services and co-ordinating any change to the HO service provider; reviewing a monthly report on EMWA-related and membership-related activities.
Contracts: reviewing all contracts between EMWA and service providers; maintaining the database of EMWA’s regular suppliers; ensuring revised contracts are approved by the EC as appropriate.
Meetings: ensuring the call for EC role nominations is sent out, correspondence required for official meetings according to the legally-required time requirements before the respective meeting (eg, a General Meeting of members); chairing General Meetings.
Other activities: ensuring each new EC member receives an official administration pack once elected on to the EC and completes accordingly (including directorship forms); being a member of the Finance Committee.

Contact email: honsec@emwa.org

Role currently held by: Sarah Choudhury

Journal Editor

The Journal Editor is responsible for all aspects of the EMWA journal, including:

Journal content: deciding on and securing content; ensuring quality of content, decisions relating to journal design and development, and production and distribution; co-ordinating an editorial team; liaising with journal contributors and vendors.
Journal production: ensuring delivery of content from authors; assigning, overseeing and peer reviewing content; making decisions on acceptance/rejection of manuscripts; writing an editorial as needed; obtaining copyright permissions when applicable; soliciting volunteers for write-ups; working with the editorial board to ensure proofs are provided and checked; approving final proofs; arranging editorial board meetings.
Other activities: liaising with the Website Manager/PR Officer and providing text to promote each issue; liaising with HO for an email notification to be sent when new issues are imminent or available.

Contact email: editor@emwa.org

Role currently held by: Raquel Billiones

Membership Officer

The Membership Officer is responsible for fostering a good relationship with EMWA members and volunteers, and promoting a more interactive experience for members, including:

Membership database and metrics: managing the database in conjunction with HO to ensure accurate and current records are held; overseeing membership metrics and reporting; analysing membership data and trends; preparing reports on membership growth, retention rates, and engagement levels.
Membership communication: responding to membership inquiries; considering and handling applications from new volunteers; managing applications for new EMWA groups (e.g., SIGs, working groups).
Membership growth: working with the PR Officer and Website Manager (and other EC members) to develop and implement membership recruitment strategies.
Other activities: serving as the Data Privacy Manager for EMWA; leading the Salary and Compensation Survey Team.

Contact email: membershipofficer@emwa.org

Role currently held by: Sarah Hopwood

Public Relations Officer

The tasks and responsibilities of the Public Relations (PR) Officer include the following:

PR activities: planning the PR and communication strategies in association with other EC members; promoting and raising awareness of medical writing as a profession; supporting the growth of EMWA and its membership; providing the Website Manager with fresh news and updates for website content; encouraging knowledge sharing through communities of shared interests; liaising with and supporting the Conference Director and HO with promoting EMWA conferences; checking all promotional literature relating to EMWA and informing other EC members.
Other activities: co-ordinating and liaising with the Webinars Team to design, conduct and promote an appropriate yearly program of events.

Contact email: pr@emwa.org

Role currently held by: TBC

Treasurer

The tasks and responsibilities of the Treasurer include:

Payments: reviewing and approving invoices, expense claims etc.; ensuring payments are booked to the correct accounting code; approving or initiating payments via EMWA’s online banking systems.
General finance: liaising regularly with EMWA’s finance team at HO regarding all aspects of EMWA’s finances (HO is responsible for bookkeeping, preparing monthly accounts, preparing conference budgets, and liaising with EMWA’s auditors); interacting with the EC regarding financial matters; leading the Finance Subcommittee which reviews monthly accounts, annual Financial Statements, and EMWA’s annual and conference budgets); drafting EMWA’s annual budget; maintaining oversight of EMWA financial service providers (e.g., bank accounts, and online payment gateways); pursuing debts to EMWA once HO has exhausted usual debt collection channels; signing supplier contracts (ongoing, conference venues, etc.).
Other activities: preparing the Treasurer’s Report including the previous year’s financial statements and proposed budget for presentation at the AM; signing the annual financial accounts.

Contact email: treasurer@emwa.org

Role currently held by: Julia Cooper and Wendy Kingdom

Website Manager

The Website Manager has overall responsibility of the content on the EWMA Website and responsibilities include:

Website-related: co-ordinating activities with content and infrastructure partners; reviewing content provided for the EMWA website; verifying requests for content updates to the website; implementing website content updates where feasible.
Associated data: working with the Membership Officer, Education Officer, and HO to ensure databases are current and complete; overseeing other EMWA-related websites (e.g., CORE Reference and the journal) to ensure integration within the EMWA infrastructure.
Other activities: delivering relevant statistics related to website usage, website costs, and website development; liaising with HO regarding content, website infrastructure (including licences) and website security.

Contact email: webmanager@emwa.org

Role currently held by: Ulrike Stiller

For details regarding eligibility, election, duration of office, meetings, contact Head Office for the latest version.

Please note, full job descriptions will be posted when roles become available.