About Susan

For over thirty-five years, Susan Coleman has worked from war zones to boardrooms teaching people negotiation skills, mediating conflict, and supporting clients in collaborative change initiatives through facilitation and coaching. She has worked with tens of thousands of people in thirty-four countries, on just about every continent, and with hundreds of organizations, governments, teams, and individuals including the United Nations, NASA, Senior Women Leaders of the Government of Afghanistan, and Columbia University.

 Her initiative with the UN ultimately resulted in over 100,000 professionals being trained in collaborative, intercultural negotiation, one of the larger peacebuilding initiatives on the planet. She started her professional journey as a litigator in New York City but detoured to the negotiation and conflict resolution field after attending the Kennedy School at Harvard.

 Coleman was born into one of the oldest colonial American families, where she has had a front row seat to the ironies of privilege, power, and patriarchy. Throughout her life, she has been an activist for evolutionary social change with a deep respect for both the diversity of humans and the natural world.

Susan’s representative client engagements have included:

• NASA, ESA, JAXA and other space partners in Intercultural Negotiation Skills which supports building collaboration for the international space station

• Government of Afghanistan Leadership Development for Senior Women

• The World Bank

• Intercultural Mediation and Change Process for International News Organization

• Women’s Leadership and Change Initiative for Financial Services Firm

• UNICEF Liberia – Whole System Retreat and Leadership Coaching

• Government of Switzerland, GAAMAC International Facilitation for Genocide Prevention

• UN Peacekeeping South Sudan Organizational Facilitation

• Global Fashion Company Leadership Coaching and Cross-Team Mediation

• Global Internet Advertising Firm Leadership Development and Coaching

• Columbia Medical School Senior Team Mediation and Coaching.

Susan has authored and co-authored numerous publications:

• Collaborative Hardball (2025) Amplify Publishing Group

• Building Common Ground: Negotiation, Mediation and Facilitation Methods (2014) Codex Alimentarius Commission

• Handbook of Conflict Resolution, 3rd Ed. (2014), Co-authored “Managing Conflict through Large Group Methods

• Handbook of Conflict Resolution, 3rd Ed., Co-authored “Teaching Conflict Resolution Skills in a Workshop”

• “Women and Negotiation: Tips from the Field (2012) S. Coleman and D. Weaver, Dispute Resolution Magazine, Spring

• The Sage Handbook of Conflict Communication (2006), International/Intercultural Conflict Resolution Training.

• AEIOU On-Line 360 Assessment of Negotiation and Conflict Communication Behaviors http://cglobal.com/products/aeiou/.

Susan holds an M.P.A. from Harvard University, Kennedy School of Government and a J.D. from Hofstra University School of Law. She has many advanced certifications including from the International Coach Federation, Gestalt International Coaching, Team and systemic coaching processes, Working with Groups Intensive from the Gestalt OSD Center in Cleveland, the International Coaching Certification Program and the Organization and Systems Development Program from the Gestalt Institute of Cleveland. In addition, Susan completed the MIT Program on Negotiation from Harvard University.

Susan is on faculty of the Center for Global Affairs, New York University where she teaches “Working with Groups”.

Susan cares deeply about wilderness and loves adventuring with family and friends to remote parts of Alaska, treks around Sagarmatha (aka Everest), and kayaking on the Hudson River.

Susan has worked in the following countries:

• Denmark

• France

• Gabon

• Germany

• Ghana

• Italy

• Lebanon

• Liberia

• Mexico

• Netherlands

• Panama