Susanne is passionate about creating spaces where all feel heard, seen and included. She uses a data-informed approach to understand the unique needs of her clients and create custom tools to support their equity, diversity and inclusion journey.
From custom training programs to anti-oppressive strategic planning, Susanne supports those ready to invest in inclusion.
ABOUT
Susanne Nyaga
Susanne Nyaga is a dedicated community organizer, activist, educator and EDI (Equity, Diversity & Inclusion) specialist. Susanne has nearly 10 years of experience working with systematically marginalized communities, assessing systemic barriers, elevating diverse narratives and developing interventions to meet the needs of the most vulnerable populations. She carries a Master of Social Work degree from Howard University where she focused on studying evidence-based approaches and frameworks to building more inclusive systems.
Susanne’s career has led her to work with institutions, in various capacities, to support the development and implementation of EDI strategic and action plans. She has unique expertise informed by anti-oppressive theory & practice, anti-racism, critical race theory, intersectionality, queer theory, feminist theory & approaches, and many more.
Susanne recognizes everyone’s journey with EDI is different, however, it becomes a lot less scary when you have the guidance needed to make the right decisions and tackle those tricky conversations. She is passionate about building inclusive systems, one organization at a time.
WHAT I DO
Services
Susanne offers a wide variety of services to meet the unique needs of her clients. Everyone’s EDI journey looks different. Whether you are just starting to formalize your EDI practices, need a custom training program or have no idea where to start, Susanne can help.
Training Programs and Workshops
Regardless of where you are on your journey, Susanne provides a range of custom training programs and workshops to help diverse audiences unpack, unlearn, and rebuild. Susanne works directly with her clients to build custom training programs that can be provided at staff training days, executive retreats, or ongoing learning opportunities for internal and external EDI stakeholders.
Changed behaviour cannot be achieved without new knowledge. Book a free consultation with Susanne today to talk about your training needs and how she can support.
Strategic and Action Planning
A central value of inclusion is intentionality. When approaching EDI work it is important to be clear on the unique needs of your organization and the specific actions that will be taken to achieve key outcomes. It is important to have a plan.
Susanne works directly with organizations to build effective and action-oriented strategic plans and/or EDI action plans. Whether you require a full organizational assessment or help to make sense of previously collected data, Susanne can help. She builds strategic plans and action plans that can help you embark on your journey with confidence.
Conflict Mediation
Conflict is not necessarily a bad thing, but when diverse individuals come together conflict is almost inevitable. However, research shows us that the beauty of effectively-resolved conflict is growth and development. So it is not about avoiding conflict, but effectively addressing it to give space for new growth.
Susanne works with organizations to mediate ongoing conflicts and identify key recommendations for resolution and prevent foreseen areas of tension in the future. She also works to help with the development of robust conflict mediation practices and policies. If you are currently navigating a conflict or want to update your practices, book a free consultation with Susanne to learn how she can help.
Speaking Engagements
With a background in community organizing and advocacy, Susanne might be the expert you need to spice up your next gala or conference. Her layered expertise and charismatic personality provide her with the right skills to meaningfully address an audience and provide depth to a topic. Susanne has spoken to issues of race & racism, gender, intersectionality, allyship, immigration, age, feminism and much more.
Reach out to Susanne if you are looking for a dynamic speaker to elevate your next event.
General Consulting
Don’t see the service you are looking for? Have a specific project in mind already? Need one-time advice and guidance from an expert? Looking for a consultant to keep on retainer? If you answered yes to any of the questions, Susanne might be exactly who you are looking for.
As everyone’s journey is different, Susanne also offers clients an hourly rate for ad-hoc consulting support or can tailor her services to meet the distinct needs of her clients. Reach out to Susanne for a free consultation to see how she can support your unique EDI journey.
Community Support
Marginalized communities often experience disproportionate barriers to building non-profit organizations and accessing resources. With expertise in non-profit management, development and evaluation, Susanne also supports community-based organizations in their development. Whether you are looking to build an organizational strategic plan or require support developing robust policies, reach out to Susanne to see how she can help operationalize your dream.
WHAT OTHERS HAVE SAID
Kind Words
Our collaboration with Susanne in developing and facilitating the “Navigating Microaggressions and Tokenism” training course was a resounding success because of various key factors. First, from the very start of the project, Susanne proved herself to be truly outstanding in her field. Her ability to distill complex concepts into understandable, engaging and actionable training content was super impressive. She has a unique talent for taking the Rise on Boards program’s needs and vision and transforming them into cohesive and comprehensive learning experiences for our program participants.
One of the most remarkable aspects of working with Susanne was her unwavering commitment to deadlines and quality. Without exception, she delivered all outputs on time and of the highest quality. Her attention to detail was evident from creating the training curriculum, training materials, and assessment tools, developing PowerPoint presentations and video recordings, and formatting/layout of training references.
Her facilitation skills were another standout feature. With her self-paced video recording and live virtual facilitations, you could feel her presence and passion in every module she developed. She made the learning experience truly enjoyable and impactful to our program participants. It was evident that she enjoyed being an instrument of learning, and her enthusiasm was contagious.
In conclusion, working with Susanne was an absolute pleasure, and her contributions were instrumental in the success of the Rise on Boards training program. If you are looking for a training developer and facilitator who will deliver outstanding training content and do it with professionalism, passion and precision, I highly recommend Susanne’s expertise.
Fora Network for Change
Susanne developed, evaluated and facilitated a 10-part training program for our staff. She provided valuable training modules that were thorough and well-developed. Susanne demonstrated professionalism throughout the whole process and was patient and understanding while staff completed the training modules asynchronously. Overall, it was a pleasure working with her.
African Community Services of Peel
The Students Commission of Canada worked with Susanne Nyaga as a part of our Nobody’s Born A Racist (NBR) 2.0 Speaker Series project that aims to engage over 600 Canadian youth aged 12-29 in a national movement to combat systemic racism. Susanne’s talk focused on structural racism in the education systems, touching on understanding the underpinnings and what can be done to combat this issue.
It was a pleasure to work with her, she was kind and knowledgeable about the subject while engaging youth in personal experiences they’ve had. Susanne also recommended forms of action for both allies and BIPOC youth in order to support and safely address structural racism. We truly recommend her work, and it was lovely to work with her.
The Students Commission of Canada
We worked with Susanne on our Anti-Racism Professional Development Series for the newcomer serving sector. The workshops aimed to strengthen relationships and bring awareness to pertinent issues for sector staff of various levels. Susanne facilitated workshops that were both engaging and impactful. She took the time to develop content that was relevant and thought-provoking. She gave folks the opportunity to unpack concepts during her sessions and shared valuable resources with participants afterwards.
Using an anti-oppressive approach and great facilitation style, Susanne was able to provide tools to support sector staff on how to address anti-racism and move towards making meaningful change. It was a pleasure working with her and would highly recommend her work.
