Susan North has an extensive background in education, both as a teacher and an administrator. Her career has allowed her to observe the workings of large organizations (schools, community groups, businesses, public agencies and nonprofits), and to note how conflicts play out among the people involved with those organizations. She has found that people resolve conflicts best when they explore win-win options that allow everyone to feel he or she got something of value.
Susie especially enjoys working with parties who are in an ongoing relationship, and helping them make that relationship function better. Common examples of these relationships are landlords and tenants, co-workers, neighbors, and separated parents who share children. She believes that a timely and skillfully conducted mediation can prevent a disagreement from becoming a disaster. In that sense, her work as a “neighborhood mediator” is largely preventive. She mediates:
- neighbor-neighbor difficulties
- non-litigated family disputes
- workplace conflicts
- co-parenting challenges
- landlord-tenant problems
- neighborhood issues (filming, parking, safety, community organizations and so forth)
Susie is a member of the Association for Conflict Resolution, the Southern California Mediation Association and the California Academy of Mediation Professionals. As a volunteer with CAMP, Susie mediates in the Beverly Hills Small Claims court. She also mediates for Centinela Youth Services, in both FARS (family mediations) and VORS (victim-offender restitutions). She helps coach college students to mediate disputes at local high schools through UCLA's partnernship with the Dispute Resolution Program, a division of the Los Angeles City Attorney's Office. Susie also trains and coaches student mediators with the Western Justice Center.
Conflict need not become catastrophic — unless it goes unchecked. Click here for more information about setting up a mediation appointment. Susie is also available to facilitate meetings of schools or community organizations.