Dianne Sutton

Dianne Floyd Sutton is a speaker, trainer, educator, author, coach, actor and president of Sutton Enterprises. She has spent over three decades providing employee training, leadership development and facilitation services - crafting her career as a pioneer and leader in the human capital development field. Dianne is well known for her humor, honesty and refreshingly down-to-earth messages. Dianne's straightforward approach to career and employee management and her ability to engage and entertain her audiences have resulted in numerous requests to share her expertise nationally and internationally.

FYI: Dianne's first job was at age 10 in St. Louis, MO.  She would walk six blocks and sweep out her grandfather's tailoring shop after hours for fifty-cents.   She got to keep all the coins on the dressingroom floor. Her grandfather, Woods the Taylor, made mohair suits for Chuck Berry, the rock and roll artist.

 

Dianne started her career as a recreation leader for the city of St. Louis, MO, while pursuing an undergraduate degree in education.  She worked as a middle school math instructor in the public school system, while earning her graduate degree from Washington University, St. Louis, MO.  Dianne then held a variety of positions at the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) as an investigator and conciliator in the St. Louis Office and as an EEO instructor and Employee Development Specialist at EEOC Headquarters in Washington, DC. She also worked at the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA-HQ) in training/employee development for Agricultural Marketing Services.  In 1987, she left the federal government and created Sutton Enterprises in Washington, D.C.

Dianne realized that "attitude" could not be legislated or controlled, so she has focused on making people aware of their behaviors and the impact of their actions on others, as well as the organization.

She served in several jobs/positions in which she made her passion for advancing workplace ethics, continual learning, and employment rights into a viable regarding career and business. 

• Board member of Training Officers Consortium (TOC)  Washington, DC-based HRD network (32 years) -- Served as TOC Historian
• Adjunct professor at American University, School of Communication, and University of Maryland University College, School of Business (on-line)   
• Recognized as an outstanding faculty member of the Graduate School USDA, Center for Leadership and Management
• Guest lecturer in the academic community (College of Southern Maryland, University of the District of Columbia, George Washington University, and Florida A & M).
• Policy Board member of the National Rural Health Association (Kansas City, Missouri)
• Twice elected as an Advisory Neighborhood Commission (ANC) Commissioner of a single-member district in the District of Columbia, representing over 2,000 residents 
• Taught ESOL (English Students of Other Languages)    

Ms. Sutton has been interviewed on Bloomberg Business News, Maryland, and Virginia Public T.V. Self Employed Magazine, published by the National Association for the Self Employed, featured Dianne in the article "When Saying No Can Lead to Success." She has testified before the U.S. Congressional Committee on Small Businesses in the USA. She also was featured in blackmeninamerica.com and interviewed on voiceamerica.com, The Leadership Forum with Bernard Robinson. She also blogs on Linkedin and suttonenterprises.org,

Dianne's diversity experiences started way before S.E. As part of her graduate work at Washington University; she conducted the blue-eye-brown-eye experiment with a high school class.  She is also certified to train in Windmills, Sensitivity to the Employment of Disabled Employees. Her diversity experience includes contributing a chapter in the book The Solve Communication Method ™, Working Out of the Bamboo Box with Asian Pacific American and African, European, Hispanic and Native Americans.

Currently, she enjoys working with employees on enhancing their soft skills (i.e., workplace etiquette, assertive communication, political savvy, team building, and branding. She is the author of Workplace Etiquette: A Guide to Thriving and Surviving in Today's Workplace and Workplace Savvy. Both books identify the competencies and behaviors needed for career effectiveness in the workplace.

When not presenting, she is dreaming, researching and writing.