Susan Oberman founded Common Ground Negotiation Services (CGNS) as a solo private mediation practice in 1999. She developed the Sustainable Knowledge Model of Norm-Educating Mediation which is based on the concept that accumulation of knowledge from one generation to another is necessary for sustaining communities, and sharing that information is crucial in making good decisions.

Ms. Oberman was certified as a mediator in the State of New York in 1987 and by the Supreme Court of Virginia in 1995. Common Ground Negotiation Services held contracts with the Supreme Court of Virginia to provide mediation in the Juvenile and Domestic Relations and Circuit Courts, from 1999-2019. In 2001 CGNS received a grant from the Supreme Court of Virginia to create the Adult Incapacity Mediation Pilot Project. As a Certified Family Mediator and Mentor in the Virginia Juvenile & Domestic Relations, and Circuit Courts, Ms. Oberman worked with parties deciding on child and spousal support, custody and parenting arrangements, and equitable distribution. In addition to providing a space for parents–including couples who are together–to address parenting issues, she sees mediation as a place for parents and children to deal with issues that range from methods of discipline and communication to gender non-conformity and sexuality. She has worked with couples, families, and community groups for over 30 years to create an environment for dialogue and decision making designed to help parties attack the problem, not each other.

As an activist in movements for social change since the mid-1960’s and a founder of a women’s center on Long Island in 1972, Ms. Oberman believes building community is an integral part of her work in mediation and group facilitation. In 1990, not long after moving to Charlottesville, Virginia she became a founding member of the Black Women/White Women/All Women Discussion Group. She was one of the founders and planners of the Days of Dialogue on Race Relations events held annually in Charlottesville from 1997 to 2002. As a member of the Community Non-Violence Education Council (CNVEC) she worked with Burnley-Moran Elementary School assisting the Life Skills Committee in redesigning the program used to fulfill the character education mandate, to one that would build not just character but citizenship. As a member of the Charlottesville Center for Peace and Justice (CCPJ) Ms. Oberman spoke out on issues that impacted the community and the nation, confronting the injustice of the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, and the illegal Israeli occupation of Palestinian land. Locally she worked continually with anti-racism and LGBTQ activists.

Ms. Oberman is the Project Manager of the Hannah Arendt Center Dialogue Project which brings together readers of Arendt’s work from around the globe. As a proponent of dialogue for over 50 years, she sees both standing one’s ground and being open to the influence of another as necessary for real dialogue to occur. Such dialogue is based on good will: to speak to be understood, and listen to understand, that is urgently needed to address our current national and global crises.