Merianne Liteman
A co-author of two books on designing and facilitating successful offsite retreats, Merianne specializes in organization effectiveness, strategic planning, leadership development, and creative thinking.

As President of Liteman Rosse, she conducts retreats and workshops in the U.S. and abroad, trains experienced facilitators in how to design and lead successful offsites, and consults with a variety of organizations on strategy, board and executive leadership development, and culture change.

Her clients include the World Bank, the UN Development Programme, the International Monetary Fund, the Inter-American Development Bank, Genentech, Mitsubishi Electric America, Fannie Mae, the Boston Museum of Fine Arts, the Nature Conservancy, the U.S. Department of State, Chicago Public Radio, WETA public radio and television, Historic Hotels of America, the Palestinian Ministry of Women’s Affairs, the Gender Violence Prevention Coalition of Ghana, the U.S. Military Academy at West Point, and the Consumer Product Safety Commission.

Merianne received a masters degree in organization development from the American University in Washington, DC, where she also completed a post-graduate training program in group facilitation.  She also has received post-graduate education in conference interpretation from the Monterey Institute of International Studies in Monterey, CA and the Institut Supérieur de Traduction et d’Interprétariat in Paris, France.

She is co-author with Sheila Campbell and Jeff Liteman of Retreats that Work: Everything You Need to Know About Planning and Leading Great Offsites published by Jossey-Bass/Pfeiffer in 2006 and co-author with Sheila Campbell of the book Retreats That Work: Designing and Conducting Effective Offsites for Groups and Organizations published by Jossey-Bass/Pfeiffer in 2002.  Her book, Planning for Succession: A Toolkit for Board Members and Staff of Nonprofit Organizations, was published in 2003.

Prior becoming an organization consultant, Merianne was the founding director of the International Program at the National Endowment for the Arts, where she consulted to arts and cultural organizations in the U.S. and abroad and negotiated partnerships with foreign governments, foundations, and state and local arts agencies that more than quintupled available resources.  While at the NEA she produced the book World Arts: A Guide to International Arts Exchange, which has been distributed widely in the U.S. and in other countries.

Previously she was director of public affairs at the U.S. International Cultural and Trade Center Commission and served as a career diplomat in the U.S. Foreign Service, where she was director of one of the largest US-host country binational cultural centers in Latin America and later managed multi-million dollar international cultural exchange programs out of Washington, DC.

In addition to her books, Merianne has written articles and columns for Associations Now magazine and has been interviewed on organization effectiveness issues by magazine writers, newspaper reporters, and radio program hosts from around the country.

She was the founder and a member of the soprano section of the women’s choral group Tessitura, which performed with the National Symphony Orchestra, at the New York Public Library, and at other venues in the Washington, DC area.

A dedicated world traveler, she enjoys touring and hiking in exotic locales, the more off the beaten path the better.  Recent trips have included Jordan, Myanmar (Burma), the Cumbria Way in England, Uruguay, and Madagascar.  She is fluent in French and Spanish and gets by in Italian and Portuguese.  She also has a penchant for getting herself in trouble by learning enough of the languages of the countries she visits to ask questions but not necessarily enough to understand the answers.

Closer to home you’ll find her tending her garden and working on a volunteer basis with the Latino community in the Washington, DC, area.