Ask the people who know Susan where her matchmaking instinct comes from, and you may get a different answer every time.

Her grandmother might have credited her Ukrainian roots. Her family might point to a career in sales, marketing and business, where she learned to read a room, understand what motivates people and quickly get to the heart of what matters. Her friends would probably give you a simpler answer: Susan has always had a knack for people.

She studied psychology and once considered psychiatry before ultimately choosing business. A natural leader and communicator with a genuine love of people, she built her career around them — selling, marketing, building relationships and bringing people together. But her fascination with what makes people tick, what they want and sometimes what gets in their way never left her.

Long before anyone paid Susan to be a matchmaker, she was doing it for fun. She introduced friends, spotted potential connections and somehow knew who should meet whom. The same instinct showed up professionally: she could see where someone might fit, connect them with an opportunity and help them find the right job. She was also the person people naturally came to for advice.

Over the years, that instinct became more refined. Susan learned to drill down quickly, ask the right questions and pick up on what isn’t being said. Eventually, something she had always done naturally became a business.

Twenty years into matchmaking, she still doesn’t believe the right person is necessarily sitting in a database waiting to be found. She works her network, follows promising connections, starts conversations in unexpected places and approaches people who may never have considered working with a matchmaker.

Susan isn’t afraid to challenge her clients either. Sometimes good matchmaking means helping someone get out of their own way, understand the realities of dating and reconsider what they think they need. It’s the candid approach behind Sue’s Straight Talk.

For Susan, great matchmaking is part instinct, part experience and a lot of understanding people. She brings business savvy, curiosity, resourcefulness, a broad network and two decades of experience to every search—along with the confidence to recognize possibilities others might miss.