About

Karen Mathieson and Serendipity

A career-long dedication to creative services has brought Karen Mathieson opportunities to work as a professional contract provider; a coach and teacher for adults; a freelance writer and editor; and an event presenter and facilitator. Through Serendipity Communications, those strands of experience have twined into a consultancy of singular intention – enhancing the human connection in a digital age.

Karen’s LinkedIn profile provides further information on her professional experience and on her education, which includes a B.A. from the University of Oregon, an M.A. from Seattle University, and a graduate certificate in Organizational Dynamics from Antioch University Seattle.

As someone who likes to bloom locally, Karen enjoys helping at Metro’s Native Plant Center and leading field trips for children as a Metro Volunteer Naturalist. Irish dancing, bicycling, hiking, snowshoeing and kayaking are Karen’s recreational delights.

Whether you would like to learn more about consulting services offered by Serendipity Communications, or simply want to shout  “Ahoy,” Karen looks forward to hearing from you.

(Click here to send an email to Karen)

Contracting

Karen Mathieson offers a complimentary initial consultation for potential clients. The Serendipity Communications contracting process adapts to the nature of services clients are seeking, with the following options:

Competitive hourly rates with monthly statements for communications skills coaching, as well as for writing, editing and content development services.

Project pricing on a contracted schedule for organization support and presentations.

(Click here for a PDF of biography and contracting text)

Testimonials

“Karen has an incredible ability to get everyone in the room talking, through various tools in her toolbox and the nature of her personality. She sets people at ease and elicits their input in such an organic way that you don’t even realize what’s happening until everyone is happily working away at the issue.” — Sarah Buckley, Executive Director, Clackamas Community Land Trust

“Karen’s edits and word-smithing gave my text more spirit, and offered a reminder that more words are not always better or necessary. Giving someone else the opportunity to change your words takes trust and honesty. I feel both with Karen.”  — Esther Lev, Executive Director, The Wetlands Conservancy

“As a busy professional, I value a focused, personalized learning environment. Karen takes a structured approach to her communications coaching, yet also demonstrated her flexibility by addressing individual issues that presented themselves through the course of our work together. Karen was able to easily identify skills I could work on to have immediate results. Karen’s warmth, enthusiasm and sense of humor make her a delight to work with.” — Physician and Department Head, communications coaching client

 “Karen both scripted and narrated the documentary, and is credited on the DVD. But Karen did much more than that: she understood that we had to work backwards, needing to create a script after all the video was shot. She asked all of the right questions at the beginning, bringing our own desires into focus. She then conducted on-camera interviews covering every point the story needed to make. Using her musical background, she worked with our audio engineer to ensure that the music soundtrack would mesh with the video to tell the story. She revised the script when necessary, kindly accommodating our changing thoughts for what to emphasize in the story. Throughout this process, Karen kept us all on track, and worked sensitively with an artistic team (ourselves) and with the video team, by turns communicating and moderating. We want to emphasize that Karen Mathieson took a seemingly impossible project and made it sing.” — Aloysia Friedmann, Artistic Director  / Jon Kimura Parker, Artistic Advisor Orcas Island Chamber Music Festival

“It is my pleasure to recommend Karen Mathieson, a Communications Consultant with a depth of skills and abilities. Karen provided valuable services to the Horizon House community, especially during a three-year expansion project that doubled the size of our campus and involved relocation of residents.  She provided consulting services ranging from program development to writing text materials to contributing professional expertise on an organizational reorganization that we underwent within Health Services as part of the expansion project. Karen clearly demonstrates a strong natural affinity for the field of communications.  Karen receives my highest recommendation for providing ongoing communications consulting work and it would be my desire that she would continue to share her many gifts and talents with future organizations.” — Laurie Warfield-Larson, Health Services Administrator, Horizon House, Seattle

“Karen was instrumental in helping our staff construct a mission statement in the mid-1990s. She guided the group through a brain-storming process, then worked to distill that input into a cohesive and organized document that was easily endorsed by the staff. The mission statement that resulted has stood the test of time, unchanged. It consistently reinforces our value system, and gives guidelines for how we want to conduct business. Karen’s support and clear focus on the goal was a great catalyst.” — Sue Mooers, Co-Owner, The Dusty Strings Company 

(Click here for a PDF of testimonials text)