United Nations and Multilateral Engagement

Helping mission-driven organizations understand how multilateral decisions get made, who matters, and how to engage to maximize impact.

We spent our careers on the government side of the table. Now we sit on yours.

Why True North

We know how the room works because we worked in it.

You can't learn how multilateral institutions work from an organizational chart or a briefing book. That insider knowledge comes from years of engaging directly with member governments and the institutions themselves.

We know when the target is wrong, when the ask is unrealistic, when a meeting is unlikely to move anything, when another government needs to move first, and when escalation will help or hurt. That judgment can save months of activity that goes nowhere.

Our practitioners spent their careers representing the United States in multilateral institutions and processes: developing policy, negotiating text, leading delegations, managing international programs, and building the coalitions needed to move issues forward.

We negotiated the text.

Our practitioners spent years working line by line through resolutions, declarations, agreements, and policy language. We know what governments can accept, where positions harden, and how consensus gets built.

We led delegations.

Our practitioners have represented the United States across the UN system and other multilateral institutions and processes, including the OAS, G20, WHO, PAHO, NATO, ASEAN, and the OSCE.

We know what government representatives need before they walk into a meeting, and what makes an outside organization a credible and useful counterpart.

We know more than one part of the system.

Our experience spans economic development and financing, human rights and democracy, global health, peace and security, gender equality, humanitarian affairs, climate and the environment, and international law.

Multilateral issues rarely stay in one institutional or policy lane. That breadth helps us see the connections.

We sat on the funding side.

Our practitioners have awarded and overseen millions of dollars in U.S. foreign assistance and funding to international organizations. We understand how governments and institutions make partnership and funding decisions.

How We Help

Senior multilateral expertise, when you need it.

Some organizations need senior multilateral expertise but not a full-time hire. Others need a strategy, help preparing for a specific moment, or support building their own internal capacity. True North offers four ways to engage.

The True North Advisory

A True North senior practitioner works part-time as an embedded member of your leadership team as a Director of Multilateral Engagement, Chief External Affairs Officer, or the equivalent in your structure.

We help you decide where to focus, whom to engage, what to ask for, how to sequence the work, and when to change course. We turn organizational priorities into a practical multilateral strategy, prepare leadership for important meetings and decisions, and stay close enough to the work to adjust as circumstances change.

We can also work alongside a designated staff member so knowledge, relationships, and capability can move in-house over time.

Best for: organizations that need sustained access to senior multilateral expertise without the cost of a full-time executive hire.

The True North Compass

Compass is a defined, deliverable-based engagement that looks at your objectives, your current multilateral activity, the institutional landscape around it, and where progress is getting stuck. We separate what matters from what does not, identify the real opportunities and constraints, and lay out what should happen next.

Depending on the need, Compass engagements may include:

institutional and landscape assessments
a multilateral engagement audit
stakeholder and delegation mapping
coalition and constituency strategy
engagement strategy
roadmaps and sequencing
leadership briefings and messaging

Best for: organizations that need to determine where to engage, what to prioritize, and what to do next, and organizations that want more from an existing multilateral presence.

The True North Intensive

When an important meeting, negotiation, forum, or decision window is approaching, there is little room for wasted effort. The Intensive helps organizations determine what they want to accomplish, where to focus, and how to use the opportunity effectively.

We identify the actors and opportunities that matter most, clarify what the organization should seek to achieve with them, sharpen the asks, and determine the right sequence and timing. The result is a focused multilateral engagement plan the team can execute.

Examples include:

bilateral and diplomatic meetings
UN and multilateral sessions and forums
UNGA and other high-level weeks
negotiations, votes, and policy windows
side events and convenings
other time-bound multilateral opportunities tied to a defined objective

Best for: organizations preparing for a high-stakes multilateral moment that need to quickly focus on the right people, priorities, and sequence.

The True North Academy

Training, courses, workshops, and speaking engagements led by senior practitioners who have done the work from inside government and multilateral institutions.

We teach how multilateral engagement works: how government positions are built, how negotiations move, how to prepare leadership, how to read a room, and how to turn formal access into useful relationships.

Programs can be tailored for executive teams, government affairs and advocacy staff, mid-career professionals, or organizations building an international engagement function. We also speak to students and early-career professionals exploring careers in diplomacy and international affairs.

Best for: organizations that want their teams to build stronger multilateral skills and develop lasting internal capability.

Not sure which fits?

Every engagement starts with a short conversation about where you are and what you're trying to reach.

Get in touch

Who We Help

Organizations with something to accomplish and no clear path through the system.

Nongovernmental Organizations

You may already have UN accreditation or consultative status. You may have leadership traveling to New York or Geneva. You may know your issue belongs in multilateral discussions but lack the internal capacity, strategy, or relationships to engage effectively.

We help NGOs connect multilateral engagement to organizational objectives, prepare leadership for diplomatic outreach, understand the negotiations and processes affecting their work, and build sustained relationships with governments and multilateral institutions.

Mission-Driven Companies

We help companies determine where engagement can advance a real business or mission objective, identify the institutions and decision-makers that matter, and pursue those opportunities credibly without pulling the company away from its core work.

Foundations & Philanthropy

We help philanthropic organizations understand the multilateral landscape around their priorities, identify where their voice and resources can have the greatest influence, build strategic partnerships, and engage governments and institutions credibly.

Multilateral Institutions

Multilateral institutions face a different challenge: determining what they can realistically sustain, how to align mandates with resources, how to strengthen engagement with member states and external partners, and where new partnerships and financing may be possible. We support institutional and landscape assessment, strategy development, partnership and stakeholder mapping, implementation planning, funding landscape analysis, and member-state and external engagement strategy.

United Nations Organization of American States G20 World Health Organization Pan American Health Organization NATO ASEAN OSCE International Labor Organization United Nations Organization of American States G20 World Health Organization Pan American Health Organization NATO ASEAN OSCE International Labor Organization

Who We Are

Senior practitioners driven by mission and dedication to service.

True North is led by its founder and supported by four senior multilateral practitioners with substantial government and multilateral experience. The people advising you are the people who have done the work and are deeply motivated to serve and help you tackle the world's toughest challenges.

The Founder

Christina Bruff

Principal

Christina is a senior government and multilateral affairs executive with 20 years of U.S. government experience, including a decade representing the United States in negotiations at the United Nations, the Organization of American States, and the G20.

Her path into international affairs started on the ground rather than in a classroom. She served as a Peace Corps Volunteer in the Dominican Republic, where she spent three years working with women and youth building their own businesses. At the State Department she negotiated for the United States across three regional bureaus and the Office of the Secretary, on human rights, poverty alleviation, women's economic empowerment, and financing for development. She built a multilateral affairs office from the ground up and oversaw millions in foreign assistance, finding common ground with partners and adversaries alike.

Christina founded True North to help organizations understand how the multilateral system works and prepare executives for the decisions and engagements that count. She holds a bachelor's degree in International Political Economy and Economics from Carthage College and a Master in Public Affairs in Development Studies from Princeton's School of Public and International Affairs.

Our Team

Senior Practitioners

Wilson W. Sumner

Senior Practitioner

Wilson Sumner is an attorney and former U.S. Department of State civil servant with 13 years of experience in securing U.S. foreign policy objectives in complex multilateral negotiations on sustainable development, financing for development, international labor standards, disaster risk reduction, and international environmental governance, including climate change, sustainable chemicals management, sustainable forest management, and biodiversity. He brings a deep knowledge of both substantive policy issues and UN processes, procedures, and dynamics.

Wilson served as the U.S. technical lead and guidance coordinator for numerous multilateral political declarations and framework agreements, including the 2023 UN SDG Summit, the 2024 High-Level Political Forum (HLPF), the 2024 Pact for the Future, and the Third Program of Action for Developing States (LLDC-3). He provided strategic guidance on political and governance issues at the International Labor Organization (ILO), served as the lead U.S. negotiator on the Ministerial Declaration of the 2019 UN Environment Assembly (UNEA-4), and has negotiated work programs, budgets, and governance structures for numerous UN environmental agreements.

Wilson holds a B.A. from Princeton University and a J.D. from Duke Law School.

Rachel E. Owen

Senior Practitioner

Rachel served as the U.S. government's lead policy expert and negotiator for the World Health Organization, the Pan American Health Organization, and UNAIDS, and as the U.S. technical expert to the Inter-American Court of Human Rights and the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights. She is an attorney and former State Department civil servant with 25 years advancing U.S. foreign policy through international law, diplomacy, and multilateral engagement.

Across her career she has worked on trafficking in persons, nonproliferation, migration, democracy, human rights, and international security. At True North, Rachel advises on global health governance, human rights mechanisms, and the legal architecture behind multilateral agreements. Rachel holds a Bachelor of Science in Journalism from the University of Kansas and a Juris Doctor from Creighton University School of Law. She is admitted to the New York State bar (2001).

Amanda J. Van Dort

Senior Practitioner

Amanda is a senior foreign policy and diplomacy practitioner with more than 15 years of experience across the U.S. Departments of State and Defense, international organizations, academia, and the nonprofit sector. At True North, she advises international organizations, foundations, and civil society organizations on multilateral strategy, coalition building, negotiated outcomes, and translating global commitments into policy and implementation.

Amanda previously served as Chief of Staff and Division Chief for Policy, Planning, and Public Diplomacy in the Secretary's Office of Global Women's Issues; and as Policy Team Lead and Senior Advisor in the Bureau of Conflict and Stabilization Operations. Her work has spanned conflict and atrocity prevention, Women, Peace and Security, humanitarian affairs, human rights, and institutional reform. She has represented the United States in policy and negotiation processes across the United Nations, NATO, ASEAN, and other multilateral forums, including helping develop NATO's first policy on conflict-related sexual violence and ASEAN's Regional Framework on Inclusivity.

Amanda is a Foreign Policy Fellow with Our Secure Future, an American Democracy and Technology Fellow with the McCain Institute, and Senior Director of Policy and Programs at Peace Pays. She teaches at Johns Hopkins SAIS and George Washington University and holds a Master of Public Policy from the University of Michigan.

Katrina Fotovat

Senior Practitioner

Kat is the former Acting Ambassador-at-Large for Global Women's Issues at the U.S. Department of State, where she led global efforts on gender equality and the prevention of gender-based violence. She also served on the White House Gender Policy Council and as the U.S. Focal Point on Women, Peace, and Security at the UN for nearly a decade. Previously, she served as Principal Deputy Director in the Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights, and Labor, overseeing over $5 billion in programs supporting civil society and human rights, including transitional justice and internet freedoms.

Kat's U.S. government service also included senior roles at embassies, the Office to Combat Trafficking in Persons, Bureau of Conflict and Stabilization Operations, and at USAID. Prior to her government career, she worked with organizations including UNHCR, UNICEF, ABA-CEELI, and on peace negotiations and post-conflict constitutions with the Nobel-nominated Public International Law and Policy Group (PILPG) where she currently serves as a Peace Fellow, focused on AI and Conflict Mediation.

Kat is also a Senior Advisor to the Swanee Hunt Foundation on Inclusive Security, and a board member of Afghan Women's Network International. She earned her Juris Doctor from the Washington College of Law and her Master's in International Affairs from the School of International Service at American University.

Let's talk.

Whether you're entering the multilateral system for the first time, questioning whether your existing efforts are producing results, or preparing for a big multilateral event, we'd love to learn from you and see how True North can help you reach your goals.

info@truenorthstrategyandconsulting.com

True North Strategy and Consulting LLC is registered in the State of Maryland.