Susan Wakhungu-Githuku

Susan Wakhungu-Githuku (born 1960) is a Kenyan business executive, writer, and publishing house founder, who in her youth was ranked as Kenya's top women's tennis player. She was born in Bungoma in British Kenya and around the age of 11 moved to Nairobi. While attending Loreto Convent Valley Road High School, she began to play tennis. In 1978, she qualified to play in the Junior girls' singles at the Wimbledon Championships. According to the sports journalist Ross McLean, she was the first Kenyan to play in a Junior Grand Slam tournament and until 2022 was the only Kenyan to have qualified for and played in a Junior Grand Slam event at Wimbledon. At the 1978 All-Africa Games she won the gold medal in women's doubles and the silver medal for the women's singles. While studying at St. Lawrence University in Canton, New York, she played in the college circuit. After winning a women's singles title at the World University Games in Mexico City in 1979, she became Kenya's top women's player. She was the 1983 women's champion at the Robbialac Classic Tournament and won the tournament's women's doubles title with her sister Judi Wakhungu the following year. In 1984, she was the winner of the women's matches at the Kenya Closed Championships and in 1987 won the bronze medal in ladies' doubles at the All-Africa Games, before retiring from tennis.

Wakhungu-Githuku began her professional career working for the Kenyan government as an economist. She then spent a decade working for various non-governmental agencies including the United States Agency for International Development, the Africa Economic Research Consortium, and Care International as a programme director. During this time, she returned to her studies, obtaining a master's degree in research and development planning from the University of Strathclyde in Glasgow, Scotland. At the beginning of the 21st century, she began working at The Coca-Cola Company as human resources director for the Africa Division in London. She later transferred to Johannesburg, South Africa, and was responsible for learning and development for 90 countries. Thereafter she served as the director of Coca-Cola University for Africa and Eurasia, but left the company in 2009 to found Human Performance Dynamics in Nairobi, a business and human resources consultancy. Aspiring to write about successful contemporary Kenyans, but unable to find a publisher for her works, she founded the publishing house Footprints Press in 2010. She has published books on Kenya's development since independence and about notable Kenyan writers, photographers and runners, both men and women. In 2021, she was honoured by the government of Kenya, as a Moran of the Order of the Burning Spear. Provided by Wikipedia