Susanne Staude completed her studies in Special Environmental Engineering at Brunel University in the UK. After graduating, she worked in the United Kingdom and Germany as a R&D engineer in the automotive industry before transferring to the University of Applied Sciences in Cologne in 2003. From October 2006 to October 2010, Susanne Staude was a research assistant at the Chair of Thermodynamics at the University of Duisburg-Essen.
In February 2011, she completed her doctorate at the University of Duisburg-Essen on the topic of "Mechanistic Investigations on Premixed Laminar Flames" and has been Professor of Thermodynamics and Fluid Energy Machines at the Institute of Energy Systems and Energy Economics at the Ruhr West University of Applied Sciences since March 2011.
In October 2015, she was appointed Vice President for Teaching and Learning, and in 2018, she was appointed state appointee to the position of President at Ruhr West University of Applied Sciences.
In September 2019, the university electoral assembly elected Prof. Dr.-Ing. Susanne Staude as president.