Janet Foerster is a cross-cultural training manager with more than 30 years of experience in education, human services, and health promotion.

Janet is the president and founder of innerCHANGE associates international (iCHai). Created in 1990, iCHai is a globally-established intercultural training, human resource development, community development, project management, and executive coaching company.

Through iCHai she develops, promotes, and presents individualized programs in areas of communication, employee development, and professional and personal growth in multi-cultural and international settings for multinational organizations, government, corporate, and academic clients. iCHai has worked with U.S.-based and international organizations to develop human capacity through understanding, valuing, and leveraging individual and cultural differences.

Since 2007, iCHai has principally been involved with Children, Health, Education and Supporting Services (CHESS) in Nicaragua, created from feasibility studies and needs assessments in the rural communities of Villa El Carmen, Nicaragua. The overall objective has been to building strong community relations and support from private sector and US governmental funding partners, as well as establishing a baseline for program evaluation. Janet, recruited, hired, trained, and managed a team of in-country Nicaraguan staff in order to implement the CHESS Project.

As the Project Director for CHESS, Janet has developed and managed all activities of a 28-month community development program working in 12 elementary schools and three health posts, reaching close to 2,000 primary school children and over 4,000 adults in the municipality of Villa El Carmen, Nicaragua. Principal activities include training workshops for teachers, parents, and families in health, hygiene and clean water; training for primary school teachers, including English language training; teacher methodologies; and establishment of computer skills training and reading libraries.

Additionally, Janet has successfully presented a variety of training programs for numerous United Nations organizations in Vienna, Austria, including the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), the United Nations Organizations of Vienna (UNOV), the United Nations Industrial Development Organization (UNIDO), and the United Nations Welfare and Relief Agency (UNWRA), to name a few. In addition, she worked as a consultant for Webster University’s Professional Development Center, for which she has conducted—in Bratislava, Frankfurt, Vienna, and Zagreb—numerous courses and seminars in multicultural management, human relations, and communication skills for the U.S. Department of State and a number of private corporations. She has also worked in Pristina, Kosovo, as a consultant in developing a scholarship program for Kosovars to study in the U.S.

Janet taught as an adjunct faculty member at the Graduate School of Public and International Affairs, University of Pittsburgh, and the H. J. Heinz College of Public Policy and Management, Carnegie Mellon University, as well as at Webster University in Vienna, where she taught graduate level courses in Intercultural Management. She has also authored textbooks and taught on the faculty of the International College for Hotel Management in Vienna, where her work emphasized cross-cultural human resource management and communication and presentation skills for multi-cultural managers.

Janet has also served as a Visiting Senior Research Associate in the Graduate School of Public Health, University of Pittsburgh, where her responsibilities included coordinating the development of a new center for global health and designing outreach programs for minority populations on health careers within the Pittsburgh public school system.

Janet received her Master of Education degree from Vanderbilt University while living in England. She later completed several courses in continuing education from Harvard University in health services management.

Email: jfoerster@innerchangeinternational.com