Brian Foster

Brian Foster started his professional life as a development economist in the United Nations, making a career shift to organizational development when he found that the health of the organizations where he was working was as absorbing as the work for which they were paying him.  He has been working as a consultant since 1985 in organizational development, change management, cross-cultural communications,  worksite counseling , human resource systems, and labour relations.

In recent years, he has focused his work with clients on speeding up effective large-scale organizational change.   He has been a team-member in large-scale transformation projects for a number of large intergovernmental organizations.  He has also  been active in management development programmes in several of these groups.   Other recent projects have included working online, competency modeling, career development, and performance management.

Clinically trained, Brian has expertise in work-site counseling and work/life balance programs.  He has been involved in introducing employee assistance programs in UN agencies through his supervision of interns from the Master's program in Social Work at Columbia University, where he currently serves on advisory boards in international social welfare, and occupational social work.

Brian earlier had extensive US private-sector experience including work in outplacement and international executive relocation, projects with the Private Industry Council of New York City, and with US clothing and textile firms throughout the eastern and southern states of the US when he was a professional employee of a US-based trade union. 

Brian has dual US and British citizenships.