Issam Karram
Issam Karram
English trainer and consultant · Paris, France

Training professionals and institutions to work across languages and cultures.

I am a CELTA-certified English trainer. For six years I trained government officials in professional English and cross-cultural communication under a ministerial contract, designing an individual curriculum and assessments for each executive I coached. I now teach in Paris, in person and online, from complete beginners to IELTS and TOEFL candidates.

The same work, carried into policy and projects, is capacity building. I covered intergovernmental negotiations at the United Nations Environment Programme in New York, hold a master’s in energy transition governance, and advise organizations whose projects must be understood by investors, partners and institutions outside their field. I work in English, Arabic and French.

CELTA · Cambridge English Six years training government officials UN Environment Programme, New York · 2024–2025 Registered consultant · UNGM & UNDP
Training

English for professionals and institutions

Courses are built around what the learner has to do in English at work, measured against clear objectives and assessed throughout.

Professional English for teams

Group courses for staff who work with foreign counterparts: meetings and presentations, emails and reports, negotiation, and phone and video calls.

One-to-one executive coaching

An individual curriculum built around the communication demands of the post the person actually holds, covering all four language skills, with assessments designed for that curriculum.

Exam preparation

Preparation for IELTS and TOEFL, with practice tests and targeted work on the sections that decide the score.

Cross-cultural communication

Preparing staff to present, negotiate and report across different professional cultures, where register and expectations matter as much as vocabulary.

In person and online

Lessons in the Paris region or live on Zoom and Google Meet, with interactive materials designed for each unit and progress tracked against SMART objectives.

Advisory

Policy, project and investment advisory

For project owners, companies preparing to raise, and organizations working across borders, whose value has to become legible to people outside their field.

Investment readiness

Turning technical documentation into investor-facing material: pitch decks, investor memoranda and capital proposals that a reader outside the sector can follow and assess.

Feasibility and business case

Agronomic, economic, infrastructure and labor analysis, capital and operating cost build-up, internal rate of return and payback, set against the regulatory requirements a project has to satisfy.

Investor and donor landscape mapping

Identifying the multilateral funds, development finance institutions, private investors and partners a project needs, and assessing each for fit.

ESG and monitoring frameworks

Indicator design, benchmarking against recognized ESG standards, alignment with SDG and national policy indicators, logical frameworks and theory of change.

Cross-cultural mediation

Mediating between teams, partners and funders who operate under different expectations, registers and reporting conventions, so that one account of a project holds across audiences that read it differently.

Selected work

Engagements

Public sector capacityMoroccoOn-site2017–2023

English Language and Cross-Cultural Communication Coach

Ministry of Solidarity, Social Integration and the Family, delivered through a training institute in Rabat

Trained government officials in professional English and cross-cultural communication under contract to the Ministry, in groups of nine to fifteen and in one-to-one executive coaching. Six consecutive years on a single institutional account, in a sector where training contracts are usually awarded a term at a time.

Designed an individual curriculum for each executive client, covering reading, writing, listening and speaking, and built around the communication demands of the post that person held. Designed the assessments and examinations used to measure progress across the program.

Taught in parallel at private language schools in Rabat: teenagers, business English, IELTS and TOEFL candidates, and children through Total Physical Response.

Teaching practiceParisIn person and online2026–present

English Trainer, Independent Practice

Paris region

Building curricula from beginner level across grammar, vocabulary, listening and speaking, with interactive materials designed for each unit and live online lessons on Zoom and Google Meet.

Runs on automated workflows in Power Automate, Zapier and Make that generate lesson plans and track each learner’s progress against SMART objectives.

Intergovernmental affairsNew YorkOn-siteNov 2024–May 2025

Intergovernmental Affairs Branch

United Nations Environment Programme, New York Office

Covered the Second Committee of the General Assembly and ECOSOC proceedings, and the third preparatory session for the Fourth International Conference on Financing for Development, reporting on the negotiations toward the outcome document. Drafted the reports submitted to headquarters in Nairobi in support of UN Environment Assembly decision-making.

Synthesized intergovernmental proceedings and long technical documents, including reports of the Secretary-General and OECD material, into analytical papers identifying entry points for the office’s upcoming interventions. Prepared speeches and talking points for the Director and facilitated stakeholder meetings.

Authored commissioned policy papers on OECD fossil fuel subsidy trends and on the relationship between historical industrial development and greenhouse gas emissions. Reviewed Arabic-language source material and supported the verification of Arabic translations of official documents.

BioenergyRemoteAug–Dec 2025

Policy Advisor

Bioenergy corporation, client name withheld

Produced the feasibility study for a 1,000-hectare integrated plantation and processing facility, covering agronomic, economic, infrastructure and labor analysis, capital and operating costs, internal rate of return and payback. Benchmarked the company’s practice against the ESG frameworks governing its operations and designed an indicator set, a monitoring framework and the reporting workflows to keep it populated.

Wrote the information memorandum presenting a multi-country project portfolio to an infrastructure investment fund, and the pitch deck and capital proposal for its lead deployment, setting out a blended finance structure with impact stated against SDG and national policy indicators. Mapped the investor and donor landscape and mediated between the operating teams and the company’s international investors and partners.

Civil societyKenyaRemoteJul–Oct 2025

Deputy Director, Programs and Operations

Child support organization, Nairobi

Advised the executive team on strategy, ethics and partnership development using theory of change and logical framework methods, and researched the requirements for an application for ECOSOC consultative status. Led partnership outreach and produced the organization’s documentation and communication material.

Mediated between the Nairobi team and Canadian, American and European stakeholders, and delivered capacity building to the team alongside the advisory work.

Methods

How the work is done

Training

  • Curriculum design
  • Assessment and exam design
  • Executive coaching
  • IELTS and TOEFL preparation
  • Total Physical Response
  • Live online delivery
  • SMART progress tracking
  • Workflow automation

Advisory

  • Logical framework
  • Theory of change
  • Project cycle management
  • M&E indicator design
  • ESG benchmarking
  • Feasibility assessment
  • CapEx and OpEx modeling
  • Investor and donor mapping
  • SDG and policy alignment
  • Cross-cultural mediation
  • Negotiation technique
Background

Training and credentials

2019
CELTA, Cambridge English Level 5 Certificate in Teaching English to Speakers of Other Languages
2024
Master’s degree, Global Energy Transition and Governance · CIFE, Nice, Berlin and Brussels Thesis on fusion and energy security, benchmarking ITER, Commonwealth Fusion Systems and General Fusion on affordability, acceptability and availability, including field research at ITER.
2017
Master’s degree, Cultural Studies and Linguistics · Ibn Tofail University, Kénitra Representation, discourse analysis, and how meaning and register travel between cultural contexts.
2014
Bachelor’s degree, English Studies · Mohammed I University, Oujda
Courses
Introductory and Developmental Psychology · George Brown College, Toronto
Certification
Language and Cross-cultural Facilitator · U.S. Peace Corps
2022
MEM Summer Summit · Università della Svizzera italiana, Lugano Competitive selection to a Middle East Mediterranean programme on intercultural dialogue, geopolitics, energy transition and climate, under the patronage of the Swiss Federal Department of Foreign Affairs.
Registered
Individual consultant, United Nations Global Marketplace and the UNDP supplier portal
Languages
Arabic, native · English, full professional proficiency (C2) · French, B1 and progressing · Tamazight
Contact

Tell me what you need

For training, the most useful first message says who the learners are, their level, and what they need English for. For advisory work, it says what the project is, where it sits, and who you need to convince.

I reply in English, French or Arabic.

karram.isam@gmail.com

Based in the Paris region · Training in person and online · Advisory engagements worldwide