Financial Affairs Officer

Behrang Sharif

Behrang Sharif has worked hard to provide PGSS members with a clear and understandable breakdown of the budget. Sharif emphasized the importance of structural changes to the budget, noting that the current structure is difficult to understand, and redoing the whole budget is a large, time consuming task. He told The Daily that it took him a few months to understand the budget, and he has been trying to make it understandable for students.

Sharif is particularly proud of the new budget templates, which he believes will be in use for many years to come. He consulted with previous Financial Affairs Officers and an accountant at PGSS, and so far he said he has received very positive feedback on the functionality of the template. He also noted the fact that the event budget is one of the biggest budget lines and was not balanced. Sharif has implemented a broad budget structure that he believes will be “self-maintaining.”

While improvements have been made in how PGSS runs events, the services the society provides, and in how the budget is balanced between the business side of PGSS and the society, Sharif wishes he could have had the time to “focus on the bigger picture improvements.” One of these goals included focusing more on improving how the business is providing services for members.

Sharif also shared some of his frustrations about the position, remarking that “when I started this, and still in some cases, we’re doing things not because they make sense, but because they have been historically done like that.” The yearly turnover of PGSS executives coming soon means that momentum for implementing programs or changing procedures is often cut short. Hopefully with Sharif’s improvements, institutional memory will be strong enough to withstand the quick turnovers.