International Relations Society: Treasurer

Hi, my name is Ishana, and I am delighted to nominate myself for Treasurer.

Growing up in Singapore, I saw how effective institutions rely on careful resource allocation to create lasting impact, shaping my belief that ambition must be matched by financial discipline. I am running for Treasurer to ensure our Society’s growth is supported by structured, transparent, and forward-looking financial leadership.

Professionally, I have worked at a fintech firm valued at over $20 million, where I conducted market analysis on the intersection of political developments and fractional bond markets. This developed my understanding of capital allocation, financial oversight, and risk management. I have also secured a 2026 Blackstone Spring Week, a programme centred on financial structuring and strategic analysis, further strengthening my analytical discipline and financial judgement.

As Event Representative for my course (250+ students), I have seen how financial decisions affect accessibility and impact. As Treasurer, I will introduce structured, evidence-based budgeting through annual forecasting, transparent spending guidelines, and regular financial updates. Looking ahead, I hope to prioritise cross-society collaboration to reduce duplication of costs and explore new revenue streams such as alumni engagement and strategic partnerships.

I am running because financial leadership should actively enable sustainable growth and ambition at scale, not merely oversee spending.

(This is a back up bid) As your committee member I plan to continue the much beloved events that IR society takes pride in, like the visit to the Global Peace Summit in Bangkok and the IR society film festival which saw great growth with introductions by guest speakers. The particular strong points of these events, that of traveling as well as combining social and academic events as a means of deepening understanding of international relations and fostering intercultural awareness, are aspects which I seek to expand on in the next year.

My key proposals are the initiation of another trip, this time to the Athens Democracy Forum, to expand the repertoire of trips available to members; the continuation of the film festival with an expansion to more experts to offer additional insights to the films; and more panel and expert talk events. Of particular importance, and involving the most work, are the trip and the talk events. The talk events, with enough speakers, have the opportunity to be some of the most engaging and useful events for members who wish to engage deeper with certain issues and also see inside the black box of work and research in IR. The pool of possible speakers and therefore opportunities for insight and even perhaps networking remains wide and untapped. The same goes for events like the Athens Democracy Forum, which I know we have funds for and I feel would be greatly attractive to new members. All that is needed is the motivation to organise these events.