Usman W. Chohan

Usman W. Chohan (b. Manhattan, NY) has previously been a Consultant with the World Bank Institute in their department of Social Accountability, working on issues of fiscal governance reform, and specifically, the implementation of Parliamentary Budget Offices (PBOs) to help bring impartial and nonpartisan financial expertise into governance institutions. His work with the World Bank led him to collaborate with and inform experts as far apart as Sydney, Washington DC, Vienna, Kampala, Ouagadougou, Abuja, Ottawa, and Canberra [1].

His budget reform work has been used to challenge and contextualize the laws underpinning legislative budget institutions in even the strongest democracies [2], such as in Canada, where his work was used to inform the landmark parliamentary debate on amending the Parliamentary Budget Office Act (C-476, 2013).

Prior to this he was the Special Situations Analyst in the Global Equities Team at Natcan Investment Management, the investment arm of the National Bank of Canada. The Global Equities team had six investment professionals including Usman and $3 billion dollars in Assets under Management (AuM).

Usman has an MBA in Strategy and Leadership from McGill University [3]; he has done Masters coursework at MIT-Tsinghua [4]. He is currently pursuing a PhD in Economics on a full scholarship from UNSW (Australia) [5], where he is exploring the Fiscal Policy implications of Legislative Budget Offices.

Given his rich 'tri-sector experience' that encompasses private sector, public sector and academia [6], Usman enjoys consulting, research, and teaching in equal measure. He delivered the 2015 Foreign Affairs Lecture in the Global Leadership Program (GLP) at Macquarie University in Sydney [7], and has been a guest lecturer in several courses at McGill University in Montreal since 2013. He is also a Global Shaper of the World Economic Forum in their Canberra Hub (2016).

Usman was nominated the Chief Administrator of Urdu Wikipedia in 2005 [8], which he had helped grow, build and code in its embryonic stages, by a 7-2 administrator vote. Usman is also a respected sitar player who, as a leading proponent in a new generation of sitarists [9], has performed live in more than 5 countries on 3 continents, including at the prestigious Borges Center for the Performing Arts in Buenos Aires (2012) [10]. With his voracious appetite for reading, Usman has completed the Goodreads Challenge of reading 100 new books every year successfully since 2012 [11].

Usman is fluent in eight languages [12], and speaks 5 out of the 7 Official languages of the World Bank. These include English, Mandarin [13], French [14], and Spanish [15], among others. Given that his last four residences were Montreal, Buenos Aires, Canberra, and Beijing, you will likely find him roaming somewhere between these four coordinates at the ends of the earth.

REFERENCES:
[1] http://www.revparl.ca/36/3/36n3e_13_chohan.pdf
[2] http://www.parl.gc.ca/legisinfo/BillDetails.aspx?billId=5997160&Language=E&Mode=1&View=10
[3] https://www.mcgill.ca/desautels/programs/mba-programs/meet-our-community/meet-our-students/usman-waqqas-chohan
[4] http://usmanchohan.blogspot.com.au/2014/07/my-tsinghua-grades.html
[5] https://www.unsw.adfa.edu.au/our-people/mr-usman-chohan
[6] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=anmWMFN4_aI
[7] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xiikCBP5u48
[8] https://www.ur.wikipedia.org
[9] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2ECAyLcTtjA&list=UU5LIjx6HsLEK2QuRUb03kYA&index=2
[10] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s4lO7kUaZUM
[11] https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/13959169.Usman_W_Chohan
[12] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=anmWMFN4_aI
[13] Ibid
[14] http://www.revparl.ca/36/3/36n3f_13_chohan.pdf
[15] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2ECAyLcTtjA&list=UU5LIjx6HsLEK2QuRUb03kYA&index=2