John Alexander, B.S. 2003

Sales Director, Nasdaq

2003 Major: Economics

How has being an Economics graduate from Duke helped shape your professional success?

"I don't use statistics in my day-to-day, but it is a critical concept when our business needs to assess significance of a pattern, how outliers affect our interpretation of the data and what results we can tie to our own actions vs market trends and random events."

What advice would you give students in Economics?

"If you are focused 100% on grades and classroom time, you are missing a lot of what college has to offer. Get to know your college professors, get involved with extra-curricular activities. Try to get in a leadership role or two before you graduate--this can be as simple as organizing a tent @ Kville. You will forget 95% of the material you learn in college but you'll retain 95% of the lessons you learn about how to function in an organization."

 

John Alexander