My name is Alex Boughton. I’m 23 years old and a young professional working in business banking at PNC Bank’s Corporate Office in downtown Washington D.C. I completed an undergraduate degree in business administration and a graduate degree in real-estate from American University in December of 2015. Raised in Basking Ridge, New Jersey, I moved to D.C. in 2011 to attend college and have chosen to stay to pursue my career in banking. I enjoy club sports such as martial arts, ultimate frisbee and kickball. I appreciate the many exciting social activities D.C. offers, including weekend volunteering for either philanthropic organizations or social events, such as wine festivals and teen fairs. When not working, I appreciate writing about all the good things my generation can achieve, particularly through a column I pen titled “Ask a Millennial” for NY’s lifestyle publication House Magazine. I also enjoy mentoring people of all ages, particularly those still going through college. Given my home is in close proximity to the American University campus, it is always a pleasure to frequent the Lambda Chi Alpha chapter as a supporting alumnus who enjoys giving guidance to this five year young chapter.
How, if at all, has your Lambda Chi Alpha experience attributed to success in your field or in other accomplishments?
Lambda Chi Alpha has had a positive impact on my life while going through college, leading up to the start of my career, and continuing onwards as a young professional. One of the biggest life lessons Lambda Chi Alpha taught me: never give up even when faced with tremendous hardships and struggles–persevere. I especially learned this while helping to establish a brand new colony on my college campus.
I have fond memories during the spring of my freshman year when approached by two fraternity campus recruiters, Nick Ludwig and Joe Citro, both of whom I have tremendous respect for, given what they did to help establish the colony. They, along with Billy Erickson, a campus staff member in our residence hall, inspired me to help found the colony in the spring of 2011. The experience exposed me to the struggles of recruitment and how to differentiate and establish our particular brand of fraternity life and values. It also taught me a lot about group dynamics and the formation of close bonds through hardships. As a fraternity on Nov.3, 2013, we finally achieved our charter, an achievement that brought us to one of our highest peaks as a brotherhood.
Throughout my years at Lambda Chi Alpha, I learned how to work with a wide variety of people, that has also helped me in my professional life, and it really taught me valuable lessons about relationship building and networking. If not for the values expressed in ritual or the lessons instilled in us through our older peers, I would not be who I am today. While our fraternity was by no means perfect, nor did it achieve great heights in recruitment, I can say with absolute certainty that joining and building a new chapter often felt like a “Rocky Balboa” achievement within the Greek life system. It was without a doubt a set of experiences I will always treasure and use the rest of my life!
What do you hope to accomplish in your next 30 years, professionally, personally or fraternally?
In the next 30 years I hope and plan to achieve quite a lot in my professional career as well as my personal and fraternal life. I want to excel in the finance industry and rise to a high leadership position in a prestigious banking firm, such as PNC. If that doesn’t happen, I want to excel in the real-estate industry and eventually start my own real-estate development company. It’s important for me to make a positive impact on both the community and other professionals around me as well as create lasting relationships with friends and family that can bring about mutual happiness. On the ritual side of the fraternity, I still frequently attend initiations to realize how the lessons taught from these rituals still have a profound impact on how to carry oneself even after leaving college. On a more personal note, I do hope to continue to develop and maintain the relationships I formed in college with my fraternity brothers and build on those as we go through life.
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