A former senior adviser of innovation to Hillary Clinton spoke Tuesday night in University Hall about the relationship between technology and diplomacy.

Alec Ross (Weinberg ’94) worked under Clinton for the duration of her term as Secretary of State, leading the State Department’s efforts to form technological solutions to some of the world’s most taxing problems, including human rights, health care and foreign conflicts.

“If you were trying to break into politics 10 years ago, you had to work within the existing structure and the existing systems that were put in place for you,” Ross said. “Today, because of your sophistication, and frankly, because of the tools available to you, you have the ability to build a campaign, or to build a project that can get big, really fast.”

Ross began his political career in 2008 working on Barack Obama’s presidential campaign. In April 2009, he joined the State Department and began working under Clinton, who created a position specifically for him. 

“We created this remarkable team of young people who were working in the office of the Secretary of State and essentially what we did is we sort of hatched solutions to foreign policy challenges,” Ross said.

Lauren Izaak, College Democrats president and organizer of the event, said she thought Ross’ various experiences would draw in a wider audience.

“He’s a Democrat. He works with Democratic politicians, but he’s also on the State Department, which is a non-partisan position,” Izaak said. “We thought it would be a great thing to add new audience members who may not come to strictly partisan Democratic events.”

Ross offered the audience three pieces of advice: First, to cultivate a network of mentors; second, to be conscious of the underlying gender bias incorporated into the workforce; and lastly, to not fear failure.

His closing words were inspired by Theodore Roosevelt.

“My final piece of advice to you would be to enjoy much and suffer much. Don’t dwell in the grey twilight, that is where mediocrity lays,” Ross said. “And frankly, most people who leave college take safe routes. They fear failure to such a degree that they only ascend to the point of being above average. The people and political movements that really break through are the ones that have a measure of audacity in them from the start.”

Weinberg senior Annas Rahman said he enjoyed hearing Ross speak, particularly because he is an NU alumnus.

“I’m interested in the intersection of technology and government, and he was the main technology guy for Hillary Clinton for so long, so it was really interesting to hear his perspective on technology and government and how he got there,” Rahman said. “It was really insightful to hear from an NU alum and what his career path was. He definitely wasn’t holding back. I appreciated his honesty.”

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Twitter: @miahariz