Matthew Pilnik, B.A. 2010

Senior Consultant at Deloitte — Dallas, Tex.

2010 Major: History, minor in Philosophy

How has being a History graduate from Duke helped shape your professional success?

"History taught me how to find/understand, analyze, and leverage the context of a situation/story to draw conclusions and make decisions."

What advice would you give students in History?

"History/Philosophy: This is a powerful combination of degrees as it builds strong critical thinking and analysis skills that allow you to draw key/succinct insights from a lot/convoluted information before making cogent and logical decisions with that data. This skill set is valuable in any professional context. Consider additional degrees/training if you want to move into a specific field, e.g. JD, MBA, etc. I returned to Duke and received an MBA from Fuqua which helped me move from HR into consulting."

Matthew Pilnik