Alexander was one of the earliest entrants to the Indian Administrative Service. He worked under a government led by Jawaharlal Nehru and was part of the bureaucratic structure that evolved and implemented programmes for free India.

With three postings to the United Nations, serving Indira Gandhi as her principal secretary for three years, governor of Tamil Nadu and currently Maharashtra governor, Alexander has been closely associated with the governance of this country for nearly half a century.

After taking his post graduate degree in History and Economics from the Travancore University, he came Madras to take M.Litt and D.Litt. degrees by research from the Annamalai University. Soon after the Independence, he joined the civil service or the Indian Administrative Service as it was called.

During that time, Travancore had not adopted the IAS scheme, so he joined at the then state of Madras. During his early years in the service, most of the officers at the senior levels in the state belonged to the Indian Civil Service, the ICS. There were a few young officers like him who had just come from the new service, the IAS.

After a few years in the districts in the Madras and Travancore-Cochin states, he came to Delhi to work in the central government. He worked in various capacities in the Government of India till his superannuation from service.

Alexander from his younger days in school and colleges had excelled himself in elocution and debates, consistently winning first prizes in inter-school and intercollegiate competitions. While a student at the Travancore University he was the leader of the Travancore University debating team which was deputed to visit other universities for inter-university debates. He was President of the Travancore University Union during 1940-41.

Throughout his career Alexander has won the acclaim and admiration of his audiences as a gifted and erudite speaker on a wide range of subjects of crucial importance to the nation such as citizens rights and duties, functioning of democracy in India, role of the civil service, issues in economic development, corruption in public life, educational reforms, etc.