The Management Consultant and Musician

I’m used to surprising people. A physicist by education, musician by night, and management consultant by day, some people struggle to see the threads holding my interests together. But for me, it’s simple: creativity and problem-solving.

At age eight I arranged my bedroom into a recording studio. Today, I produce, manage, and release my own music. Music is a benefactor of all of the other experiences that I’ve had, like earning a physics bachelor’s degree at Howard University, working as a patent examiner, and becoming a consultant.

I didn’t start out with this career path in mind. In my last year of college, everyone—my parents to professors—were on me about making a plan. I could almost hear my department chair sigh, “Here comes Nick again, let’s try to get him to do something besides that music...” I eventually settled on the idea of medical school and got a job working part time for the Society of Physics Students while studying for the MCAT.

At SPS, I helped assemble the Careers Toolbox (