Chicago native Cory Adams knew he wanted to be an engineer but he never considered North Carolina A&T State University. In fact, he had never been to North Carolina but information from his school counselor Joyce Brown about the College of Engineering started to sway him.

“Once I was accepted and decided to go, I interviewed for the Jackie Robinson Scholars program and there was an alumnus on the selection committee who was an engineer,” Adams said. “Everything lined up and I thought it was a good choice.”

Adams made his first trip to North Carolina when he enrolled at A&T as a chemical engineering major and he’s been jet setting ever since. After an active undergraduate tenure working with the Student Government Association, the A&T chapter of the National Society of Black Engineers and other organizations, Adams applied to the Nestle Operations Management Training Program.

“I had a realization a little while ago that people have to eat. When you work for the world’s largest food and beverage company (Nestle), you are going to be able to feed the world,” he said.

Since being chosen for the program, Adams work has taken him back home to Chicago, South Carolina, Switzerland, Spain, the United Kingdom, Finland and now New Jersey. He is currently a production manager responsible for key manufacturing in the United States for some of Nestle’s tea and coffee products.

Working as a manager in the food and beverage industry might seem like a stretch for a chemical engineering grad but for Adams, it was a perfect fit.

“I think engineers are educated to do management and engineering,” he said. “When you deal with processes you have to deal with people and the quality of the product, you get a finished product. We are one of the most interdisciplinary focuses in engineering.”

During his tenure with Nestle, he has managed teams of 45 to as many as 110 people. While this is certainly a lot of responsibility for a 28-year-old, Adams said it was his experiences at A&T that have prepared him for this challenge.

“I think that A&T allowed me to learn how to be a better leader and to practice leadership,” he said. “I was getting experiential learning on how to lead and develop people and drive results. Those are direct skills that I needed as a manager at Nestle.”

With the great experiences he’s had with Nestle, Adams hopes to continue moving upward in the company. He hopes his next step will be operations manager – running day to day operations for an entire factory – and eventually factory manager.