Grove Nichols

Grosvenor (“Grove”) Nichols joined the Middlebury faculty as a Professor of the Practice in January 2024, teaching a J-Term course titled “From Shakespeare to Wall Street: Management and the Liberal Arts,” a general business course taught through the lens of a liberal arts education. 

Grove graduated from Middlebury in 1971 where he majored in English and played varsity hockey and tennis. After Middlebury he went on to a long and varied career in banking and consulting. He initially joined the Chase Manhattan Bank in New York City, but after two years he moved to California to get his MBA at Stanford. Following an internship at Goldman Sachs in New York, he decided to remain in California for his business career, initially joining the consulting arm of Peat, Marwick, Mitchell (now KPMG) and eventually leading the firm’s bank consulting practice in San Francisco. He then founded Commerce Security Bank in Sacramento, serving as its CEO for ten years before rejoining KPMG as the National Practice Director for the firm’s community bank consulting practice. Grove then joined a client firm that eventually became Indymac Bank in Pasadena, serving as Executive Vice President for ten years. The bank became one of the largest mortgage lenders in the country but was not able to survive the financial crisis of 2008. He finished out his business career serving for ten years as a consultant to the California Public Employees Retirement System (“CalPERS”), the largest pension fund in the country, with over $480 billion in assets.

In addition to his business career, Grove was active in the Sacramento community, serving as president of the board of Sacramento Country Day School, president of the Sacramento chapter of the Stanford Business School Alumni Association, and as a Dean’s Distinguished Speaker and mentor to MBA students at UC Davis. He now lives in Manchester, Vermont, where he is a ski instructor and tennis pro at Stratton Mountain and plays in a competitive ice hockey league.