Submitted by csciadmin on Fri, 03/30/2012 - 16:11
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Image: 
Name: 
Nolan Stain
Featured Profile: 
No
At A Glance
Licensed Body: 
ICR
Scientist Type: 
Service provider/Operational
Business/marketing
Region: 
London
Location: 
London
First Degree: 
Accounting and Law
Job: 
Cardiology Manager
Age: 
36
Home: 
London
Works For: 
NHS
Qualifications: 
MSc Cardiology
Pet Hates: 
Queues
Burning Ambition: 
To set up and run my own consultancy
Superpower: 
Telekinesis – move things with my mind!
Big Picture
When you were a child, what did you want to be when you grew up? 
A lawyer
Who or what inspired you to become a scientist? 
I fell into health sciences after deciding not to pursue a lawyer career. I haven’t looked back, yet!
What do you love about your job and being a “scientist”? 
I love the variation and the opportunity to be constantly involved in new areas. I have recently moved into the management side of the health science, and I am enjoying the challenges.
What would you change? 
Streamline the administration.
Education
What qualifications did you take at school? 
Believe it or not, I never did any science A-levels focusing on accounting, business and law subjects
Why did you choose your first degree subject? 
Accounting and Law
Do you have a Masters or PhD? If not, was it difficult to demonstrate Masters-level equivalence in order to achieve CSci? 
Yes, I have a Master of Science with a specialization in Clinical Cardiology
Job
How do you describe your job when you meet people at a party? 
Nowadays, I tend to say I work in Healthcare Management.
What is ‘cutting-edge’ about your work? 
We are always looking to explore new technologies in cardiac imaging or cardiac pacing therapies as well as seeking to improve the patient experience.
What are the biggest implications your work will/could have in the future? 
We operate on a “patient level” and our work doesn’t necessarily have a global impact. But, I do think the continuous improvements in cardiac devices will have a very positive impact on cardiac patient’s quality of life.
Describe some of the highlights of your average day. 
No day is ever the same. I can be doing an echocardiogram list in outpatients, running a pacing follow-up clinic, attending medical emergency call, conducting research interviews for my doctorate or attending very long income and activity managers meeting.
Describe briefly how your career has progressed to date. 
After graduating with an accounting degree in South Africa, I moved to London in 1997. I worked for a few years in various temporary finance jobs in the City before deciding a career change was needed. A Careers Fair led me to train as a cardiac physiologist. I worked my way up the different cardiac physiologist’s grades up to head of department – where I am now.
How is your job cross-disciplinary? 
As a head of department my role is a third clinical (treating patients), a third research (overseeing projects) and a third management (ensuring the services running smoothly and within financial targets)
How well is your job compensated? What is the starting salary for your field, and how much can this be expected to rise? 
A newly qualified cardiac physiologist would start in Band 5 (circ 28k) and could rise up to a head of department which is Band 8a or 8b (circ 45k to 65k) depending size and level of responsibility.
How do you see your field developing over the next 5-10 years? 
It is very technology-based profession, as the technology evolves so does the job. I think there will be very interesting changes in cardiac devices and cardiac imaging over the next decade.
What’s the most unexpected thing about your job? 
You never how the day is going pan out!
What’s the biggest achievement of your career so far? 
I don’t think I can isolate it to one specific event. There have many milestones including, successfully making the change from accounting into a health science career, getting my masters degree and becoming a head of department. My next milestone will be finishing off my doctorate.
Life
Would you say you have a good standard of living/ work-life balance? 
I certainly try!
What do your friends and family think about your job? 
They think it’s most interesting job ever and they love to pick my brains over health matters.
What kind of hobbies or extracurricular activities do you do to relax? 
Travelling to new places, reading a good book, watching CSI Miami on channel five, taking long walks and ice-staking.
CSci
Why did you choose to apply for CSci and what do you value most about being a Chartered Scientist? 
It gives practitioners a set of standards to maintain and promotes working practices as well as raising their professional profile as a whole. I chose CSci, as I felt it was way of demonstrating that collectively my work, thus far, meets a high set of standards.
What is the value of professional bodies? 
They promote fellowship of like-minded professionals, peer review and professional developments.
How important is CPD? What do you think of the revalidation process in ensuring that CSci is a mark of current competence? 
I think it’s very important as the world of science continually evolves, if don’t make a point of staying in touch; you can easily get left behind. Revalidation is good way to verify.
Advice & Reflection
What words of wisdom would you give someone interested in getting into your field? 
If you are entering a health science research career, be prepared to have your research ideas criticised or rejected. Don’t take it personally keep trying, you will eventually get there.
How important is the mentoring process in your field and to you personally? 
Everybody needs to someone to coach them from time to time. I think it is a really important for self and professional development as well as the development of others.
What would you do differently if you were starting out in your career now? 
I would have gone straight into a health science career.
What would you like people to remember about your life as a scientist? 
I am too young to answer that, ask me again in 20 years.
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