Eric Shwalm
Executive summary
The name "Eric Schwalm" refers to multiple individuals in public records and reporting: a Bain & Company consultant with a Carnegie Mellon MBA and chemical engineering undergraduate degree [1], at least one obituary for an Eric Joseph Schwalm who died in 2025 [2] [3], a Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu instructor listed as Eric P. Schwalm [4], and numerous public-record aggregates that list many people with that name [5]. Available sources do not establish a single unified biography tying all these records together, and they warn that name collisions and third‑party aggregators can create misleading overlaps [5].
1. Who the Bain profile identifies as Eric Schwalm
Bain & Company lists an Eric Schwalm on its "Our team" pages and attributes to him industry expertise in Advanced Manufacturing & Services, Construction & Infrastructure, and Consumer Products, along with experience in corporate and business‑unit strategy, operations, cost reduction, brand and channel strategy, and M&A work; the profile also states he worked previously in business planning for Ford Motor Company and at Dravo Engineering Company [1]. The Bain profile further records academic credentials: an MBA from Carnegie Mellon University and a Bachelor of Science in chemical engineering, with distinction, from the University of Pittsburgh [1].
2. Independent contact and company listings that corroborate a consultant identity
A business directory (ZoomInfo) lists an Eric Schwalm as a management consultant at Bain & Company based in Boston and links him to peers and colleagues in management consulting, supporting the Bain affiliation reported on the company site [6]. Third‑party directories like ZoomInfo often compile professional data from public profiles and employer rosters, which can corroborate but also occasionally misattribute employment without direct employer confirmation [6].
3. Multiple obituaries and athletic profiles showing name collisions
Separately, obituaries exist for an Eric Joseph Schwalm who died July 6, 2025, born July 21, 1951, described as a longtime family and community member in Champaign, Illinois, with surviving spouse and children listed [2] [3], and there are earlier obituaries for other individuals named Eric M. Schwalm [7] [8]. An unrelated profile identifies an Eric P. Schwalm as owner and head instructor of Kaze BJJ and Judo Institute and notes a criminal‑justice bachelor’s degree from Troy State University and prior EMT‑paramedic credentials [4]. Those records suggest distinct people sharing the same name rather than a single person with a single public profile [2] [4] [7].
4. Public‑records aggregators and the risk of conflation
Aggregators such as Radaris report dozens of "Eric Schwalm" profiles, claim addresses and phone numbers, and list potential relatives, illustrating how online data services can multiply identities with partial or outdated data and create false merges between distinct persons [5]. Because these services compile from diverse public sources and user submissions, they can give a misleading impression of one comprehensive identity when in fact multiple individuals match the same name [5].
5. What can and cannot be concluded from these sources
It can be concluded from Bain's site and ZoomInfo that a consultant named Eric Schwalm is associated with Bain & Company and has the educational background and industry experience described on that profile [1] [6]. It can also be concluded that at least one person named Eric Joseph Schwalm died in 2025 and that other deceased individuals named Eric Schwalm appear in obituary records [2] [3] [7]. What cannot be concluded from the available reporting is that all these entries refer to the same person; the sources neither claim nor show a single unified identity linking the Bain consultant, the BJJ instructor, and the obituary subjects, and the public‑record aggregator highlights name multiplicity without verification [1] [4] [5]. For definitive identification, primary documents (employment records, direct statements from Bain, or family confirmation) would be required; such documents are not present in the cited reporting [1] [2].
6. Why this matters and how to proceed journalistically
Name collisions in public records can produce reputational harm and factual error if profiles are conflated, and the disparate sources here—corporate bios, obituaries, athletic association pages, and aggregators—illustrate that risk [1] [2] [4] [5]. Responsible next steps include seeking direct confirmation from Bain for biographical details if the Bain consultant is the subject of a story, contacting the funeral home or family listed in the obituary for verification when reporting on the deceased, and treating aggregator data as leads rather than facts [1] [2] [5]. Readers should be wary when a name search yields multiple, inconsistent records and favor primary documentation or direct source confirmation to avoid amplification of mistaken identity.