Entrepreneur Archives - NonClinical Physicians

How to Start a Thriving Educational Company with Dr. Andrea Paul – 073

John Jurica — Tue, 12 Feb 2019 12:30:54 +0000

Taking Calculated Risks

Dr. Andrea Paul is a physician entrepreneur who has a unique story to share about her educational company. She started BoardVitals to provide relevant medical information to help residents prepare for and pass their board exams.

Although BoardVitals hasn’t been around that long, it’s grown tremendously into an Inc. 500, eight-figure business. Now, Andrea and her company are part of a much larger educational organization, Ascend Learning.

Growing Up Selling Golf Balls

Andrea’s been an entrepreneur since she was a child. When her family lived on a golf course, she would find golf balls and sell them. During high school, she rented retail space in the local mall to start a new business.

Andrea grew up in a family of engineers and doctors. She chose to become a physician and went to Michigan State University College of Medicine. She began a residency at Yale University, but left to start BoardVitals with a cofounder.

Fortunately, BoardVitals took off, made the Inc. 500 list, and now employs 35 full-time staff members, with 60 different product lines, and more than 100,000 customers.

Our Sponsor

This podcast is made possible by the University of Tennessee Physician Executive MBA Program offered by the Haslam College of Business. You’ll remember that I interviewed Dr. Kate Atchley, the Executive Director of the program, in Episode #25 of this podcast.

The UT PEMBA is the longest running, and most highly respected physician-only MBA in the country, with over 650 graduates. Unlike most other ranked programs, which typically have a duration of 18 to 24 months, this program only takes a year to complete. And, it’s offered by the business school that was recently ranked #1 in the world for the Most Relevant Executive MBA program, by Economist magazine.

University of Tennessee PEMBA students bring exceptional value to their organizations by contributing at the highest level while earning their degree. The curriculum includes a number of major assignments and a company project, both of which are structured to immediately apply to each student’s organization.

Graduates have taken leadership positions at major healthcare organizations and have become entrepreneurs and business owners. If you want to acquire the business and management skills needed to advance your nonclinical career, contact Dr. Kate Atchley’s office by calling (865) 974-6526 or going to vitalpe.net/physicianmba.

Day-to-Day Duties as CMO and Founder

Andrea and her partner demonstrated the concept of BoardVitals as an educational company for about a year, reaching monthly sales of about $30,000. They then sought external investors by working in an incubator.

Using the funds and expertise provided by their investors, BoardVitals quickly accelarated its growth by expanding into other healthcare education markets. That led to its sale to Ascend Learning, a much larger educational company.

As CMO, Andrea now works with Ascend Learning to find and develop new opportunities for educational products or continuing education content. She thoroughly enjoys developing new ideas for products and content.

At BoardVitals, Andrea oversees all of its products. She manages a large team, which includes more than 500 individual contractors, writers, editors, and reviewers who create, edit, and review content.

In addition, there are about 100,000 experts in various medical areas who review the content and provide feedback. This enables the company to continuously improve. As a result, BoardVitals can demonstrate higher board exam pass rates in its students.

Setting up Startup and Students for Success

BoardVitals was a self-funded startup. Initially, Andrea and a couple physician friends were the only ones creating products and content for the company.

To grow the company quickly and avoid competition, BoardVitals used Blueprint Health to help raise money and connect with experts who understand what the company wanted to accomplish.

BoardVitals sets up medical residents and other healthcare professionals for success by offering high-quality educational material that increases their knowledge and helps them pass their board exams.

Making the Transition from Startup to Corporate World

It was an adjustment for Andrea, but she's learned much since becoming part of a larger corporate structure. There are additional meetings and conferences to ensure alignment within Ascend. Different functions require a little more interaction than others. But, on a day-to-day basis, Ascend Learning allows BoardVitals to continue to grow in its own way.

If you liked this episode, you'll enjoy these interviews with other physician entrepreneurs:

Links for today's episode:

Dr. Andrea Paul
BoardVitals
Ascend Learning
Inc. 500 List
Crane’s Fast 50 List
ABFM
Blueprint Health Accelerator

Thanks to our sponsor…

Thanks to the UT Physician Executive MBA program for sponsoring the show. It’s an outstanding, highly rated, MBA program designed for working physicians. It might be just what you need to prepare for that joyful, well-paying career. You can find out more at vitalpe.net/physicianmba.

Thanks again for listening to the story explaining how I found my wonderful nonclinical careers. I hope to see you next time on the PNC Podcast.

If you enjoyed today’s episode, share it on Twitter and Facebook, and leave a review on iTunes.

Podcast Editing & Production Services are provided by Oscar Hamilton.

Disclaimers:

The opinions expressed here are mine and my guest’s. While the information provided on the podcast is true and accurate to the best of my knowledge, there is no express or implied guarantee that using the methods discussed here will lead to success in your career, life or business.

Many of the links that I refer you to, and that you’ll find in the show notes, are affiliate links. That means that I receive a payment from the seller if you purchase the affiliate item using my link. Doing so has no effect on the price you are charged. And I only promote products and services that I believe are of high quality and will be useful to you, that I have personally used or am very familiar with.

The information presented on this blog and related podcast is for entertainment and/or informational purposes only. It should not be construed as medical, legal, tax, or emotional advice. If you take action on the information provided on the blog or podcast, it is at your own risk. Always consult an attorney, accountant, career counsellor, or other professional before making any major decisions about your career.

Right click here and “Save As” to download this podcast episode to your computer.

Here are the easiest ways to listen:

vitalpe.net/itunes – vitalpe.net/stitcher – vitalpe.net/googleplay

The post How to Start a Thriving Educational Company with Dr. Andrea Paul – 073 appeared first on NonClinical Physicians.

How One Physician Leader Makes His Career Decisions with Dr. William Lynagh – 046

John Jurica — Tue, 07 Aug 2018 11:30:49 +0000

Dr. William Lynagh is a board-certified family physician with a somewhat eclectic career. In today's interview, he describes some of the rules he uses to make career decisions.

Photo by Mahkeo on Unsplash

Before we get to today’s interview, I want to tell you about a new project I’m working on.

As I mentioned last week, I’ve just started a new edition of my weekly newsletter. Once a week, I’m going to write about my efforts to convert my blogging and podcasting hobby into a business.

My goal is to share my successes and failures as I create my own online side-hustle. I’m calling this series of newsletters Creating My Online Business.

I just released my first issue this past Saturday. To follow me on this journey as I share what I learn, you’ll need to sign up for my newsletter. You can do that by going to vitalpe.net/newsletter.

There’s no cost to learn what I’m doing, and I promise to share all of the good and bad of trying to create this new business. Here are some of the topics I’ll be covering:

The ideal steps I should have followed to create my business.
Time to form an LLC and set up my checking account.
What are my options for generating revenue from this business?
What is a platform and why did I choose the ones I did?
When should I start building an email list?

In the upcoming issue on Saturday, I'm going to talk about: How did I select my niche and how should you? But the only way to get the weekly updates is to sign up for the newsletter. Again, that’s at vitalpe.net/newsletter.

Dr. William Lynagh's Story

The first time Dr. Lynagh was admitted to medical school, he withdrew his application and joined the Peace Corps instead.

Several years later, he reconsidered, returned to medical school, and then completed a family medicine residency. He practiced in several different settings. And he found himself being pulled into management roles as he volunteered for committees and part-time management duties.

And, like myself and others of that era, he found that there were few role-models for getting into physician management.

He worked for a few years in managed care at United Healthcare, taught leadership principles to non-physicians for a while, and eventually landed at the Advisory Board Company. It was there that he led the Physician Leadership Academy, a service that I remember well.

He also spent a short time working as an independent consultant, and he is now contemplating his next move. I thought it would be fun and instructive to listen as Bill recounts his experiences, and shares the lessons he learned while making his career decisions over the years.

Like many of us, his early forays into nonclinical activities resulted from filling a local need when others would not step up. But then, he realized that he enjoyed those activities, and his career path became more intentional. He started to actively pursue those nonclinical activities.

More Career Decisions

He decided early in his career to stop doing part-time clinical work. As we discussed, there are many physicians that continue to see patients well into their full-time management or consulting jobs.

During our conversation, Bill hit on some concepts that are worth emphasizing:

The importance of consistently taking action if you want to make real progress;
The benefits of taking time to reflect and solicit feedback so that you can become more self-aware, in both clinical practice and in management;
Reading the book Man's Search for Meaning* by Viktor Frankl, provided him with some great insights and inspiration and is recommended reading;
How crafting your own personal purpose statement helps clarify your goals and inform important career decisions; and
His belief that servant leadership is a philosophy and set of practices that can be very helpful to aspiring leaders.

He described how those concepts help drive his career decisions.

Creating My Online Business Newsletter

If you wish to be reminded of each new episode and to receive other resources and free content, including my new newsletter Creating My Online Business, please sign up at vitalpe.net/newsletter. My goal is to share my successes and my failures I create my own online side-hustle.

Also, if you want to receive a FREE 24-page guide to 5 non-clinical careers, do it now. I’ll soon be taking down this free guide, and converting it to a paid ebook, as part of my online business strategy. But you can still get a free copy at vitalpe.net/freeguide. If you’re listening after August 2018, I may have already substituted a different freebie.

Be sure to subscribe to the podcast on the Apple Podcast App.

If you liked today’s episode, please tell your friends about it and SHARE it on Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn.

And join me next week for another episode of Physician Nonclinical Careers.

Right click here and “Save As” to download this podcast episode to your computer.

Disclaimer:

The opinions expressed herein are those of me and my guest, where applicable. While the information published in written form and in audio form on the podcast are true and accurate, to the best of my knowledge, there is no express or implied guarantee that using the methods discussed herein will lead to success in your career, life or business.

The opinions are my own, and my guest's, and not those of any organizations that I'm a member of, or affiliated with. The information presented on this blog and related podcast is for entertainment and/or informational purposes only and should not be construed as advice, such a medical, legal, tax, emotional or other types of advice.

If you take action on any information provided on the blog or podcast, it is at your own risk. Always consult a professional, e.g., attorney, accountant, career counsellor, etc., before making any major decisions related to the subject matter of the blog and podcast.

[*This is an affiliate link. I make a small commission if you buy, but your price is unchanged.]

The post How One Physician Leader Makes His Career Decisions with Dr. William Lynagh – 046 appeared first on NonClinical Physicians.

How Blockchain Technology Can Protect Your Credentials with Dr. Leah Houston – 045

John Jurica — Tue, 31 Jul 2018 11:00:34 +0000

Dr. Leah Houston is a board-certified Emergency Physician. She was caught up in a credentialing snafu that inspired her to start a new company to address the issue. As an entrepreneur, she intends to create a very secure physician-controlled credentialing tool using blockchain technology.

While practicing medicine across the U.S., Dr. Houston recognized a common problem affecting physicians. It’s uncompensated administrative burdens related to physician credentialing that lead to administrative waste and physician burnout. This burden reduces access to patient care and worsens the physician shortage.

She began her company, HPEC (which can be found at hpec.io) in early 2018 when she realized blockchain could solve the problem with its distributed ledger technology. H-PEC is using that technology to create a decentralized autonomous organization of doctors by verifying the credentials of every physician member and making that information portable and secure.

Photo by Fancycrave on Unsplash

She’s an entrepreneur in the early phases of creating this start-up company. She’s been promoting her business, pitching it to investor groups, and seeking physician partners.

Leah is super-enthusiastic about this new venture. And part of her inspiration comes from addressing a personal credentialing nightmare that she describes in some detail during our conversation. It's a bit reminiscent of my conversation with Sylvia Romm.

One disclaimer: I’m not making any judgment with regard to the likelihood of success of her business, nor am I making any recommendation to invest or partner in her venture.

Using Blockchain to Protect Physicians

During our conversation, Leah touched on the following topics:

The credentialing issue that helped motivate her to create her company.
How her entrepreneurial interests developed.
The challenges facing physicians as it relates to credentialing and licensing.
How her company, HPEC, intends to solve this problem.
How to find incubators such as StartUp Health.
An invitation to listeners to contact her and consider joining her mission to use blockchain to bring control of healthcare back into physicians' hands.

Photo by Toa Heftiba on Unsplash

The most surprising realization that I had during our interview was that many of us may not be aware that former employers are using our credentials to order tests, or bill for services, long after we've left employment. That can lead to a situation, as it did with Dr. Houston, in which we're wrongly accused of practicing without a license, or of billing for services that we did not perform.

Contact Leah Houston

I thoroughly enjoyed speaking with Leah. Her story was both frightening and inspiring. I think she gave us a good glimpse into the world of health technology start-ups.

You can learn more about her company at hpec.io and you can email her at support@hpec.io.

Follow My New Project

Before closing, I want to tell you about a new project I’m working on.

I believe you have so much knowledge as a practicing physician, or as someone involved in a non-clinical career, that you can readily teach others. I’ve seen other physicians do it. And technology is advancing in a way that makes it much easier.

It’s a great way to create a part- or full-time online business and generate income that will enable you to reduce your dependence on your high stress clinical career.

I believe it’ll be of interest to many of you to learn how to start such an online business. To that end, I’m working on bringing on a guest or two who has created such a business.

Also, since I’m in the process of developing products like an eBook and online courses, I think you may find it interesting to hear about my experiences. So, I’m going to chronicle my efforts to create and market those products.

However, I’m not able to fit those updates into my usual podcast episodes. You’ve told me the upper limit you wish to consume is 30 minutes.

Creating My Online Business Edition of the Newsletter

So, I’m going to be adding a weekly update to my newsletter specifically devoted to chronicling this journey. My goal is to share my successes and my failures as I move to create my own online side-hustle. I’m calling this series of newsletters Creating My Online Business.

To follow me on this journey as I share what I learn, you’ll need to sign up for my newsletter. You can do that by going to vitalpe.net/signup.

If you want to receive a FREE 24-page guide to 5 non-clinical careers, go to vitalpe.net/freeguide. But do it now. I’ll soon be taking down this free guide, editing it and converting it to a paid ebook, as part of my online business strategy. But, you can still get a free copy at vitalpe.net/freeguide.

Get My Newsletter

Be sure to subscribe to the podcast on the Apple Podcast App.

If you liked today’s episode, please tell your friends about it and SHARE it on Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn.

And join me next week for another episode of Physician Nonclinical Careers.

Right click here and “Save As” to download this podcast episode to your computer.

Disclaimer:

The post How Blockchain Technology Can Protect Your Credentials with Dr. Leah Houston – 045 appeared first on NonClinical Physicians.