August 29, 2024 • 39 mins
#062 How can healthcare professionals transition from clinical practice to successful entrepreneurship? Join us as we chat with Jonathon Lee, a physical therapist who co-founded Pickle, an AI-powered job search platform for clinicians. The global challenges posed by the COVID-19 pandemic reshaped his mission and vision for the healthcare industry and led him to create this AI-powered job search platform that helps clinicians find roles matching their skills and interests.
In this episode, you will hear about Jonathon's journey through healthtech, medtech, pharma, and startups. And you will learn valuable insights into the critical steps necessary for launching a startup, from developing a network of supportive peers to acquiring essential non-clinical skills.
Jonathon’s story highlights the importance of building a diverse startup team and finding mentors to maintain accountability and share knowledge. Join us and find the inspiration you need for your own entrepreneurial journey in the healthcare industry.
For links and show notes, head to: https://rehabrebels.org/062
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Intro (00:01):
Welcome to the Rehab Rebels podcast.
Are you a rehab professionalready to transition to an
alternative career?
Hear inspiring stories fromothers just like you and learn
the best ways to bridge yourcareer gap.
This podcast has you covered.
Now here's your host, doctor ofphysical therapy and podcaster,
Tanner Welsh.
Tanner Welsch (00:21):
Welcome back to another episode of Rehab Rebels.
Welcome back to another episodeof Rehab Rebels.
For this episode, the biggestthing we can learn is that the
journey of a rehab professional,particularly in the context of
global challenges like theCOVID-19 pandemic, can lead to
profound insights about thelimitations and opportunities
within the healthcare system.
(00:41):
Transitioning from clinicalpractice to entrepreneurship
isn't just about personalfulfillment.
It's about leveraging clinicalexpertise to address systemic
issues and drive meaningfulchange at scale.
Our guest today is Jonathan Lee.
He's a physical therapist andco-founder of Next Degree, whose
(01:02):
mission is to help cliniciansfind jobs they love in order to
help build careers they love.
He holds an MBA from theUniversity of Oxford and
completed his residency andfellowship in Houston, texas.
Welcome to the show, john.
Thanks for having me Superexcited.
Absolutely Me too.
Me too.
There's so many places to beginwith you and so many questions.
(01:24):
But let's start from the storybehind the first sense of
awareness that things maybeweren't quite right for you in
the traditional rehab setting.
What the reasons were?
What the story was behind yourshift outside of the traditional
clinical patient care model.
Jonathon Lee (01:40):
Absolutely.
And, first off, I think thisidea of the Rehab Rebel podcast
is really timely.
I think, whether you're lookingto change the landscape or your
own career, or improve patientcare in your own personal way,
this idea of understanding thatways that we're working right
now could be done a little bitbetter.
As for me, I've actually madefour or five pivots in my career
(02:05):
at this point, and I've beenout of PT school for about 11
years at this point, I think, soit's definitely been a crazy
journey.
Right now, I'm one of theco-founders of Next Degree, and
we've built an AI-powered jobsearch for healthcare where you
can instantly learn about newroles and industries across the
healthcare ecosystem, such ashealth tech, med tech, biotech,
et cetera.
And not only can you learnabout new roles and industries
across the healthcare ecosystem,such as health tech, med tech,
(02:26):
biotech, et cetera.
And not only can you learnabout these companies and roles,
but we match each company, roleand industry to your background
.
So, for example, if you're aphysical therapist, you
automatically match with digitalmusculoskeletal care companies
like Hinge and Sward and thingslike that.
Or, let's say, you're apharmacist, then PBM
pharmaceutical benefitsmanagement companies pop up, or
(02:48):
other pharma tech companies likeIrene, and we built this
because I think clinicians arelooking for a way to expand
their impact post-COVID, but alot of times the information
that they are receiving iseither piecemeal or not easily
accessible, and so we built anAI for healthcare for clinicians
, specifically to be part ofthat change and understand
(03:10):
what's going on around them,give them real data so they can
make the best choice forthemselves, with the bonus of
being able to apply for jobsquickly and not get ghosted.
That's what I'm doing now.
But in terms of how I got here,it's a very circuitous story
and I'd like to caveat this insaying sometimes, when people
reach out, the journey can seemlinear, but I promise you it's
(03:34):
very, very not, and sometimesjust in the right place in the
right time.
But you make your own luck byputting yourself in those
positions to be vulnerable andto grow and to learn and to be
rebellious, I guess.
So you know, like most teenageboys, I wanted to be a sports
athlete and I wanted to be asports therapist.
So I went the whole residencyand fellowship route after PT
(03:56):
school down in Texas, I was atHouston Methodist.
I did my fellowship with TokoNguyen.
He's in PT.
I think he's the president ofthe sports section of AOMT right
now.
After I finished that, I movedup to Portland Oregon and while
I was in that space I got areally amazing opportunity to
work with athletes from NFL,from Major League Baseball,
(04:17):
college, high school weekendwarrior, et cetera, at this
gigantic facility in the Nikeecosystem.
I did that for a few years andit was great.
I really enjoyed it.
But my first pivot out of thattraditional patient care world
happened when I decided to gofrom outpatient pro sports
(04:37):
therapy into community health.
I was working at this hugesports facility and one of my
colleagues went on holiday and Itook over her patient while she
was gone.
He was a 90 year old man andall he really wanted to do was
pick up his grandkids.
I taught him how to barbellthat lift using lifts and things
like that so I could pick uphis grandkids.
But it really stuck with me, somuch so that I realized that I
(05:00):
had spent the last five years atthis point on this pro sports
journey and maybe all the skillsI was using weren't helping the
people who really needed it.
I come from a family ofimmigrants, very blue collar.
We worked in restaurant jobsand dishwashers and make our way
through America, and I reallywanted to help those people.
(05:23):
So I decided to leave that joband I went to go work at a
community care clinic for areally large Medicaid hospital
in Portland called Providence.
This was driven in part by theecosystem around 2018.
It was a mental health crisis,it was the opioid crisis, it was
the homeless crisis in Portlandand my caseload shifted from
(05:47):
pro sports to breast cancer, tohomeless people, to oncology
rehab, to autoimmune diseasesfor undocumented immigrants and
the unsure people that reallyneeded it right, and I loved it
Did that for a few years.
Along the way, I realized thatthere was a force multiplier
through education, so we starteda mini residency program.
(06:10):
Keep in mind, we're a Medicaidhospital, so we didn't have the
money to pay the APTA, so itwasn't official, but I built a
residency curriculum tests, tookresidents and taught them
everything I needed from prosports.
But then I think my next pivotusually happens, like most
people, when you thinkeverything's going well, and
that was COVID, and COVID wascrazy.
(06:32):
I mean, it was crazy forpatients.
I think people forget how crazyit was for clinicians.
And then, in April 2020, I sawa ticker on CNN that said Oxford
was creating the first COVIDvaccine in partnership with
AstraZeneca and had received $2billion or pounds or some sort
(06:53):
of extravagant amount of moneythat doesn't make sense to
clinicians.
Right, and I had thisrealization that my team and I,
if we were lucky, we could getto 100 patients at a time in
Portland, and I realized thatevery clinician starts
healthcare with that white coatof right.
How can I help my community?
(07:13):
How can I do no harm?
And in a city of less than amillion people, in this global
pandemic, seeing 100 people meanI had the max impact on my
community.
And this is important becauseit's not about did you have
impact?
That is incredibly impactful.
Right, you change the lives ofpeople one at a time.
But with a black swan eventlike COVID, how do you do more?
(07:35):
Thinking back to that first dayof PT school or nursing school
or med school or whatever bythese people who really need you
?
Right, and so I applied toOxford the next day, took me
about a week to finish thatapplication.
The only program they had leftwas business school, and so I
applied to business schoolwithout ever having opened Excel
(07:57):
or PowerPoint or even thoughtabout finance, aside from
balancing my own checkbook.
I wrote about what it was liketo be a physical therapist in
America, to have this dream ofhelping people get better
physically, mentally,emotionally, to go through this
rigorous training in school andresidency and fellowship, to
(08:17):
have all these student loans,yet sometimes work in a setting
where you're not being utilizedto your best ability and to deal
with people who are sufferingor who have other social
determinants of health, and tohave to do this every 15 minutes
and compartmentalize this andcontextualize this, sometimes
for people managers, directors,et cetera who had never had to
(08:39):
watch somebody die.
And so being a PT actually gotme into Oxford.
It's amazing, and it wasn't mystory, it's our story.
So I got my job, I sold my house, went overseas, went to
business school and while I wasthere I decided I wanted to get
into every corner of healthcareI could.
So this is the next pivot, andthe first pivot I made was into
(09:00):
startups.
I was the founder's associateat this amazing startup that's
called Regmetrics, and thefounder was a scientist at
Oxford who was trying to find away to accelerate production of
life-saving medical devices, butshe realized that a big
bottleneck is actuallyregulatory pathways, so she
built this amazing AI wherefounders could put their ideas
(09:21):
in for their medical devices andit'll tell you exactly what
regulatory pathway you need tofollow before you build it.
Tanner Welsch (09:27):
How did you guys get in contact with each other
and you realized you were a goodfit?
And what's the backstory there?
Jonathon Lee (09:32):
So this is not elegant at all, but when I went
to business school I did notknow.
People took a year to preparefor business school.
I did not know even what VC orprivate equity or management
consulting was.
I didn't know any of it.
So I literally went online andsent out maybe 10 to 20 messages
a day on LinkedIn to people whohad PT backgrounds, who were
(09:56):
doing non-PT things.
And one guy I got linked up towas a professor of robotics at
Oxford who was a PT in theNetherlands and his wife was the
founder of this company.
Very cool.
Yeah, I just tried to find away to build an environment
where I could ask stupidquestions safely, and I felt
(10:17):
really safe in our PT network.
Tanner Welsch (10:19):
I love that.
The cold emails I heard thatquite a bit.
Jonathon Lee (10:22):
Yeah, and you'd be surprised.
Our PT community is amazing.
If you go and talk to peoplebecause you want to learn
something, I mean, that's thesame way we became physical
therapists.
How did you become a PT?
You heard it was a cool job.
You reached out to a local PT,you shadowed them, etc.
Right, the system is nodifferent.
That was great.
(10:47):
Thanks for the backstory onthat.
I'm working at Regmetrics andthen at the same time I became a
fancy word for an intern it'scalled a venture consultant at
this really cool company inGermany called DeepSpin, and so
now I'm pivoting into medtechwhile I'm in regtech health tech
and DeepSpin was building thisamazing MRI that fit on a cart
and it plugged into athree-pronged outlet and it
costs one 1,000th the cost of atraditional MRI, and they had
(11:08):
found a way to bring the powerso low that you could take it
mobile and you could plug itinto things.
And so they were a Germancompany who was trying to figure
out how to get to the US afterthey finished development and
things like that.
So my job was how do younavigate the US healthcare
system?
How do you build a go-to-marketstrategy that makes sense to
(11:29):
investors and help key yourproduct build so that you can
bring this life-saving deviceand money-saving device to other
countries.
Right, and that sounds reallyfancy, but it's stuff that every
physical therapist or nurse ordoctor knows about.
Who is the decision maker in ahospital?
What is the flow of patientsfrom first visit to MRI
prescription?
(11:50):
Who reads MRIs Things that weknow about that we don't think
we know, but we're actually very, very deep experts in right, so
that was cool.
I was able to work with themfor a few months until they went
to fundraising.
They were able to raise a bunchof money and then finally, in
MBA programs, the way mostprograms work is at the end of
the year you can do aninternship if you choose.
I got super lucky through thesecold outbound reach outs to
(12:14):
other clinicians and gotconnected to the chief medical
officer of Bayer Pharmaceuticals.
I went to go work for the chiefmedical officer and his team on
the digital transformation team.
This was 10 months afterleaving the clinic.
10 months is a very short timeand I'm you sure you want me to
work for you and he goes.
Yeah, I just really have onething for you to think about
this summer and I want you tothink about how do we update our
digital transformation teamsacross the organization?
(12:36):
How do we optimize this programthat we have where we're trying
to integrate tech intohealthcare?
It's a pretty ambiguous project.
I don't really know how it'sgoing to go, so just tell them
you work for me and you can liketalk to whoever you want.
Okay, I'm learning fromdifferent departments and
different projects and differentpersonnel across the
organization, globally, becauseno one says no to the chief
(12:56):
medical officer, right?
And I got exposed to a lot ofcrazy things, and not just the
drugs, but the tech side AR andVR, rehab models and equipment,
genomic digital twins, highthroughput data modeling and
data lakes All this crazy stuffthat we read on random articles
(13:19):
online.
It's actually real.
I learned a lot, finished upthere, graduated and then we
were still in the pandemic.
So I spent the next two-ishyears in management, consulting,
slash biotech and I wanted tofind a way to make more
precision medicines for peoplewho really needed it.
I found a really amazingconsulting firm in New York and
(13:41):
London called Idea Pharma, andbasically what happens is a
bunch of big pharma companieswill come to them with their
molecules and Idea has to turnthem into medicines and really
this idea of taking a scientificbreakthrough and turning it
into the actual functionalmedicine that people can use and
then build out all the clinicaltrial programs, build on all
the different potential pathways, all the go-to-market, all the
(14:03):
market entering to every country, because the UK versus France
versus Germany versus the US istotally different.
In a lot of ways it's likebuilding a plan of care with a
lot of different layers to it.
And so I did that for the nexttwo and a half years until the
pandemic was over.
But while that was happening, Ialso pivoted back into startups
and VC funds and accelerators,because a ton of founders and a
(14:26):
ton of accelerator managers andinvestors would reach out to me
while I was working there andsay, hey, I'm working on this
idea, I'm trying to find X for Y, do you know of anybody or can
you help me?
And then on the other side, Iwould say like a thousand
clinicians reached out to mejust saying, hey, I'm working
during COVID, I'm burnt out, Iwant to do more in terms of
(14:46):
helping our communities and I'mnot being used to the best of my
ability at the hospital rightnow.
How did you do what you do?
How did you get there, can wechat?
What would you do if you wereme?
And so this whole thing isswirling while I'm living in
London, and so I had an idea, aBritish and a millennial hybrid
idea.
(15:08):
What happens if you put thesepeople who need each other,
these investors and founders,and these clinicians who want to
work at startups, if you justput them together?
And what if you did it?
In a way that was fun.
So I started a pub night onesummer and I put it on Reddit,
and then the NHS went on strikeand it absolutely exploded.
The entire NHS in the UK wenton strike Doctors, nurses,
physiotherapists, et ceteratogether, which is very rare,
because a lot of times we'refighting with other professions
(15:30):
for our own piece of the pot.
I bring my VC and my operatorfriends and my founder friends.
I bring my clinician friends.
I would just put them at atable and I would just listen
and just see what they weretalking about.
The.
And I would just listen andjust see what they were talking
about.
The first thing that happenedwas that these clinicians
thought that the companiesdidn't want them.
That was false.
The second thing that happenedwas that these companies thought
(15:52):
clinicians who could do morethan just clinical care didn't
exist.
So the challenge then becomesnot do they not exist?
Because that's false.
The challenge becomes actuallythey're in different communities
.
So what happens if you just putthem together?
And this is the output A bunchof these companies hire these
clinicians.
A bunch of these companies thenfundraised and a bunch of these
(16:13):
companies then had theirscientific and healthcare
breakthroughs adopted by the NHS, and so this all happened.
Then COVID ended and I quit myconsulting job because I went in
there wanting to help outduring the pandemic.
Pandemic was over and I startednext degree with the idea that
if you can give clinicians thepower and the freedom of data to
(16:37):
understand how fast things arechanging, will they be able to
take control of the careerprocess on their own and make
the best decision for them,instead of outsourcing this to
LinkedIn or other forms ofsupport services that maybe
don't have your best interest inmind.
In my mind, my assumption isabsolutely.
I mean, you're telling me thatyou could do a code blue.
(16:59):
You're telling me that you cando gross anatomy, but you're
telling me that you can't doExcel.
I think that's ridiculous.
That's absolutely ridiculous.
If you know how to do what youwanted to do and you know the
people in there that are doingwhat you want to do and how they
did it.
Could you alter your own careerwhile helping these other
(17:20):
founders and investors who arebuilding these crazy things to
go reach more patients?
And on the backside for thesefounders, healthcare is a super
highly regulated industry.
If you could connect them withactual healthcare experts with
years of experience, could theybuild faster, and this is our
hypothesis.
We connect the two so thateveryone wins.
Tanner Welsch (17:40):
John, I love that .
That's brilliant.
I have several questions foryou.
The first is defining whathealth tech, med tech, biotech
is for those that don't know.
And then a follow-up questionis next degree.
What can someone expect fromnext degree when they're looking
for this?
Match with what's out there?
What best aligns for them?
What kind of information doesNext Degree need to help the
(18:03):
clinician line up with the bestpossible career outcome?
Jonathon Lee (18:07):
Oh, great questions.
The way I like to think of itis that health tech, med tech,
biotech, femtech all thesebuzzwords are tech-enabled
children or cousins ofhealthcare.
Health tech is mostlysoftware-related enablement of
healthcare.
That could be a bunch ofdifferent ways.
(18:27):
You could do it asinfrastructure tech.
Maybe I'm building somethingthat can link an EMR to a
scheduling software.
Maybe you're creating a digitalhealth company where I'm using
tech to enable telehealthservices right.
So health tech is tech-enabledhealthcare delivery and
optimization.
Medtech is tech-enabled devicedevelopment, optimization
(18:50):
Basically something that you cansee and touch and feel, where
software is a bit more nebulousAnything where you're using a
device to optimize or fulfill atreatment objective.
Biotech is anything where you'reusing biological sciences to
solve a problem, and thatproblem can actually be beyond
(19:11):
healthcare.
For example, food science isactually part of biotech.
But the easiest way I thinkabout biotech is big pharma.
You take these new compoundsthat could do something and you
figure out could they help acertain disease or patient
population, in what sequence, inwhat schedule, in what format,
in what dosage, et cetera.
And so biotechs in thatindustry are actually the
(19:35):
smallest companies, whereas bigpharma is the biggest companies.
Does that make sense?
Tanner Welsch (19:40):
Yeah, yeah, absolutely.
Thanks for the clarifications.
I love that.
Jonathon Lee (19:43):
Now, what can people expect from Next to Great
?
That was the second question,and the short answer is we've
started with the basics andwe're building out more.
So we started this company inOctober of last year.
It's been about five months asof this, recording the way we've
built this is very simple.
Right now we're invite onlysign up for the wait list when
(20:06):
you go in.
It's very simple.
It's your traditional searchstrings date, posted salary, et
cetera.
But then we've built out acouple of really nifty AI
features from scratch.
The first AI feature is a bestfit company match, and what this
does is we've mapped the entireecosystem of healthcare to a
(20:28):
spine that's based on differentmedical professions.
So at the click of a button,you can decide.
You can say I'm a physicaltherapist or I'm a nurse, or I'm
an occupational therapist, andfilter out the thousand jobs
that we have currentlyspecifically to the jobs and
companies where physical therapywould be a powerful value add
Things like medical devices,digital MSK, emr billing for
(20:51):
physical therapy startups.
Then the next AI feature thatwe've built out that's really
interesting is we've taken thenext step and we've incorporated
the clinical background totraditional startup hiring trees
, so you can say I'm looking fora job that was posted within
the last seven days, that'spaying at least $100,000, where
a physical therapist who'sinterested in operations would
(21:12):
be a good fit at Boom.
Very simple.
What's really important, though, it's not really just about
finding the jobs.
It's about understanding if youactually want to work for them.
Within each company, afteryou've done your filtering,
we've actually done a couple ofthings.
We've highlighted the mission,the wow factor, and how each
(21:32):
company does what they do in onesentence.
We've created a synopsis ofevery single company in 250
words or less, that tells youtheir place in the industry,
their place in fundraising andthen their place in the
healthcare ecosystem, and we'vecut out all the jargon.
There's no words like hypergrowth.
There's no words likeconvertible debt equity none of
(21:56):
that stuff.
It's simply simple andstraightforward, and then you
can apply directly through ourportal no third-party job or
anything like that, and sothat's where we started.
Currently, we're building out aton of other amazing features
that get away from these basefeatures that we're rolling out
over the next coming weeks andmonths Things like resume
(22:18):
generators and resume critiques.
How can I answer theseinterview questions?
How can I go from productspecialist to product manager to
head of product if I'm a newgraduate.
And finally, the last thingabout next degree that I think
is the absolute most importantthing is that we've highlighted
and partnered with hundreds ofclinicians from around the world
(22:40):
who are doing exceptionalthings Clinicians who have
founded startups, who havebecome VPs at hospitals,
clinicians who have becomesoftware developers and product
managers, et cetera.
And these clinicians havereached out to us and written
step-by-step guides on a milliondifferent things, such as
getting a product, such asstarting your startup, such as
(23:02):
fundraising, from theirperspective, and have included
the resources that have helpedthem get to where they've gotten
to.
And who better to understandyour perspective than someone
who's been through what you'vebeen through?
And this is what I'm most proudof.
The clinical community has beenso good to me when I was trying
to figure out how I couldchange healthcare in my own
little way, and now we havehundreds of clinicians from Asia
(23:25):
, australia, england, germany,the US, canada, turkey doing the
same thing, sharing theirknowledge with the rest of us
for free.
Tanner Welsch (23:34):
Is there like a timeline for when the next
degree is going to have fullfutures available?
Everything's up and running andready to go.
Jonathon Lee (23:43):
Yeah, it'll never be done.
Never and, quite honestly,that's the way it should be.
Healthcare changes so rapidlyand there are so many different
types of clinicians andmotivations and ways that you
can make an impact that we can'thonestly say our job will ever
be done, because our job willonly be done when clinicians
stop caring about how to changehealthcare, which will never
(24:05):
happen.
In terms of opening up thewaitlist, it's actually live and
we have a bunch of clinicianson our platform.
We have a bunch of people onthe waitlist that we're still
onboarding now over time, but Iwould anticipate in the next few
months that we'll probably getrid of the waitlists.
The challenge is that we had somany people clinicians sign up
at first we actually broke ourwaitlist vendor, so now we're
(24:26):
scaling our backend systems toactually accept these thousands
of clinicians into the platform.
We've done most of that, butreally the main point is
building out these crazy toolsis really important and we want
to make sure that they work howyou want them to work, while
testing them, but not releasingthem to everybody, right,
(24:46):
because I think clinicians havebeen so disappointed myself
included in some of the toolsout there for us Making sure
that things work under a smallscale, and then ramping up the
scale allows the things youdon't see, like back-end
authorization bottlenecks don'thappen.
Tanner Welsch (25:05):
Makes sense.
So something I've been thinkingabout throughout this interview
is you mentioned that there'sseveral people that reach out to
you and basically, hey, this iswhere I'm at.
I want to get to where you are,what would you recommend, what
would you do?
And there's some minitransitions that I'm at.
I want to get to where you are,what would you recommend, what
would you do?
And there's some manytransitions that I'm interested
to dive deeper into to figureout how that happened, and one
(25:25):
of those is this startup withNext Degree.
The light bulb came on when yousaw these clinicians coming
together with the startups andthese two groups of people
actually mingling and there was,oh my God, this is brilliant.
So one is what have yourealized or what would you share
with those that are interestedin transitioning or doing
something that you've done andor what you've noticed from a
(25:46):
lot of people you've talked to.
If you can give us somepointers on some themes or
concepts that really applies tothe majority of those
individuals that you talk to,that would be helpful to share
with everybody on the podcast.
Jonathon Lee (25:58):
Absolutely.
I can actually think of acouple of things, but I'll keep
it to a few.
The first thing is you alwaysstart with people in your tribe
who have done different things,because you need to build a
fail-fast, fail-safe environmentwhere you can ask questions
that you may think are stupid,but actually the other person
said, no, they're not stupid,because I had them too.
This would be your PT who's aproduct manager?
(26:24):
Or your nurse who did an MBA?
Whoever has done kind of thathybrid scheme that you're
looking to use as a platform foryour own journey.
That's where you start.
Within that, there's two typesof people you need to find, and
I need to credit my friend,jules for this.
Jules has a great podcast alsoon PT careers.
Most people focus on mentors,but you also need to focus on
finding a sparring partner, anda sparring partner is someone
(26:45):
who's in the same stage as you,who is also trying to do what
you're trying to do, because byhaving a sparring partner, it
keeps you honest and you canexchange information with each
other, as you're both lookingfor mentors.
But the next step is actuallyjust as important.
After that step, you need to gohard into the community that
you know nothing about.
(27:08):
So let's say that you'reactually in an MBA, you start
with a PT and an MBA, but thenyou need to use that bridge to
build networks with otherfounders who are not clinicians.
And this is really scarybecause I think as clinicians
we're really comfortable withinvesting in our clinical
careers but we're a littlescared to invest just as heavily
into our non-clinical careers.
But this is super importantbecause there's so many layers
to this that we never learned inclinic.
(27:28):
Things like what is a C-corpversus an S-corp versus an LLC,
how do I allow an election 83Bfor my tax-deferred compensation
for my equity.
These things are reallyimportant for helping bring your
idea to life.
And those are all just a bunchof jargon and other things which
you'll learn.
But building this network ofpeople who are not clinicians,
who are experts or experiencedin what you're trying to get to,
(27:50):
is really important toencapsulate that understanding.
Encapsulate that understanding.
But I would suggest thatstrategy Find your mentor and
your sparring partner in thathybrid transition you're trying
to make and use that informationto get to the next step, to
find people that are hard on theother side to fill in the gaps
(28:11):
you don't know.
Tanner Welsch (28:12):
I love that.
Thanks for sharing so thesemany transitions.
You had a consulting it wasmanagement biotech consulting
position that you did for acouple of years, I believe and
also with the next degree, pickwhichever you feel is best.
Or if you want to share both,share both.
But what was it like, let's say, six months before you actually
did either of those live?
(28:33):
What was that like?
What were those struggles like,getting that stuff off the
ground and then give us a sixmonth after then?
What was your struggles andstuff then?
Jonathon Lee (28:43):
Actually, it was a lot like taking your board exam
.
Six months before is like theweek before your exam.
You're afraid of everything.
You're trying to do everything.
You don't know what the futureis going to look like.
There's so much chaos and justthat feeling of dread and worry.
Six months after is actuallylike that week after your board
exam, where you have that one ortwo week gap, depending on your
(29:05):
profession, and waiting foryour results to come back when.
Okay, well, I can't reallychange it.
Now I've accepted that it'schaos and now I just need to see
where it goes.
That's the best way I can putit.
To give you an example,especially as a first-time
founder, you have this idea ofwhat you're trying to do.
Right, I want to help empowerclinicians so that they can be
(29:26):
inspired to go change healthcarein ways that I could never do.
But how do you do that?
Do I research a bunch of stuff?
Do I incorporate a companyfirst?
Do I try to raise money frominvestors?
Do I try to learn how to code?
Someone else is doing somethingsimilar.
Should I stop?
It's very chaotic, right, andafterwards, six months later, a
couple of transitions happen.
I think that all clinicianshave gone through.
(29:47):
In a way, it's like the GreekStoics You've accepted that the
world is chaos and all you canreally control is your response
to it.
Startups will be crazy.
There will always be thingsthat come up that you have to
deal with urgently, especiallyas a founder or early employee.
Right, but I know that as longas I have my own ecosystem set,
(30:08):
I've got my team, I've got myfamily, I've got, you know, my
loved ones with me.
Together, we can deal withwhatever that comes up, right.
Tanner Welsch (30:16):
I loved how you, six months before you, had all
these questions that were racingthrough your mind where to
start?
Can we dive deeper into thatand share a general framework
for how you started puttingsomething together to create a
startup?
I imagine there's severalpeople involved that are
required to do this thing.
Give us a general roadmap andmaybe some challenges that you
(30:37):
had to get this thing going forthose that are looking to maybe
also do a startup as well.
Jonathon Lee (30:41):
Absolutely.
I'm going to give a piece ofunpopular advice that I have
both given and received in mytime as an accelerator, mentor,
a PC advisor, etc.
You can start building acompany now as a solo founder,
but that also does not mean youhave to stay a solo founder.
In general, the way I like toapproach building a company in
(31:04):
any industry is you're lookingfor three main personalities on
your team.
It doesn't mean you need threepeople, but you're looking for
three general personalities andI like to think of those
personalities very simply.
It's a hustler, a hacker and adesigner.
Your hustler is the one who, nomatter how crazy it gets, is the
(31:26):
optimist.
They find ways to solveproblems or they find ways to
sell your product or they findways to fundraise.
That super optimist, energizer,bunny person just figures out a
way to keep your company fromdying.
The hacker is your person thatcan create something out of
(31:47):
absolutely nothing.
This could be the person whomakes your cards, if you're
doing a wedding invite.
This could be your softwaredeveloper, who can just make
something out of nothing.
So this is the infrastructureperson.
If you're a hustler, it's yourfinancial person.
And the last one is, I think,the most important.
This is the designer.
(32:07):
The designer is the person who,no matter what happens, is
always thinking about thecustomer.
Does this look right?
This is how they would want touse it.
Does this look right?
This is how they would want touse it.
Are we positioning ourselves toshow these customers or users
that we want to help them withwhat they're really struggling
with?
Because no one else knows whatthey're struggling with except
(32:28):
as well as we do.
That person is their operationsperson.
They would handle positioning,infrastructure, ui, ux, customer
research, et cetera.
So, hacker, hustler, designerthat's the three personalities.
Now, what's absolutelyfascinating is you don't have to
be all three, but you shouldfind out which one you identify
with most, with most withinyourself, what that person's
(32:50):
strengths are, and then use thatas you're doing your other
resource, going through yournetworks, your hybrid networks,
and then your non-familiarnetworks.
Then add your co-founders tothose other two.
A founder is someone who'sthere from day one, inception.
A co-founder can be someone whocomes on later.
(33:11):
They're used interchangeably,but they're actually slightly
different from a definitionsperspective.
I'm really lucky because I havejust a team.
That is amazing, like I woulddo anything for them and, quite
honestly, most people see me andthink this is my company.
It's not.
It's our company and we worktogether, and that's the only
(33:32):
reason why we're able to takeall these crazy concepts and
make them actually work, becauseI could do this on my own.
You keep thinking about thisidea and then you meet other
people and you talk to themabout it who fulfill one of the
other two personas, and, if itworks, you bring them on and you
keep building like that.
So start your company now interms of thinking about it,
based on which of the threeprofiles that you align most
(33:53):
strongly with.
Learn about it, write thingsdown, research it, but then
always be looking for thoseother personalities, either if
you build it yourself or youfind someone you trust who can
do one of those things Hacker,hustler, designer.
Tanner Welsch (34:08):
I love that, john .
Thank you so much for theinsights, man.
That's great.
We'll have to bring it to aclose.
Is there anything else thatyou'd like to share with rehab
professionals and betterstruggling, I think, working in
the traditional model andinterested in, and or looking
for, something different?
Jonathon Lee (34:24):
Yes, there's one thing that I really want to talk
about.
This is separate from NextDegree.
I want to talk about the globalhealth care workforce crisis.
Right now, a lot of people getthe mistaken idea that I'm
trying to get clinicians toleave clinic.
My goal is how do we take thisinformation that's traditionally
been siloed away fromclinicians and give it to you
(34:46):
for free, so you can make thebest choice for yourself, your
family, which actually, a lot oftime, is a clinical career, but
that doesn't change the factthat you should have this
information to make the bestdecision.
Specifically, though, peopleget this idea that I'm trying to
take clinicians out ofhealthcare, out of clinical care
, and I think that's ridiculousfor three main reasons.
The first reason is just purelyDEI diversity, equity and
(35:09):
inclusion.
If there is a global workforceshortage of clinicians, why are
you going to excommunicate anysegment of them, especially the
risks-seeking, innovative ones,who may be even just thinking
about what a different careerpath could look like?
There's not enough of usalready, and you're going to
excommunicate someone for askinga question that, quite honestly
(35:31):
, could be asked in any otherindustry.
I don't think that's right froma human or moral perspective.
I don't think that's right froma human or moral perspective.
The second is we are enteringthis entire new generation of
workers.
By 2030, two-thirds of allclinicians will be Gen Z or
young millennials, and whatCOVID has shown us is that this
is the boomerang generation.
(35:52):
Gone are the days where ourparents or elders would work at
one company for the rest oftheir lives.
This new generation of workersis looking to be challenged and
will seek out differentemployers to find them and will
come back to the ones that arereally good to them.
So right now, in terms ofstartups, all the first movers
are actually in the 2010s,during the boom cycle of tech.
(36:15):
But now our research actuallyshows that a bunch of these
people, these clinicians whohave gone into startups, are
actually coming back tohealthcare.
Can you imagine the amount ofinformation and insights and
knowledge that these clinicianshave gleaned in clinical care
and then in startups thatthey're going to bring back now
to slower moving legacyhealthcare players?
(36:36):
This is a new generation ofworkers who, just because they
leave, research shows they'reactually more likely to come
back.
Cool.
And the third reason why I thinkthis idea of taking clinicians
out of clinical care isridiculous is just the data.
When I was in the UK, I had theopportunity to meet this
amazing surgeon named Dr TonyYoung.
(36:58):
Tony Young is a urologist inthe UK's NHS who started a
program 10 years ago called theClinical Entrepreneur Program.
What his hypothesis was if wecan stimulate clinicians and
teach them about non-clinicalthings, can they take their vast
clinical insight and use it tofix these clinical problems?
(37:20):
Basically, it's a mini MBA forclinicians in the NHS that's
jointly run by the NHS and EastAnglia University.
It's been doing it for 10 years, pledging a ton of data, and
the data is astounding.
First off, if you think about it, every clinician who applies to
this program is thinking aboutleaving the NHS.
A full one-third of applicantsover the last 10 years and
(37:41):
participants have stayed in theNHS because of the clinical
entrepreneurship program.
Name to me a single workforceprogram in the US healthcare
system that cuts attrition by athird.
I can't think of a single one.
A lot of these clinicians thetwo-thirds that ended up leaving
actually started companies orworked for companies that they
were then able to have theirtechnology adopted by the NHS.
(38:03):
So, if you think about it, thisidea that giving clinicians
information about what theirpassions and career growth can
align with.
It's totally different thanthis idea of taking clinicians
out of healthcare.
But what's going to happen isAI will never replace clinicians
.
Clinicians who use andunderstand data replace the ones
(38:24):
that don't.
Tanner Welsch (38:25):
John love that man.
We're going to have to have ahard stop.
Thank you so much for coming onand sharing your knowledge and
experience, so really appreciateyou and hope we have you on
again and see you around.
So thank you.
Jonathon Lee (38:37):
Absolutely.
Thanks for having me.
Sorry for rambling a little bit.
Let me know if you needanything.
Thanks for being interested inNext to Great and I can't wait
for you to see it.
I think you're going to love it.
Tanner Welsch (38:46):
Thanks, john.
I'm excited too to see all ithas to bring and offer everybody
.
So, yeah, looking forward to it.
Tak e care, thank.
Intro (38:53):
Thank you for listening to the Rehab Rebels podcast.
If this podcast was useful,make sure to hit that subscribe
button and leave a review.
For more information abouttransitioning to alternative
careers, head to rehabrebelsorgor follow us on Instagram at
rehabrebelspodcast.
We'll see you next time.
Welcome to the Rehab Rebels podcast.
Are you a rehab professionalready to transition to an
alternative career?
Hear inspiring stories fromothers just like you and learn
the best ways to bridge yourcareer gap.
This podcast has you covered.
Now here's your host, doctor ofphysical therapy and podcaster,
Tanner Welsh.
Tanner Welsch (00:21):
Welcome back to another episode of Rehab Rebels.
Welcome back to another episodeof Rehab Rebels.
For this episode, the biggestthing we can learn is that the
journey of a rehab professional,particularly in the context of
global challenges like theCOVID-19 pandemic, can lead to
profound insights about thelimitations and opportunities
within the healthcare system.
(00:41):
Transitioning from clinicalpractice to entrepreneurship
isn't just about personalfulfillment.
It's about leveraging clinicalexpertise to address systemic
issues and drive meaningfulchange at scale.
Our guest today is Jonathan Lee.
He's a physical therapist andco-founder of Next Degree, whose
(01:02):
mission is to help cliniciansfind jobs they love in order to
help build careers they love.
He holds an MBA from theUniversity of Oxford and
completed his residency andfellowship in Houston, texas.
Welcome to the show, john.
Thanks for having me Superexcited.
Absolutely Me too.
Me too.
There's so many places to beginwith you and so many questions.
(01:24):
But let's start from the storybehind the first sense of
awareness that things maybeweren't quite right for you in
the traditional rehab setting.
What the reasons were?
What the story was behind yourshift outside of the traditional
clinical patient care model.
Jonathon Lee (01:40):
Absolutely.
And, first off, I think thisidea of the Rehab Rebel podcast
is really timely.
I think, whether you're lookingto change the landscape or your
own career, or improve patientcare in your own personal way,
this idea of understanding thatways that we're working right
now could be done a little bitbetter.
As for me, I've actually madefour or five pivots in my career
(02:05):
at this point, and I've beenout of PT school for about 11
years at this point, I think, soit's definitely been a crazy
journey.
Right now, I'm one of theco-founders of Next Degree, and
we've built an AI-powered jobsearch for healthcare where you
can instantly learn about newroles and industries across the
healthcare ecosystem, such ashealth tech, med tech, biotech,
et cetera.
And not only can you learnabout new roles and industries
across the healthcare ecosystem,such as health tech, med tech,
(02:26):
biotech, et cetera.
And not only can you learnabout these companies and roles,
but we match each company, roleand industry to your background
.
So, for example, if you're aphysical therapist, you
automatically match with digitalmusculoskeletal care companies
like Hinge and Sward and thingslike that.
Or, let's say, you're apharmacist, then PBM
pharmaceutical benefitsmanagement companies pop up, or
(02:48):
other pharma tech companies likeIrene, and we built this
because I think clinicians arelooking for a way to expand
their impact post-COVID, but alot of times the information
that they are receiving iseither piecemeal or not easily
accessible, and so we built anAI for healthcare for clinicians
, specifically to be part ofthat change and understand
(03:10):
what's going on around them,give them real data so they can
make the best choice forthemselves, with the bonus of
being able to apply for jobsquickly and not get ghosted.
That's what I'm doing now.
But in terms of how I got here,it's a very circuitous story
and I'd like to caveat this insaying sometimes, when people
reach out, the journey can seemlinear, but I promise you it's
(03:34):
very, very not, and sometimesjust in the right place in the
right time.
But you make your own luck byputting yourself in those
positions to be vulnerable andto grow and to learn and to be
rebellious, I guess.
So you know, like most teenageboys, I wanted to be a sports
athlete and I wanted to be asports therapist.
So I went the whole residencyand fellowship route after PT
(03:56):
school down in Texas, I was atHouston Methodist.
I did my fellowship with TokoNguyen.
He's in PT.
I think he's the president ofthe sports section of AOMT right
now.
After I finished that, I movedup to Portland Oregon and while
I was in that space I got areally amazing opportunity to
work with athletes from NFL,from Major League Baseball,
(04:17):
college, high school weekendwarrior, et cetera, at this
gigantic facility in the Nikeecosystem.
I did that for a few years andit was great.
I really enjoyed it.
But my first pivot out of thattraditional patient care world
happened when I decided to gofrom outpatient pro sports
(04:37):
therapy into community health.
I was working at this hugesports facility and one of my
colleagues went on holiday and Itook over her patient while she
was gone.
He was a 90 year old man andall he really wanted to do was
pick up his grandkids.
I taught him how to barbellthat lift using lifts and things
like that so I could pick uphis grandkids.
But it really stuck with me, somuch so that I realized that I
(05:00):
had spent the last five years atthis point on this pro sports
journey and maybe all the skillsI was using weren't helping the
people who really needed it.
I come from a family ofimmigrants, very blue collar.
We worked in restaurant jobsand dishwashers and make our way
through America, and I reallywanted to help those people.
(05:23):
So I decided to leave that joband I went to go work at a
community care clinic for areally large Medicaid hospital
in Portland called Providence.
This was driven in part by theecosystem around 2018.
It was a mental health crisis,it was the opioid crisis, it was
the homeless crisis in Portlandand my caseload shifted from
(05:47):
pro sports to breast cancer, tohomeless people, to oncology
rehab, to autoimmune diseasesfor undocumented immigrants and
the unsure people that reallyneeded it right, and I loved it
Did that for a few years.
Along the way, I realized thatthere was a force multiplier
through education, so we starteda mini residency program.
(06:10):
Keep in mind, we're a Medicaidhospital, so we didn't have the
money to pay the APTA, so itwasn't official, but I built a
residency curriculum tests, tookresidents and taught them
everything I needed from prosports.
But then I think my next pivotusually happens, like most
people, when you thinkeverything's going well, and
that was COVID, and COVID wascrazy.
(06:32):
I mean, it was crazy forpatients.
I think people forget how crazyit was for clinicians.
And then, in April 2020, I sawa ticker on CNN that said Oxford
was creating the first COVIDvaccine in partnership with
AstraZeneca and had received $2billion or pounds or some sort
(06:53):
of extravagant amount of moneythat doesn't make sense to
clinicians.
Right, and I had thisrealization that my team and I,
if we were lucky, we could getto 100 patients at a time in
Portland, and I realized thatevery clinician starts
healthcare with that white coatof right.
How can I help my community?
(07:13):
How can I do no harm?
And in a city of less than amillion people, in this global
pandemic, seeing 100 people meanI had the max impact on my
community.
And this is important becauseit's not about did you have
impact?
That is incredibly impactful.
Right, you change the lives ofpeople one at a time.
But with a black swan eventlike COVID, how do you do more?
(07:35):
Thinking back to that first dayof PT school or nursing school
or med school or whatever bythese people who really need you
?
Right, and so I applied toOxford the next day, took me
about a week to finish thatapplication.
The only program they had leftwas business school, and so I
applied to business schoolwithout ever having opened Excel
(07:57):
or PowerPoint or even thoughtabout finance, aside from
balancing my own checkbook.
I wrote about what it was liketo be a physical therapist in
America, to have this dream ofhelping people get better
physically, mentally,emotionally, to go through this
rigorous training in school andresidency and fellowship, to
(08:17):
have all these student loans,yet sometimes work in a setting
where you're not being utilizedto your best ability and to deal
with people who are sufferingor who have other social
determinants of health, and tohave to do this every 15 minutes
and compartmentalize this andcontextualize this, sometimes
for people managers, directors,et cetera who had never had to
(08:39):
watch somebody die.
And so being a PT actually gotme into Oxford.
It's amazing, and it wasn't mystory, it's our story.
So I got my job, I sold my house, went overseas, went to
business school and while I wasthere I decided I wanted to get
into every corner of healthcareI could.
So this is the next pivot, andthe first pivot I made was into
(09:00):
startups.
I was the founder's associateat this amazing startup that's
called Regmetrics, and thefounder was a scientist at
Oxford who was trying to find away to accelerate production of
life-saving medical devices, butshe realized that a big
bottleneck is actuallyregulatory pathways, so she
built this amazing AI wherefounders could put their ideas
(09:21):
in for their medical devices andit'll tell you exactly what
regulatory pathway you need tofollow before you build it.
Tanner Welsch (09:27):
How did you guys get in contact with each other
and you realized you were a goodfit?
And what's the backstory there?
Jonathon Lee (09:32):
So this is not elegant at all, but when I went
to business school I did notknow.
People took a year to preparefor business school.
I did not know even what VC orprivate equity or management
consulting was.
I didn't know any of it.
So I literally went online andsent out maybe 10 to 20 messages
a day on LinkedIn to people whohad PT backgrounds, who were
(09:56):
doing non-PT things.
And one guy I got linked up towas a professor of robotics at
Oxford who was a PT in theNetherlands and his wife was the
founder of this company.
Very cool.
Yeah, I just tried to find away to build an environment
where I could ask stupidquestions safely, and I felt
(10:17):
really safe in our PT network.
Tanner Welsch (10:19):
I love that.
The cold emails I heard thatquite a bit.
Jonathon Lee (10:22):
Yeah, and you'd be surprised.
Our PT community is amazing.
If you go and talk to peoplebecause you want to learn
something, I mean, that's thesame way we became physical
therapists.
How did you become a PT?
You heard it was a cool job.
You reached out to a local PT,you shadowed them, etc.
Right, the system is nodifferent.
That was great.
(10:47):
Thanks for the backstory onthat.
I'm working at Regmetrics andthen at the same time I became a
fancy word for an intern it'scalled a venture consultant at
this really cool company inGermany called DeepSpin, and so
now I'm pivoting into medtechwhile I'm in regtech health tech
and DeepSpin was building thisamazing MRI that fit on a cart
and it plugged into athree-pronged outlet and it
costs one 1,000th the cost of atraditional MRI, and they had
(11:08):
found a way to bring the powerso low that you could take it
mobile and you could plug itinto things.
And so they were a Germancompany who was trying to figure
out how to get to the US afterthey finished development and
things like that.
So my job was how do younavigate the US healthcare
system?
How do you build a go-to-marketstrategy that makes sense to
(11:29):
investors and help key yourproduct build so that you can
bring this life-saving deviceand money-saving device to other
countries.
Right, and that sounds reallyfancy, but it's stuff that every
physical therapist or nurse ordoctor knows about.
Who is the decision maker in ahospital?
What is the flow of patientsfrom first visit to MRI
prescription?
(11:50):
Who reads MRIs Things that weknow about that we don't think
we know, but we're actually very, very deep experts in right, so
that was cool.
I was able to work with themfor a few months until they went
to fundraising.
They were able to raise a bunchof money and then finally, in
MBA programs, the way mostprograms work is at the end of
the year you can do aninternship if you choose.
I got super lucky through thesecold outbound reach outs to
(12:14):
other clinicians and gotconnected to the chief medical
officer of Bayer Pharmaceuticals.
I went to go work for the chiefmedical officer and his team on
the digital transformation team.
This was 10 months afterleaving the clinic.
10 months is a very short timeand I'm you sure you want me to
work for you and he goes.
Yeah, I just really have onething for you to think about
this summer and I want you tothink about how do we update our
digital transformation teamsacross the organization?
(12:36):
How do we optimize this programthat we have where we're trying
to integrate tech intohealthcare?
It's a pretty ambiguous project.
I don't really know how it'sgoing to go, so just tell them
you work for me and you can liketalk to whoever you want.
Okay, I'm learning fromdifferent departments and
different projects and differentpersonnel across the
organization, globally, becauseno one says no to the chief
(12:56):
medical officer, right?
And I got exposed to a lot ofcrazy things, and not just the
drugs, but the tech side AR andVR, rehab models and equipment,
genomic digital twins, highthroughput data modeling and
data lakes All this crazy stuffthat we read on random articles
(13:19):
online.
It's actually real.
I learned a lot, finished upthere, graduated and then we
were still in the pandemic.
So I spent the next two-ishyears in management, consulting,
slash biotech and I wanted tofind a way to make more
precision medicines for peoplewho really needed it.
I found a really amazingconsulting firm in New York and
(13:41):
London called Idea Pharma, andbasically what happens is a
bunch of big pharma companieswill come to them with their
molecules and Idea has to turnthem into medicines and really
this idea of taking a scientificbreakthrough and turning it
into the actual functionalmedicine that people can use and
then build out all the clinicaltrial programs, build on all
the different potential pathways, all the go-to-market, all the
(14:03):
market entering to every country, because the UK versus France
versus Germany versus the US istotally different.
In a lot of ways it's likebuilding a plan of care with a
lot of different layers to it.
And so I did that for the nexttwo and a half years until the
pandemic was over.
But while that was happening, Ialso pivoted back into startups
and VC funds and accelerators,because a ton of founders and a
(14:26):
ton of accelerator managers andinvestors would reach out to me
while I was working there andsay, hey, I'm working on this
idea, I'm trying to find X for Y, do you know of anybody or can
you help me?
And then on the other side, Iwould say like a thousand
clinicians reached out to mejust saying, hey, I'm working
during COVID, I'm burnt out, Iwant to do more in terms of
(14:46):
helping our communities and I'mnot being used to the best of my
ability at the hospital rightnow.
How did you do what you do?
How did you get there, can wechat?
What would you do if you wereme?
And so this whole thing isswirling while I'm living in
London, and so I had an idea, aBritish and a millennial hybrid
idea.
(15:08):
What happens if you put thesepeople who need each other,
these investors and founders,and these clinicians who want to
work at startups, if you justput them together?
And what if you did it?
In a way that was fun.
So I started a pub night onesummer and I put it on Reddit,
and then the NHS went on strikeand it absolutely exploded.
The entire NHS in the UK wenton strike Doctors, nurses,
physiotherapists, et ceteratogether, which is very rare,
because a lot of times we'refighting with other professions
(15:30):
for our own piece of the pot.
I bring my VC and my operatorfriends and my founder friends.
I bring my clinician friends.
I would just put them at atable and I would just listen
and just see what they weretalking about.
The.
And I would just listen andjust see what they were talking
about.
The first thing that happenedwas that these clinicians
thought that the companiesdidn't want them.
That was false.
The second thing that happenedwas that these companies thought
(15:52):
clinicians who could do morethan just clinical care didn't
exist.
So the challenge then becomesnot do they not exist?
Because that's false.
The challenge becomes actuallythey're in different communities
.
So what happens if you just putthem together?
And this is the output A bunchof these companies hire these
clinicians.
A bunch of these companies thenfundraised and a bunch of these
(16:13):
companies then had theirscientific and healthcare
breakthroughs adopted by the NHS, and so this all happened.
Then COVID ended and I quit myconsulting job because I went in
there wanting to help outduring the pandemic.
Pandemic was over and I startednext degree with the idea that
if you can give clinicians thepower and the freedom of data to
(16:37):
understand how fast things arechanging, will they be able to
take control of the careerprocess on their own and make
the best decision for them,instead of outsourcing this to
LinkedIn or other forms ofsupport services that maybe
don't have your best interest inmind.
In my mind, my assumption isabsolutely.
I mean, you're telling me thatyou could do a code blue.
(16:59):
You're telling me that you cando gross anatomy, but you're
telling me that you can't doExcel.
I think that's ridiculous.
That's absolutely ridiculous.
If you know how to do what youwanted to do and you know the
people in there that are doingwhat you want to do and how they
did it.
Could you alter your own careerwhile helping these other
(17:20):
founders and investors who arebuilding these crazy things to
go reach more patients?
And on the backside for thesefounders, healthcare is a super
highly regulated industry.
If you could connect them withactual healthcare experts with
years of experience, could theybuild faster, and this is our
hypothesis.
We connect the two so thateveryone wins.
Tanner Welsch (17:40):
John, I love that .
That's brilliant.
I have several questions foryou.
The first is defining whathealth tech, med tech, biotech
is for those that don't know.
And then a follow-up questionis next degree.
What can someone expect fromnext degree when they're looking
for this?
Match with what's out there?
What best aligns for them?
What kind of information doesNext Degree need to help the
(18:03):
clinician line up with the bestpossible career outcome?
Jonathon Lee (18:07):
Oh, great questions.
The way I like to think of itis that health tech, med tech,
biotech, femtech all thesebuzzwords are tech-enabled
children or cousins ofhealthcare.
Health tech is mostlysoftware-related enablement of
healthcare.
That could be a bunch ofdifferent ways.
(18:27):
You could do it asinfrastructure tech.
Maybe I'm building somethingthat can link an EMR to a
scheduling software.
Maybe you're creating a digitalhealth company where I'm using
tech to enable telehealthservices right.
So health tech is tech-enabledhealthcare delivery and
optimization.
Medtech is tech-enabled devicedevelopment, optimization
(18:50):
Basically something that you cansee and touch and feel, where
software is a bit more nebulousAnything where you're using a
device to optimize or fulfill atreatment objective.
Biotech is anything where you'reusing biological sciences to
solve a problem, and thatproblem can actually be beyond
(19:11):
healthcare.
For example, food science isactually part of biotech.
But the easiest way I thinkabout biotech is big pharma.
You take these new compoundsthat could do something and you
figure out could they help acertain disease or patient
population, in what sequence, inwhat schedule, in what format,
in what dosage, et cetera.
And so biotechs in thatindustry are actually the
(19:35):
smallest companies, whereas bigpharma is the biggest companies.
Does that make sense?
Tanner Welsch (19:40):
Yeah, yeah, absolutely.
Thanks for the clarifications.
I love that.
Jonathon Lee (19:43):
Now, what can people expect from Next to Great
?
That was the second question,and the short answer is we've
started with the basics andwe're building out more.
So we started this company inOctober of last year.
It's been about five months asof this, recording the way we've
built this is very simple.
Right now we're invite onlysign up for the wait list when
(20:06):
you go in.
It's very simple.
It's your traditional searchstrings date, posted salary, et
cetera.
But then we've built out acouple of really nifty AI
features from scratch.
The first AI feature is a bestfit company match, and what this
does is we've mapped the entireecosystem of healthcare to a
(20:28):
spine that's based on differentmedical professions.
So at the click of a button,you can decide.
You can say I'm a physicaltherapist or I'm a nurse, or I'm
an occupational therapist, andfilter out the thousand jobs
that we have currentlyspecifically to the jobs and
companies where physical therapywould be a powerful value add
Things like medical devices,digital MSK, emr billing for
(20:51):
physical therapy startups.
Then the next AI feature thatwe've built out that's really
interesting is we've taken thenext step and we've incorporated
the clinical background totraditional startup hiring trees
, so you can say I'm looking fora job that was posted within
the last seven days, that'spaying at least $100,000, where
a physical therapist who'sinterested in operations would
(21:12):
be a good fit at Boom.
Very simple.
What's really important, though, it's not really just about
finding the jobs.
It's about understanding if youactually want to work for them.
Within each company, afteryou've done your filtering,
we've actually done a couple ofthings.
We've highlighted the mission,the wow factor, and how each
(21:32):
company does what they do in onesentence.
We've created a synopsis ofevery single company in 250
words or less, that tells youtheir place in the industry,
their place in fundraising andthen their place in the
healthcare ecosystem, and we'vecut out all the jargon.
There's no words like hypergrowth.
There's no words likeconvertible debt equity none of
(21:56):
that stuff.
It's simply simple andstraightforward, and then you
can apply directly through ourportal no third-party job or
anything like that, and sothat's where we started.
Currently, we're building out aton of other amazing features
that get away from these basefeatures that we're rolling out
over the next coming weeks andmonths Things like resume
(22:18):
generators and resume critiques.
How can I answer theseinterview questions?
How can I go from productspecialist to product manager to
head of product if I'm a newgraduate.
And finally, the last thingabout next degree that I think
is the absolute most importantthing is that we've highlighted
and partnered with hundreds ofclinicians from around the world
(22:40):
who are doing exceptionalthings Clinicians who have
founded startups, who havebecome VPs at hospitals,
clinicians who have becomesoftware developers and product
managers, et cetera.
And these clinicians havereached out to us and written
step-by-step guides on a milliondifferent things, such as
getting a product, such asstarting your startup, such as
(23:02):
fundraising, from theirperspective, and have included
the resources that have helpedthem get to where they've gotten
to.
And who better to understandyour perspective than someone
who's been through what you'vebeen through?
And this is what I'm most proudof.
The clinical community has beenso good to me when I was trying
to figure out how I couldchange healthcare in my own
little way, and now we havehundreds of clinicians from Asia
(23:25):
, australia, england, germany,the US, canada, turkey doing the
same thing, sharing theirknowledge with the rest of us
for free.
Tanner Welsch (23:34):
Is there like a timeline for when the next
degree is going to have fullfutures available?
Everything's up and running andready to go.
Jonathon Lee (23:43):
Yeah, it'll never be done.
Never and, quite honestly,that's the way it should be.
Healthcare changes so rapidlyand there are so many different
types of clinicians andmotivations and ways that you
can make an impact that we can'thonestly say our job will ever
be done, because our job willonly be done when clinicians
stop caring about how to changehealthcare, which will never
(24:05):
happen.
In terms of opening up thewaitlist, it's actually live and
we have a bunch of clinicianson our platform.
We have a bunch of people onthe waitlist that we're still
onboarding now over time, but Iwould anticipate in the next few
months that we'll probably getrid of the waitlists.
The challenge is that we had somany people clinicians sign up
at first we actually broke ourwaitlist vendor, so now we're
(24:26):
scaling our backend systems toactually accept these thousands
of clinicians into the platform.
We've done most of that, butreally the main point is
building out these crazy toolsis really important and we want
to make sure that they work howyou want them to work, while
testing them, but not releasingthem to everybody, right,
(24:46):
because I think clinicians havebeen so disappointed myself
included in some of the toolsout there for us Making sure
that things work under a smallscale, and then ramping up the
scale allows the things youdon't see, like back-end
authorization bottlenecks don'thappen.
Tanner Welsch (25:05):
Makes sense.
So something I've been thinkingabout throughout this interview
is you mentioned that there'sseveral people that reach out to
you and basically, hey, this iswhere I'm at.
I want to get to where you are,what would you recommend, what
would you do?
And there's some minitransitions that I'm at.
I want to get to where you are,what would you recommend, what
would you do?
And there's some manytransitions that I'm interested
to dive deeper into to figureout how that happened, and one
(25:25):
of those is this startup withNext Degree.
The light bulb came on when yousaw these clinicians coming
together with the startups andthese two groups of people
actually mingling and there was,oh my God, this is brilliant.
So one is what have yourealized or what would you share
with those that are interestedin transitioning or doing
something that you've done andor what you've noticed from a
(25:46):
lot of people you've talked to.
If you can give us somepointers on some themes or
concepts that really applies tothe majority of those
individuals that you talk to,that would be helpful to share
with everybody on the podcast.
Jonathon Lee (25:58):
Absolutely.
I can actually think of acouple of things, but I'll keep
it to a few.
The first thing is you alwaysstart with people in your tribe
who have done different things,because you need to build a
fail-fast, fail-safe environmentwhere you can ask questions
that you may think are stupid,but actually the other person
said, no, they're not stupid,because I had them too.
This would be your PT who's aproduct manager?
(26:24):
Or your nurse who did an MBA?
Whoever has done kind of thathybrid scheme that you're
looking to use as a platform foryour own journey.
That's where you start.
Within that, there's two typesof people you need to find, and
I need to credit my friend,jules for this.
Jules has a great podcast alsoon PT careers.
Most people focus on mentors,but you also need to focus on
finding a sparring partner, anda sparring partner is someone
(26:45):
who's in the same stage as you,who is also trying to do what
you're trying to do, because byhaving a sparring partner, it
keeps you honest and you canexchange information with each
other, as you're both lookingfor mentors.
But the next step is actuallyjust as important.
After that step, you need to gohard into the community that
you know nothing about.
(27:08):
So let's say that you'reactually in an MBA, you start
with a PT and an MBA, but thenyou need to use that bridge to
build networks with otherfounders who are not clinicians.
And this is really scarybecause I think as clinicians
we're really comfortable withinvesting in our clinical
careers but we're a littlescared to invest just as heavily
into our non-clinical careers.
But this is super importantbecause there's so many layers
to this that we never learned inclinic.
(27:28):
Things like what is a C-corpversus an S-corp versus an LLC,
how do I allow an election 83Bfor my tax-deferred compensation
for my equity.
These things are reallyimportant for helping bring your
idea to life.
And those are all just a bunchof jargon and other things which
you'll learn.
But building this network ofpeople who are not clinicians,
who are experts or experiencedin what you're trying to get to,
(27:50):
is really important toencapsulate that understanding.
Encapsulate that understanding.
But I would suggest thatstrategy Find your mentor and
your sparring partner in thathybrid transition you're trying
to make and use that informationto get to the next step, to
find people that are hard on theother side to fill in the gaps
(28:11):
you don't know.
Tanner Welsch (28:12):
I love that.
Thanks for sharing so thesemany transitions.
You had a consulting it wasmanagement biotech consulting
position that you did for acouple of years, I believe and
also with the next degree, pickwhichever you feel is best.
Or if you want to share both,share both.
But what was it like, let's say, six months before you actually
did either of those live?
(28:33):
What was that like?
What were those struggles like,getting that stuff off the
ground and then give us a sixmonth after then?
What was your struggles andstuff then?
Jonathon Lee (28:43):
Actually, it was a lot like taking your board exam
.
Six months before is like theweek before your exam.
You're afraid of everything.
You're trying to do everything.
You don't know what the futureis going to look like.
There's so much chaos and justthat feeling of dread and worry.
Six months after is actuallylike that week after your board
exam, where you have that one ortwo week gap, depending on your
(29:05):
profession, and waiting foryour results to come back when.
Okay, well, I can't reallychange it.
Now I've accepted that it'schaos and now I just need to see
where it goes.
That's the best way I can putit.
To give you an example,especially as a first-time
founder, you have this idea ofwhat you're trying to do.
Right, I want to help empowerclinicians so that they can be
(29:26):
inspired to go change healthcarein ways that I could never do.
But how do you do that?
Do I research a bunch of stuff?
Do I incorporate a companyfirst?
Do I try to raise money frominvestors?
Do I try to learn how to code?
Someone else is doing somethingsimilar.
Should I stop?
It's very chaotic, right, andafterwards, six months later, a
couple of transitions happen.
I think that all clinicianshave gone through.
(29:47):
In a way, it's like the GreekStoics You've accepted that the
world is chaos and all you canreally control is your response
to it.
Startups will be crazy.
There will always be thingsthat come up that you have to
deal with urgently, especiallyas a founder or early employee.
Right, but I know that as longas I have my own ecosystem set,
(30:08):
I've got my team, I've got myfamily, I've got, you know, my
loved ones with me.
Together, we can deal withwhatever that comes up, right.
Tanner Welsch (30:16):
I loved how you, six months before you, had all
these questions that were racingthrough your mind where to
start?
Can we dive deeper into thatand share a general framework
for how you started puttingsomething together to create a
startup?
I imagine there's severalpeople involved that are
required to do this thing.
Give us a general roadmap andmaybe some challenges that you
(30:37):
had to get this thing going forthose that are looking to maybe
also do a startup as well.
Jonathon Lee (30:41):
Absolutely.
I'm going to give a piece ofunpopular advice that I have
both given and received in mytime as an accelerator, mentor,
a PC advisor, etc.
You can start building acompany now as a solo founder,
but that also does not mean youhave to stay a solo founder.
In general, the way I like toapproach building a company in
(31:04):
any industry is you're lookingfor three main personalities on
your team.
It doesn't mean you need threepeople, but you're looking for
three general personalities andI like to think of those
personalities very simply.
It's a hustler, a hacker and adesigner.
Your hustler is the one who, nomatter how crazy it gets, is the
(31:26):
optimist.
They find ways to solveproblems or they find ways to
sell your product or they findways to fundraise.
That super optimist, energizer,bunny person just figures out a
way to keep your company fromdying.
The hacker is your person thatcan create something out of
(31:47):
absolutely nothing.
This could be the person whomakes your cards, if you're
doing a wedding invite.
This could be your softwaredeveloper, who can just make
something out of nothing.
So this is the infrastructureperson.
If you're a hustler, it's yourfinancial person.
And the last one is, I think,the most important.
This is the designer.
(32:07):
The designer is the person who,no matter what happens, is
always thinking about thecustomer.
Does this look right?
This is how they would want touse it.
Does this look right?
This is how they would want touse it.
Are we positioning ourselves toshow these customers or users
that we want to help them withwhat they're really struggling
with?
Because no one else knows whatthey're struggling with except
(32:28):
as well as we do.
That person is their operationsperson.
They would handle positioning,infrastructure, ui, ux, customer
research, et cetera.
So, hacker, hustler, designerthat's the three personalities.
Now, what's absolutelyfascinating is you don't have to
be all three, but you shouldfind out which one you identify
with most, with most withinyourself, what that person's
(32:50):
strengths are, and then use thatas you're doing your other
resource, going through yournetworks, your hybrid networks,
and then your non-familiarnetworks.
Then add your co-founders tothose other two.
A founder is someone who'sthere from day one, inception.
A co-founder can be someone whocomes on later.
(33:11):
They're used interchangeably,but they're actually slightly
different from a definitionsperspective.
I'm really lucky because I havejust a team.
That is amazing, like I woulddo anything for them and, quite
honestly, most people see me andthink this is my company.
It's not.
It's our company and we worktogether, and that's the only
(33:32):
reason why we're able to takeall these crazy concepts and
make them actually work, becauseI could do this on my own.
You keep thinking about thisidea and then you meet other
people and you talk to themabout it who fulfill one of the
other two personas, and, if itworks, you bring them on and you
keep building like that.
So start your company now interms of thinking about it,
based on which of the threeprofiles that you align most
(33:53):
strongly with.
Learn about it, write thingsdown, research it, but then
always be looking for thoseother personalities, either if
you build it yourself or youfind someone you trust who can
do one of those things Hacker,hustler, designer.
Tanner Welsch (34:08):
I love that, john .
Thank you so much for theinsights, man.
That's great.
We'll have to bring it to aclose.
Is there anything else thatyou'd like to share with rehab
professionals and betterstruggling, I think, working in
the traditional model andinterested in, and or looking
for, something different?
Jonathon Lee (34:24):
Yes, there's one thing that I really want to talk
about.
This is separate from NextDegree.
I want to talk about the globalhealth care workforce crisis.
Right now, a lot of people getthe mistaken idea that I'm
trying to get clinicians toleave clinic.
My goal is how do we take thisinformation that's traditionally
been siloed away fromclinicians and give it to you
(34:46):
for free, so you can make thebest choice for yourself, your
family, which actually, a lot oftime, is a clinical career, but
that doesn't change the factthat you should have this
information to make the bestdecision.
Specifically, though, peopleget this idea that I'm trying to
take clinicians out ofhealthcare, out of clinical care
, and I think that's ridiculousfor three main reasons.
The first reason is just purelyDEI diversity, equity and
(35:09):
inclusion.
If there is a global workforceshortage of clinicians, why are
you going to excommunicate anysegment of them, especially the
risks-seeking, innovative ones,who may be even just thinking
about what a different careerpath could look like?
There's not enough of usalready, and you're going to
excommunicate someone for askinga question that, quite honestly
(35:31):
, could be asked in any otherindustry.
I don't think that's right froma human or moral perspective.
I don't think that's right froma human or moral perspective.
The second is we are enteringthis entire new generation of
workers.
By 2030, two-thirds of allclinicians will be Gen Z or
young millennials, and whatCOVID has shown us is that this
is the boomerang generation.
(35:52):
Gone are the days where ourparents or elders would work at
one company for the rest oftheir lives.
This new generation of workersis looking to be challenged and
will seek out differentemployers to find them and will
come back to the ones that arereally good to them.
So right now, in terms ofstartups, all the first movers
are actually in the 2010s,during the boom cycle of tech.
(36:15):
But now our research actuallyshows that a bunch of these
people, these clinicians whohave gone into startups, are
actually coming back tohealthcare.
Can you imagine the amount ofinformation and insights and
knowledge that these clinicianshave gleaned in clinical care
and then in startups thatthey're going to bring back now
to slower moving legacyhealthcare players?
(36:36):
This is a new generation ofworkers who, just because they
leave, research shows they'reactually more likely to come
back.
Cool.
And the third reason why I thinkthis idea of taking clinicians
out of clinical care isridiculous is just the data.
When I was in the UK, I had theopportunity to meet this
amazing surgeon named Dr TonyYoung.
(36:58):
Tony Young is a urologist inthe UK's NHS who started a
program 10 years ago called theClinical Entrepreneur Program.
What his hypothesis was if wecan stimulate clinicians and
teach them about non-clinicalthings, can they take their vast
clinical insight and use it tofix these clinical problems?
(37:20):
Basically, it's a mini MBA forclinicians in the NHS that's
jointly run by the NHS and EastAnglia University.
It's been doing it for 10 years, pledging a ton of data, and
the data is astounding.
First off, if you think about it, every clinician who applies to
this program is thinking aboutleaving the NHS.
A full one-third of applicantsover the last 10 years and
(37:41):
participants have stayed in theNHS because of the clinical
entrepreneurship program.
Name to me a single workforceprogram in the US healthcare
system that cuts attrition by athird.
I can't think of a single one.
A lot of these clinicians thetwo-thirds that ended up leaving
actually started companies orworked for companies that they
were then able to have theirtechnology adopted by the NHS.
(38:03):
So, if you think about it, thisidea that giving clinicians
information about what theirpassions and career growth can
align with.
It's totally different thanthis idea of taking clinicians
out of healthcare.
But what's going to happen isAI will never replace clinicians
.
Clinicians who use andunderstand data replace the ones
(38:24):
that don't.
Tanner Welsch (38:25):
John love that man.
We're going to have to have ahard stop.
Thank you so much for coming onand sharing your knowledge and
experience, so really appreciateyou and hope we have you on
again and see you around.
So thank you.
Jonathon Lee (38:37):
Absolutely.
Thanks for having me.
Sorry for rambling a little bit.
Let me know if you needanything.
Thanks for being interested inNext to Great and I can't wait
for you to see it.
I think you're going to love it.
Tanner Welsch (38:46):
Thanks, john.
I'm excited too to see all ithas to bring and offer everybody
.
So, yeah, looking forward to it.
Tak e care, thank.
Intro (38:53):
Thank you for listening to the Rehab Rebels podcast.
If this podcast was useful,make sure to hit that subscribe
button and leave a review.
For more information abouttransitioning to alternative
careers, head to rehabrebelsorgor follow us on Instagram at
rehabrebelspodcast.
We'll see you next time.
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