They'll Tell You the Brutal Truth

Healthcare news is complex. I want to make it simple. So, I started Healthcare Huddle exactly a year ago with Brett Dashevsky and Harrison Kaplan to make healthcare news more understandable and accessible. Our journey is far from over, but the first anniversary marks an important milestone, one requiring reflection on how we got here and where we’re going. 

Building momentum is tough; sustaining momentum is tougher.

Within three months of launching our first newsletter, our audience (“Huddlers”) grew from zero to 700. This was fast growth, but was it sustainable? On top of juggling medical school, I was performing all of the research and writing. I had friends and selected-Huddlers help me out with the editing and reviewing (Julia and many others — thank you so much), which relieved some stress. 

But the answer is “no,” this process wasn’t sustainable and was only a recipe for burnout. Luckily I received a cold email from Sitara Shirol, a senior at the University of Pennsylvania at the time, who inquired about Healthcare Huddle after seeing a LinkedIn post by Brett. Sitara mentioned the possibility of joining the team to help write content. It turned out she was just as enthusiastic as I was about the Huddle and its future — she joined the team the very next day.

Embrace feedback with open arms — you need this and it’s tough to grow without it.

Building a Team Isn’t Easy

Building a team isn’t easy, especially when working for the Huddle and on the Huddle simultaneously. Solidifying a core focus with team values has been critical to the success of the Huddle. That’s because when everyone is on the same page, operations run smoothly. These “operations” were put to the test over the summer when we expanded our team from four to 13, adding content creators and a graphic designer.

During this expansion, our team’s principles of transparency and continuous improvement became even more salient. We were, still are and may continue to be, completely virtual. For this reason, transparency, or allowing every team member to clearly see how processes are running, has been so important. On top of that, continuous improvement necessitates giving and receiving critical feedback in real-time and using this feedback to improve. 

There’s perhaps no more excellent tool that we use than Trello, which allows us to visually see who’s working on what and provide quick feedback. One of the greatest attributes of each person on the team is that they embrace feedback with open arms — you need this and it’s tough to grow without it.

They’ll Tell You the Brutal Truth

Transparency and continuous improvement allowed our team to function at high capacity and helped grow our audience by 80% over the summer. However, “high capacity” didn’t always translate into “perfect content.” Over time, we’ve received critical feedback from our Huddlers regarding things they do and do not like about our content. We’ve made it a goal to accept as much feedback as possible and evaluate it, no matter how brutal it is. This is vitally important — getting feedback, evaluating it and improving from it. I first learned this lesson from a professor.

When responding to a business idea I had (not the Huddle), my professor at Lehigh University asked, “who did you pitch this idea to?” I said, “my friends and family,” to which he laughed. “Your friends and family are only going to tell you what you want to hear,” he said, “go pitch your idea to a stranger in Starbucks; they’ll tell you the brutal truth.” For this reason, we embrace feedback from everyone and love iterating.

New Territory

Following the summer, we launched a campus ambassador program called Huddlebassador. This project was new for us, and we were excited to get it off the ground. We modeled the program off of Morning Brew’s campus ambassador program. Here’s a tip: chances are someone is doing what you’re doing, and that’s OK. Don’t try to reinvent the wheel, just put your own spin on it.

Have a clear motivation and focus. Without the two, you’ll end up on Mars when you intended to go to the moon.

The program attracted over 90 bright and passionate students from across the country and Canada. The objectives of this program were to provide students with a healthcare community and entrepreneurial experience as well as grow the Huddle through referrals. This was especially challenging to run. I thank my team and our Huddlebassadors, who joined us for our first journey with this program. It’s challenging to build a virtual community, provide constant educational resources and attend to questions. We did it, though, to the best of our ability. Again, we accepted feedback from our Huddlebassadors with open arms and will improve the program’s next iteration.

Heading into 2021

Heading into 2021, we’re now a 14-person team and have an audience of 15,000 across all of our platforms. We’re gearing up to launch new products in 2021, including a referral program, educational platform and other newsletters. By no means has this been an easy experience, but it sure has been a fun one.

So, a year in, here’s my advice to you if you’re trying to execute an idea you have:

• Find yourself co-founders who complement your skills rather than mimic your skills.
• Have a clear motivation and focus. Without the two, you’ll end up on Mars when you intended to go to the moon.
• Embrace feedback, don’t fear it — ask strangers what they think about your idea, not your mom, dad or best friend.
• Build a team of people who understand your vision, want to help you reach that vision and have the time and resources necessary to do so. Chances are, if you do step one, two and three correctly, you will have created an attractive proposition for people to want to work with you.

Explore the Huddle

• Weekly Healthcare Huddle newsletter: read in 5 minutes, read for free.
• Daily Instagram posts on hot topics in healthcare.