The latest Balderton Capital podcast is a recording of the panel session from the latest Doctorpreneurs Meetup, which was held at Balderton HQ. Doctorpreneurs are the ‘global community for doctors, medical students, and individuals interested in healthcare innovation and entrepreneurship’. The team put together an excellent panel of health-tech entrepreneurs – including two Balderton portfolio companies TouchSurgery and Patients Know Best – who shared their experiences of hiring their first employees, growing their teams, raising investment, utilising medical advisors, and the importance of sharing your ideas.
The panellists were:
Dr Jamie Wilson, My Home Touch
Dr Mohammad Al-Ubaydli, Patients Know Best
Special thanks go to Vishal and the Doctorpreneurs team.
0100 Question: How do you hire the first person that isn’t you? And, for the doctors-turned-entrepreneurs, how do you hire the first non-medical person? Dr Jamie Wilson shares his experiences on the answer.
0240 Melissa Morris of Network Locum, explains her own tactics on how to poach key players from other companies. She also goes through the questions that she asks candidates.
0510 Question: How do you hire individuals with highly specifics skills who are not in a different field of expertise to yourself? Jean and Andre answer this question, as they are both surgeon who have perfected their skill of hiring animators.
0700 Andre reminds the audience that the ‘mission’ of a healthcare technology company can be key in helping to persuade employees to join a company at an early stage.
0745 Daniel Nathrath talks about helping early employees adapt as the business grows, and what to do if they can’t. Daniel also explains why bringing in ‘senior people’ from big companies doesn’t always work for startups.
0955 Mohammad Al-Ubaydli shares his experiences regarding how employees adapt as companies grow
1100 Question: When did you then that is was the ‘right time’ to raise money from external investors?
1310 Question: Do your investors need to have knowledge of the healthcare industry?
1515 Jamie Wilson explains that investors should be treated as members of the tea, who have skills that can supplement that of the ‘core team’.
1520 Melissa talks about why she turned down a term-sheet from a healthcare-specific investor, and also advocates the importance of having a board of medical advisors. Daniel Nathrath seconds this point.
1730 John and Andre talk about ‘the very, very long learning curve’ that they encountered when they were looking for investment. They talk about their first ever VC deck, which was way too long and cryptic; and about exactly how much money you should ask your VC for…
2000 The TouchSurgery founders also talk about why you need to share exactly what your company does, and its monetisation strategy, if you’re looking for investment. To paraphrase Andre: if you’re worried that someone else is going to steal your idea, you need to get over yourselves, as ideas are cheap – execution is the important part.
2340 Audience Question: What gives entrepreneurs conviction an the earliest stages, when nothing is proven?
2700 Melissa ventures the opinion that, even thought conviction is great, it is very useful to remain flexible and to not confuse conviction with arrogance.
2800 Audience Question: If you’re building a marketplace company, is it best to build out the supply or demand side first? Melissa recommends focusing on the supply side, and that you can accelerate this process by offering the supply side something they need (other than custom).
3045 Audience Question: What should you look for in investment term sheets? Mohammed comes in on this question, recommending that it is better to have no investors, rather than to have a bad investor.
3215 Final Audience Question to the Drs: What made you feel like it was the right time top step back from your medical career in favour of entrepreneurship?
