Navigating Venture Capital and Healthcare

Megan [: 00:00:00

What is being a finance chat? Is it crunching Excel numbers all day? Is it, you know, sailing off the coast of Ibiza? Like, what is a finance bro? I think oftentimes that goes back to sort of my answer with 1 b, which is, like, why is there so much ambiguity in this industry, and why are we not just plainly and simply telling people what we do for a living?

James [: 00:00:31

Welcome to the Business Blind Spot's podcast, where we talk to industry experts, entrepreneurs, and professionals, learn about their journey and mistakes they've made along the way. So maybe you won't have to make them either. You can find us on Spotify, Apple, and anywhere you wanna listen to your podcast, including YouTube. Like, subscribe, leave us a review. 1 star, 5 stars. Just leave something. We'd appreciate it. Today's guest is Megan Linder.

James [: 00:00:58

She focuses on growth within the health tech sector for venture capital based organizations.

Megan [: 00:01:04

Hi. So many buzzwords. I love it. We're off to a good good start, especially in VC.

James [: 00:01:09

I have 17 more buzzwords that I'd like to fit into this podcast.

Megan [: 00:01:13

So Yeah. Can we post edit add, like, a ding or something every time we say a buzzword? Count. Calculate. Yeah.

James [: 00:01:19

Corner of it.

Megan [: 00:01:19

Count it. I think that'd be great for the audience.

James [: 00:01:21

I think we can do that.

Megan [: 00:01:22

Yeah. Post edit. Yeah. We've got this. K. Yeah. Thank you for having me, by the way.

James [: 00:01:26

It's

Megan [: 00:01:27

exciting. That's a hefty intro to have to sort of woman up to is, you know, being a subject matter expert and expert in my field. So see if we can do it. Can we measure up?

James [: 00:01:39

I think you can handle it. So what's going on?

Megan [: 00:01:43

In life, love, personal, professional, all the things.

James [: 00:01:47

Well, let's just focus on venture capital.

Megan [: 00:01:49

Yeah. Let's focus on venture capital. So it's a great question. I think what's going on in venture capital and health care specifically right now is a really interesting market. It's an interesting landscape and market. I think something that doesn't get enough airtime when you talk about the intersection of venture capital and health tech, health care, all of the buzzwords, is this dichotomy between the industries. So you have venture capital, which we can step back and look at it from a macro lens after this comment, but you have venture capital that within the finance industry and sector is very low regulation. They do have some SEC parameters and regulations and rules that they abide by to protect integrity, but it's low.

Megan [: 00:02:40

When you talk about regulations, it's slow. And then you

James [: 00:02:43

go cooperatively?

Megan [: 00:02:44

Yeah. Write that word down. And then you go to health care, which is one of the most regulated and compliance dense industries within America. So it's always really funny that they come to this intersection, and I find it almost comical when you get venture capitalists and healthcare executives in a room, because venture capital is very, you know, fail fast, fail forward, and pivot, and we can make product updates on a dime, and we love tech, and then you have health care. It's like people's lives are at stake here. Let's move slow and do pilots and be regulated and concise with our decisions. So I think something that

James [: 00:03:24

Sounds like oil and water.

Megan [: 00:03:25

Yeah. Oil and water. And so it's, like, either gonna make the most perfect balsamic vinaigrette or it's gonna come crashing down. So it takes a lot of people management and culture management to fuse these industries, and I don't think it gets enough airtime how well it's been done in today's market and sort of the, culture and institutional knowledge that it takes to really blend these. So

James [: 00:03:49

Can we rewind?

Megan [: 00:03:50

Yeah.

James [: 00:03:51

So for the layman, the layperson, because it's 2024 Yes. Give a give a 30,000 foot view of VC, Venture Capital.

Megan [: 00:04:02

Yeah. 30,000 scope view. On paper, the definition of what is venture capital is that it's a dilutive form of funding. So what that means is that if you accept liquid capital, or debt money, as the kids are calling it these days, from a VC organization, you're gonna give up an ownership stake in your organization. So you are essentially cutting off slices of the pie to receive these large, influxes of money, capital, networking, all of these things. So that's what it looks like on paper. That is the definition on paper. Reality looks a little bit different, and there's an entire ecosystem behind that, so I think one of the most common misconceptions about venture capital is is that it's just a place you go to get money, When in reality, start up owners and entrepreneurs are going to VCs, they're going to venture capitalists because they want the incubator.

Megan [: 00:05:03

They want those concrete pillars to help stand up their organizations, and they want to learn from the best and brightest minds within their field, and the quickest way to do that is to go to a venture capital firm, and ask not only for equity, not only for money, but for help getting started in your industry because your network is everything, so why not go to the best? And, historically, venture capitalists have the best networks.

James [: 00:05:29

Mhmm. Network's your net worth.

Megan [: 00:05:31

Yeah. I'm I'm biased, though, so I'm sure other people will have, you know, different views on where to go to get the best network. But I think VC is a great way to start.

James [: 00:05:41

Okay.

Megan [: 00:05:43

I was gonna make a TCU joke, but then I reeled it back. No.

James [: 00:05:46

Go ahead. Lay it on me.

Megan [: 00:05:48

No. No. No. No.

James [: 00:05:48

Go frogs.

Megan [: 00:05:49

No. Go frogs. Yeah. You could just join the cult of TCU and probably have a great way in.

James [: 00:05:55

I'm probably holding off. You know? I bleed purple, I think.

Megan [: 00:05:59

You do?

James [: 00:06:00

This aide goes. Mhmm. So how does one approach a VC firm? Mhmm. Is it a pitch deck centric? Are you selling yourself any idea? Do you need Yeah. An existing company that you're just trying to get a series a funding for? What do you what's that look like?

Megan [: 00:06:19

I think that's gonna look different for everybody, and within every industry and sector is gonna have a different approach. Right? So, sometimes entrepreneurs reach out to VCs. They send them their financials. They send them a business review deck of some you know you know, deal sourcers might come to you, and they might see the attention that you're drawing either on your own, or through a friend of a friend of a friend type of network. There's tremendous, like, websites and organizations that you can join as an entrepreneur to sort of evangelize your organization, your product. If you don't have any revenue yet, you can you can still talk about how you would get that first dollar. So I think it's gonna be different for everyone. I think if we want to get really niche and talk about the health care sector, I think you need to be really tailored and targeted about the type of fund and the type of financing and networking that you're looking for.

Megan [: 00:07:26

And I don't know if you wanna double tap into there or if shaking your head, yes. Okay. Great. Yeah. So I think, for instance, if you were a health tech entrepreneur or someone who had a really great idea about an EHR or an update that you wanted to make to an existing tech stack within the health and hospital systems unit, you would really need to look for what I would do if I was you is I would look for a leading health system in your area and see if they have a Ventures arm already. What we're seeing in the market, a great example of this is Moderna. So even though it's not a health tech example, what Moderna is is kind of an encapsulation of the ideology that biopharma, labs, that sort of industry sector within healthcare has sort of abdicated their r and d budgets and really outsourced that to venture arms. And then once that proof of concept comes to life, they will just M and A or acquire that organization that they I love that.

Megan [: 00:08:31

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So it's a great ideology, and that's what happened with Moderna. And now it's a household name, and not many people know that Moderna was a VC backed organization before they were the COVID vaccine people. So I would take that ideology and apply it to your area and your market and look first at leading health systems in your area to see if they have a Ventures arm currently, because they are outsourcing and trying that same ideology as if If you were just a generalist in the tech sphere, I would really narrow it down to people who have portfolio companies that look like you that are successful. Right? You wanna see that they have a proven track record. You are giving up part of your ownership to these people.

James [: 00:09:31

Your baby.

Megan [: 00:09:32

Your baby. Right? And I, like, VC is very sexy nowadays, and it's clicky, and it's trendy, but at the end of the day, yeah, you're you don't have a loan. You're not paying these people back. You're giving them part of your baby, and your product, and your ownership. So I would say be selective, because I think it's a common misconception and narrative that there's not enough money out there to go around.

James [: 00:09:58

There's plenty to do.

Megan [: 00:09:59

There's so especially right now, there's so

James [: 00:10:02

So when you say be selective so if I have a start up Mhmm. And I I want a personal VC or I'm being approached by VC, what are some maybe red flags that I should look for that might tell me that that's not in my best interest to work with that partner?

Megan [: 00:10:18

So I would say if you're a health care entrepreneur Health

James [: 00:10:21

care yeah. From health care Yeah.

Megan [: 00:10:23

Perspective. If they don't have a former clinician or someone on staff that can be a clinical guiding point, I I wouldn't go there. I would look for firms that have a track record with health care organizations, and especially especially if they have a clinician on staff, It's not uncommon in today's market for people to transition to venture capital from health care. It's very common. Look for those people. If you can find common ground with someone who's been in the trenches and knows these problem statements, go there. Someone who specializes in consumer tech, you know, c to c, not b to b, they're not gonna be as helpful for you as someone who has experience in

James [: 00:11:13

Stop using all the buzzwords of c to c and b to b.

Megan [: 00:11:16

Yeah. I thought we were dinging. Do we do we have a counter running? Ding ding. Okay. Ding ding.

James [: 00:11:25

I really so what else? A clinician on staff, experience within that space. Mhmm. Do you wanna experience or do you what's more important, actually? So would you say experience or would you say because experience can be like skins on the wall. It doesn't necessarily have to be a win. Yeah. So experience or a win?

Megan [: 00:11:46

I think that's gonna be deeply personal, and I know I keep saying that, but, again, this is a relationship, and always, as an entrepreneur, kind of trust your gut. Right? Like, you're gonna sit here and take advice from me when, you know, I have a bias and a positive bias towards health care and and the VC network, so use your gut. That's deeply personal. I would advise from someone who's seen it multiple times that people try and go into health care and health tech and venture backed health care without clinical experience. It's very difficult to gain stickiness in the market because health care and hospital executives don't trust people unless they know what happens on the ground within health systems. So if you want to build trust, the fastest way to do that is to have somebody who's experienced it firsthand. Mhmm. Right? You probably if I tried to give you military experience advice because my great uncle twice removed was in the military, and I think I know it all, what you would tell me to go pound sand, most likely.

Megan [: 00:12:57

Yeah. You wouldn't take my advice seriously, but it would also be really difficult for me to build trust with you. So, that's gonna be deeply personal for every start up and entrepreneur out there who wants to break into this field or who wants to impact change. Most of the time, though, I will say most people who start up in VC backed health care come from health care. This usually isn't the field where you've never had any health care experience, you've never worked for a payer or a provider in some capacity, like, you've had previous skin in the game and you know the pain points. So this industry is a little bit more niched out than, say, general tech or, you know, Fintech or something like that where you have a really great idea and you're like, I can make I can make this happen. I this is my post it note moment. Right? This is my get rich scoop.

Megan [: 00:13:49

Most people who are in this field have previous health care experience. It would be difficult, in my opinion, to know where to be a disruptor.

James [: 00:13:59

Yeah. Where's the gap at? You can't

Megan [: 00:14:01

Yeah. If you haven't been in the trenches. So that that's why I think it is a little bit different advice for health tech versus just generalized venture capital or if you're just a founder or an entrepreneur in general.

James [: 00:14:13

So what attracted you to the health care VC space?

Megan [: 00:14:18

What attracted me can I give a 2 part answer? Can you hold me accountable for parts 1 and part 2? Okay. So part 1, my genesis story here was that I fell into health care sort of by accident, but I came armed with a unique set and a unique toolkit. What I mean by that is I actually thought I would change the world through art when I was young. It doesn't pay. I don't know if anyone's if anyone's, like, right wing parents have told them that it's a waste to get a liberal arts degree, but let me tell you, it is a waste to get a liberal arts degree. I thought I would save the world through art, and I ended up figuring out that you can save the world through health care a lot faster, and make patient impact, but I fell into this industry from a business development perspective working with, some healthcare players. What I didn't realize going into it was that I had a personal experience. My father has passed away.

Megan [: 00:15:19

He is called my big daddy. Let me clarify that he's not my pimp for anyone listening and who doesn't know my personal story. He was my big daddy, and he passed away with congestive heart failure and chronic kidney disease, when I was 20 20 years old. And so I came into health care already knowing a lot of the patient pain points that my organization was trying to solve for. So it was You

James [: 00:15:48

lived it.

Megan [: 00:15:49

I lived it, and I went through it. And although I'm not a physician and I don't have clinical experience, a lot of the problems that VC and health tech solves for is mostly patient experience, coordination of care, interconnectability within health care, pain points within the journey and the ecosystem, not necessarily the practice of clinical medicine. We have a great set of academia that excels in that in this country. We don't have a problem practicing good medicine. We have a problem getting it into the hands of the people when they need it.

James [: 00:16:27

So you're you're trying to translate your lived experience into your VC firm that you're attached to?

Megan [: 00:16:35

Yeah. Every day. Every day, I think of Big Daddy and the pain points and the problems that me and my mom went through with that journey. I actually feel really blessed because he had a great team of providers. Mhmm. But that's how I fell into health care, and when I got into it, it was really natural for me to be the person on the wall saying, oh, wait. This this works in the bubble, but this won't work outside the bubble. Like, I've seen this in real life.

Megan [: 00:17:04

I think you guys need to go back to the drawing board a little bit.

James [: 00:17:07

Can can you give me one example of that?

Megan [: 00:17:10

Well, I'm trying to call it an example without being biased. Okay. So a really common example that I saw in my experience with Big Daddy or with, his patient journey is that he had a large team of doctors, and it was always like they never spoke to each other. In fact, the only communication that we got cross specialty wise was usually from a home health aide nurse who would come and say, well, I I see these, this medication plan, but I'm gonna tell you right now, if you do this, it's gonna kill his kidneys, and then if you do that, it's gonna kill his heart. So I remember very vividly, a nurse telling me, what would you rather him die from? Do you want him to die from the CHF, or do you want him to die from the CKD? Is there a c is there an option where he doesn't, or what is the easiest way to pass? And so, it became very apparent to me that we have a problem within this network, and and it's a known problem now and heightened of, you know, just interoperability and how to streamline the patient journey and then simplify it. Right? So I shouldn't be hearing from a nurse that my dad is gonna die either by kidney failure or heart failure.

James [: 00:18:31

Mhmm.

Megan [: 00:18:31

Pick 1. Right? Like, there should be a team

James [: 00:18:34

of That's horrible.

Megan [: 00:18:35

Yeah. A team of people who can easily collaborate on his treatment plan to choose the best treatment for him, Even though we always knew it would sort of end in passing, there's no reverse button here on these diseases, but when you get to chronic condition management and these really high acuity patients, it's very easy to see the gaps in care because everyone is talking around the patient. No one is talking to the patient. They have very little time for that, and so that's a problem that is being solved by several tech solutions. Several value based care organizations have recognized that, so it's being worked on and advocated for for the average American, but at the same time, I've lived it first hand. So that was a a real pain point that I was able to highlight at my first organization and understanding the severity of these decisions.

James [: 00:19:35

Was that part 1 of your answer?

Megan [: 00:19:37

Yeah. Part 1 of my answer, and then part 2 of my answer, if I wanna be a real person on this podcast, which I was given permission by production to do, yeah, they allowed me. So if I wanna be a real person, this is this is sort of a rant of mine, is that for some reason, venture capital is one of these industries where people never really tell you the true story of how they got in there, how why they're in venture capital. Right? And so you get a lot of personal passion projects like what I just mentioned. But for some reason, we're so scared to say simple things like venture capital is really bleeping cool, and I wanna be involved in this. Like, why are we so hesitant to just say simple things? Like, I love finance. I don't think that it's derogatory or negative to make a profit and generate revenue. Why can we not just say venture capital is

James [: 00:20:40

That's the whole point.

Megan [: 00:20:41

Yeah. Venture capital is really cool, and it's fast paced, and it's exciting, and it's this beautiful blend of business and finance and product and all of these industries that maybe don't get spotlighted. Like, when when you're a little kid and you see a fireman, you're like, firemen are really cool. I wanna be a fireman when I grow up. Mhmm. But for some reason, in venture capital, is but I think we just need to be honest, and I think honesty gets you further in life, and it's actually totally fine to say, why do you wanna be in venture capital, Megan? It's really cool. I wanna be a part of something that's innovative and drives disruption in a market. Like, I was an anarchist when I was a teenager.

Megan [: 00:21:30

You mean to tell me that in corporate America, I can be an anarchist and everyone wins? Why can't we just say that? So cool.

James [: 00:21:37

Disruption, if it's done appropriately, is so much fun.

Megan [: 00:21:41

So much fun.

James [: 00:21:41

I mean, you look at, you know, I just recently watched the, I forget the name of the show, but the WeWork show on HBO. And it's absolutely awesome what that guy did through just a a just a force of nature and personality. I know it's not exactly the same thing.

Megan [: 00:21:57

Fix it to say, like, should we use WeWork?

James [: 00:22:00

But, yeah, on on the way up, it was awesome. Yeah. Well Like, he was actually disrupting a market. But so let me ask you a question. Mhmm. Are can you be considered a finance bro?

Megan [: 00:22:13

Can I be considered a finance bro? Probably not. I'm trying to be I'm trying to be professional in my answer, but I could be maybe a finance chatty or a finance baddie, but I think even those that term in that vernacular, like, what does a finance Chad do? What is being a finance Chad? Is it crunching Excel numbers all day? Is it, you know, sailing off the coast of Ibiza? Like, what is a finance bro? I think oftentimes that goes back to sort of my answer with 1 b, which is, like, why is there so much ambiguity in this industry, and why are we not just plainly and simply telling people what we do for a living?

James [: 00:23:02

Well, I mean, I love my favorite thing about venture capital is the whole point is to disrupt an industry, make it a little bit better, and also make money at the same time Mhmm. Versus other types of equity, right, or other types of capital, groups, and their job is to acquire, build some bolt ons, build the build the top line, build the bottom line, and then exit after you've taken the growth out of the company. Right? So I think there's a little bit of nobility in venture capital if it's not appropriate and for the right reasons.

Megan [: 00:23:36

Yeah. I say that all the time. So when I first entered this industry as a baby, and I would say I'm still, you know, definitely an infant or a toddler, but, when I was a baby in this industry, I was so enamored with this romantic idea of venture capital. I used to say all the time, it is, sort of an arm of the American dream. Right? It's sort of this thesis that no matter where you come from, who you are, if you have generational wealth or not, you can access these really large amounts of capital based on an idea.

James [: 00:24:10

A good idea.

Megan [: 00:24:11

A good idea. We'll use asterisk around good since everyone has a different, kinda iteration of what that is. But if you have a good idea and you have promise and you do the work, you can get in front of a VC and receive the funding that you need for your dream, which is the American dream. Mhmm. I've been kicked out of some rooms because I always say I truly believe Alexander Hamilton would have been a venture capitalist if he was alive today, but I say this all the time. I think it is the American dream. And, yeah, there's a whole culture element that we can talk about. I'm not gonna disregard some people's feelings that venture capital is a bit difficult to break into.

Megan [: 00:24:54

There are some accessibility issues, for sure. There's some diversity issues within the industry and the orgs as a whole. But on paper, right, on paper, this is a way to get the American dream, and I think it's really beautiful and romantic and all the things. I think if you ask me deeper why I like working in venture capital or for venture capital backed organizations, especially within health care, is that they want to help people, and they need a vessel to do that. And in today's world, in 2024, capital is the way to do that. And it's just great. I think there's so much negative. Like, let's let's maybe tackle that, but also focus on the positive and the why behind why we're here.

James [: 00:25:45

So I was gonna we didn't plan that, but you just teed me up for my next question. And I think that anyone who's been paying attention over the last 10 years, especially the last, like, 5 years, can comfortably say that there's some serious problems with health care in the US. Yeah. So do it really seems like the lens of VC is really lasering in on health care, health

Megan [: 00:26:12

tech,

James [: 00:26:14

which is amazing because they are it's inevitable they're gonna make a difference. Right?

Megan [: 00:26:19

Yeah. You can.

James [: 00:26:20

Rise to the top of of good ideas. So what sort of things or trends are you seeing in BC that get you excited Mhmm. About the difference? And if you've you can be as vague as you need to be because I I don't wanna have to sign an NDA after this. But

Megan [: 00:26:35

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Disclaimer. All of these opinions are my own. Don't take financial advice from me and sue me. Okay? Don't come for my job. I have 2 very cute kiddos at home to feed and, keep clothes on them.

Megan [: 00:26:49

So what excites me about the intersection of venture capital and health care innovation is that I don't think you can have health care innovation without VC in today's current climate. So what I mean by that is that, again, we talked about this earlier in the episode that health care as a whole is very risk averse. Venture capital is very much in favor of risk. They will make riskier decisions, and they will take on that risk, with enjoyment and a smile on their face versus health care. And I think, people usually come to the table and have conversations with me about health care, and one of the most common pushbacks that they give is sort of the regulatory lens. They sort of see regulation and compliance as a hindrance to start ups in health care, and that couldn't be further from the truth. Government and oversight organizations, such as CMS and the CMS Center For Innovation are the ones pushing forward financial incentives for health care organizations to change and to innovate and to grow and to solve complex problems because they are aware they can't do it on their own.

James [: 00:28:03

What's CMS?

Megan [: 00:28:04

Center for Medicare, Medicaid. It's the governing body for, Medicaid plans and Medicare plans. So CMS is doing really great work with incentivizing innovation within health systems, so you can't have innovation without financial incentive. People don't usually innovate innovate because they're bored. Yeah. They're not bored and sitting around at a desk. They wanna be financially incentivized to do so. So regulation within CMS or different other governing bodies within America are the ones actually pushing for this.

James [: 00:28:41

Mhmm.

Megan [: 00:28:41

And the fastest and easiest way to get that to a market is venture capital. You could say that for angel investing too, but I'm not an angel investor subject matter expert, so leave that for the next panel or the next person. But that's the quickest way, I think, in today's economic climate to get something to a market.

James [: 00:29:01

So you're excited about the innovation speed?

Megan [: 00:29:04

Yeah. I'm excited about speed to innovation. I'm excited about care models, and care model innovation. So CMS is doing a ton of work. I encourage all the listeners to go Google the 21st Century CARES Act. They're doing a ton of work with care model innovation and how do we take sort of the value based care idea and apply it not only to Medicaid, Medicare, but then privatized insurance payers as well. So you're really seeing a spotlight on value within health care unlike any other time, I think, within health care's history. So it's no longer fee for service or just pay as you go.

Megan [: 00:29:49

Each procedure gets paid, you know, x y z dollars. What you're seeing is how do we create true value within the patient's journey and kind of hold financial accountability and clinical accountability hand in hand. And so I think another point that I wanna get across is that you don't have to demonize anymore the words patient and profitability in the same sentence. It's no longer more, more, more, more, more, more, more within care and care models as it is, how do we create quality and reduce the total cost of care for a patient in their journey? Right? So I think once you start targeting the whole, the individual increments and the costs associated with that shouldn't be sort of highlighted or demonized as much as it is, you know, in the news or with the average American's kind of bias towards health care entities. A lot of people have failed trust within the health care organization, within their health care orgs. We can see that. We know why. I'm not going to sit here and tell you that it should be any different.

Megan [: 00:31:01

I am going to tell you that things are changing and change is coming. And because of venture capital and because they have such high business acumen and drive towards business principles, they have infused that within health care, and you're seeing everybody win now. Patients are getting better care. Health systems and payers are are finally, you know, making a profit like they want. It's been a really, really, really rough year for 2020, 2021, 2022, and 2023 for hospitals. Mhmm. A little known fact that that Americans probably don't spend their time idolizing or mewling over is that hospitals have been really operating in the negative until about q one of this year. So

James [: 00:31:52

Wow.

Megan [: 00:31:52

Yeah. For so for 3 years since COVID, they've been really struggling.

James [: 00:31:56

Mhmm.

Megan [: 00:31:57

And that's that's why you've seen them

James [: 00:31:59

Do you think it was because of all the nurses doing TikTok dances?

Megan [: 00:32:02

I think it could have been that. I think it could have been that. It could have been the TikTok dances. It also could have been, you know, the pandemic. So Okay. You know?

James [: 00:32:11

So I was totally off

Megan [: 00:32:12

base in my head. Been the, like, apocalypse MVP that we went through. Yeah.

James [: 00:32:17

Indeed. That's why I'm not in health care in the venture capital space because I, you know, totally missed totally off base on that one.

Megan [: 00:32:25

Yeah. Because you like the TikTok dances? No. No? Okay.

James [: 00:32:28

The exact opposite.

Megan [: 00:32:29

Yeah.

James [: 00:32:29

But

Megan [: 00:32:30

And and also, you know, health care's 20% of the GDP in this country. Mhmm. So it's not a small fish. So it's natural for venture capitalists to want to be in that space. Right? They know that there is the capability to

James [: 00:32:47

That's a huge piece of it.

Megan [: 00:32:49

Huge piece of the pie, and I'm not an economist, but but being in it every single day, I I feel like it's higher than 20%, but someone who maybe specializes in that get back to me. But like,

James [: 00:33:02

there's gotta be so much, like, extemporaneous, associations of of the space in and of itself. Right? So you've got tech. You've got all logistics, transportations, all all the associated just probably the food industry alone of the companies that work with hospitals has gotta be monumental. I would love to see some numbers on that.

Megan [: 00:33:22

Oh, I love those. We have so many coming up in the in the start up space about people who are trying to tailor and target that problem of food accessibility. Mhmm. They've recognized, right, because of value based care, because of all these buzzwords and booms in the system of, hey, We're not gonna look at the patient as just their points in the journey. We're gonna look at them as a whole person because we wanna lower total cost of care. Social determinants of health is a huge factor in that, and and people are seeing that. Clinicians are seeing that, and they're branching off and starting up organizations that help tailor the issues they saw in the practice and in the clinics. Right? All of my patients who are on Medicare, I can't get them healthy because no matter how much I pump into them, if they don't have a good diet, if they don't have good transportation, they still can't I can't get them where they need to be in their health care journey.

Megan [: 00:34:19

It's not just clinical practice of medicine. It's whole person care.

James [: 00:34:24

Mhmm.

Megan [: 00:34:24

And so whole person care is becoming kind of the norm and where we wanna go within health care. And so food accessibility is a great, great

James [: 00:34:33

thinking, like, for example, say hospital food. So for Oh. Like like, 50 years, it's been a running joke that hospital food is disgusting. Yeah. Brown gravy on everything. Right. Yeah. Like, I'm sure you have some personal anecdotes about that based on your lived experience.

James [: 00:34:49

But that's one of the cool things from someone on the outside of VC is there's a huge space for that. Every everyone is so health conscious these days, especially when it comes to diet. That if you come up with a good market plan to disrupt that, VC will probably jump all over it.

Megan [: 00:35:08

Yeah. But, again, just to go back to to one of the original points that I made, like, make sure that you're consulting with someone who has those great acronyms behind their names. Right? Make sure that that you're really that you have someone on staff or that you are or that you have in your network a really acclaimed panel of clinicians to call upon.

James [: 00:35:29

So outside of, to circle back Yeah. My favorite buzz phrase, catchphrase.

Megan [: 00:35:36

Ding.

James [: 00:35:37

How's this number 19. Outside of clinician experience on staff, what are you seeing VC do to kind of overcome the industry standard and the expectations, like the oil and water stuff we were talking about?

Megan [: 00:35:59

Yeah. Double click on that question for me. Let's get it a little bit more granular, and then maybe we can get in the trenches.

James [: 00:36:05

Double click is another buzzword, Granular trenches. Yeah. We're if we hit I wanna hit 50 for this one.

Megan [: 00:36:11

Okay. We're gonna get

James [: 00:36:12

you there. So you get it's it's like marines and air force working together. Right? 2 totally 2 different cultures. So is there a certain type of person within VC that meshes well within the health tech space, health care space that pursues that? Is that a bad question? Do we need to edit that out?

Megan [: 00:36:34

Like No. It's a it's a great question. I think it's it's a great question. I think what we're seeing is that historically, we might have gotten it wrong. What I mean by that is that I think you're seeing a surge of clinicians leaving health systems or health care executives leaving their traditional fields and flocking to firms and becoming general partners because of what you just asked me, because they've been in the room and they've said, wait a minute. Everyone's making decisions about patients' lives, and they've never seen a patient a day in their life. So the type of personalities that really mesh well in this intersection are ones who have experience in both of the lanes and or are hungry enough to learn and educate themselves on how health care really works and get micro and get in the weeds, get in the trenches, work in clinical operations, see what these people are going through day in and day out, and know their struggles, because the number one struggle between venture capitalists and health care is implementation. And they do not understand or they they go into it a little bit naively of how we can implement within a leading health system or within a payer field.

Megan [: 00:37:58

Sometimes it takes upwards of 12 to 18 months to fully implement a tech solution at a leading health system. When you talk about velocity, that's pretty slow. So if you don't know that going into it, if you have some sort of preconceived misnomers about tech in general and you've seen it be implemented in another industry in 3 months, you're you're gonna come into it with some misguided illusions on how things work within the health care ecosystem. So I would say get get really granular and spend some time within the operations department, which is I don't I don't know since I'm not a subject matter on other industries, but I don't think that's common standard of practice within other orgs or other industries.

James [: 00:38:41

Sounds like a lot of the disruption that VC is championing is is around, like, the bureaucracy of the health care space. Would you agree with that?

Megan [: 00:38:50

I would I would agree with that. I think it's gonna be hard to fully to fully infiltrate bureaucracy of the health care system as a whole. But I think if you look at some stats and numbers about culture, who are health care executives? So these are individuals who have been in this space a long time. They're not leaving. They won't retire. God bless them. We love them for it. They are not willing to change as much as venture capitalists are willing to change.

Megan [: 00:39:23

So that's why I would also recommend if you have a health tech product or a health care product that you have a marketing team and a sales team that is really highly in tune with how to sell into health care. Because selling into health care is not like any other industry out there.

James [: 00:39:43

Mhmm.

Megan [: 00:39:43

It's dense. Your deal velocity is very slow. It's gonna be really slow. You're playing the long game. You're playing the gain trust game, and more than that, you're playing the can you just get in front of anybody game because that's gonna be the most difficult part, I think, of the whole thing, which leads me back to why a lot of people use VC funds and firms to sell into health care because they have a vast network of advisors who can get them in front of the people they need to get in front of. Because just cold calling or cold emailing a CFO of a health system is gonna be probably a waste of your time.

James [: 00:40:24

Yeah. Cold cold calls are dead across the industry, period.

Megan [: 00:40:27

But especially within health care, because these people are so gated and guarded, that I I would say definitely hire a growth product marketer or a marketing team, a sales team that really has worked in health care before and knows the ins and outs because selling into health care is really, really difficult. But but then, you know, to kinda wrap it up, I think why you're seeing venture capital interest within health care and health tech is that if you look across the board at Fortune 500, even all the way to Fortune 1,000 organizations, if you're a CEO of any of those orgs, you're technically a health care CEO. Because at the end of the day, for example, Starbucks spends more money on health insurance benefits and health related benefits on their employees than they do on coffee beans. That's a heavy stat. Right?

James [: 00:41:23

Mhmm.

Megan [: 00:41:24

So if you're a CEO of one of those organizations, you're basically health care CEO, especially with, like, direct to employer plans and how people pay for insurance benefits and employee benefits within this country. So I think that's another reason that would excite me if I wanted to get into venture capital or if I was someone who worked in employee benefits. Look at Teladoc as an example as well. Mhmm. Teladoc is a great example. They started out in employee benefits sort of as a, hey. You know, we're gonna come in. We're gonna offer this service in tandem with the insurance benefits that you're already providing for your employees, and then it took off like wildfire.

Megan [: 00:42:07

And now they've just merged and acquired and are this giant beast and a catalyst to all digital health initiatives and change in the industry. But it was because they recognized that a large part of the market is consumers and patients. But, you know, I don't have exact numbers, but a good gut estimate is that another equal side of this business are the CEOs paying for people's health insurance

James [: 00:42:35

Mhmm.

Megan [: 00:42:35

And insuring people in this country.

James [: 00:42:37

So the name of the podcast is Business Blind Spots, and it's so people can listen to my guests who've gotten a lot of experience in their field and possibly made some mistakes and errors along the way and maybe to learn from those mistakes and errors. And we got down the rabbit hole of venture tech pretty quick, which which I love, and we could probably talk 3 hours about it. So is there a takeaway that you'd like someone listening to this podcast to take from it to maybe not make any missteps that you've made along the way. And if you just had a perfect career, you could say that too.

Megan [: 00:43:12

Yeah. I've had the opposite of a perfect career. So I definitely, would say do as I say and not as I do. Right? And I would offer that caveat for any life advice too, but, ways to avoid blind spots, I think, in this particular industry is to not get caught up in the shine and the glamour of venture capital as a whole, because it is a trendy topic and celebrities are, are kind of making it in this field as well. Don't focus on being a shiny penny. The best advice someone ever gave to me, when entering this field is decide right now, do you wanna be a generalist, or do you wanna be a specialist? And move forward with that momentum. And so

James [: 00:43:58

That's great advice.

Megan [: 00:43:59

It's it's great advice because it's so personal to everyone. And if you want to be a generalist, venture capital is a great field. If you wanna be a specialist, venture capital is a great field. But you really have to earn your stripes in whatever lane that you pick for that. So if we wanna really tailor that down, like, pick your skill strengths and the set of skills that you feel confident in, and become an expert in that. It could be a set of hard or soft skills, but become an expert, and then be willing to put in sweat equity. So you may not get paid for a lot of the work that you do in venture capital when you're first starting out. If you do, great.

Megan [: 00:44:42

You probably come from a long line of legacy of venture capitalists, and I love those people just as much as I do the people who kind of scrappily made their way in. But, you know, really get in and be okay with doing sweat equity and maybe working for free, maybe working with entrepreneurs and just doing pretty slide decks, which is how I broke into the the industry. Right? Like, I was the deck master, and I could make these really pretty slide decks probably coming from an art background. Use that to your advantage and then learn and absorb as you go through that. So if your lane is making decks, read all the notes, ask all the questions, gain that business acumen, and use it to your advantage. And hit up the school of Google if you need to hit that up, but decide what you want as a person and as a professional and just move heavy with that.

James [: 00:45:38

Awesome. That's a lot of good advice crammed into a very small amount of time. Okay. So what's next?

Megan [: 00:45:46

What's next for me as a person and as a professional?

James [: 00:45:50

Mhmm.

Megan [: 00:45:50

Yeah. I got a meeting coming up I gotta bounce to, and then, yeah, you can find me on LinkedIn if you have any questions about health tech or you just want to talk about health care. Value based care is one of my favorite topics. Come talk to me about that. You can come talk to me about, Jesus if you want. I am 10 toes down for that. You can come come maybe, grab a cup of coffee with me and talk about that. But what's next for me as a person is that, you know, I'm going back to school and and starting there and getting an MBA just so that I can put it in my email signature and have that acronym.

Megan [: 00:46:27

So I'm very excited for that and just continuing to move up and, really improve patient outcomes within my field. I I feel strongly like it's a win win for everybody.

James [: 00:46:37

Awesome. For more information on Megan Lindner, check out the show notes. Look her up on LinkedIn. Go to Spotify. Go to Apple. Go to Itunes. Click on subscribe, like, check us out on YouTube. We're available all the cool places.

James [: 00:46:53

Thank you so much for coming on.