Is success just a definition - applying IT and healthcare for innovation
I really liked this post on Inc.com, an interview with Esther Dyson on finding a purpose and what's next for entrepreneurship. It made me think about the underlying meaning of why we choose to participate and advocate for something.
Im not an entrepreneur - I have trouble remembering how to spell it, but I think the idea of it has taken on a life of it's own recently. Esther mentions (among other things) that the best entrepreneurs have a purpose, a goal to be achieved, and that the goal shouldn't just to be an 'entrepreneur'.
I have been involved with an Australian organisation that has taken personalised healthcare to new levels by leveraging the science of nutrigenetics and nutrigenomics and through that, have joined some colleagues in building a community of healthtech developers, entrepreneurs and VCs with a mandate to build an inspired and dynamic health tech innovation community that makes a difference. Having a background in design and IT and now marketing, I was initially attracted by the idea of participating in developing mobile health applications, health information technology and digital health systems and what the interfaces for these might be.
My knowledge of this space furthered when I attended Digital Healthcare Week in Singapore September past and learnt that in the AsiaPac region at least, there are vast amounts of money being spent in emerging healthcare technologies and leveraging the ease of wearables for collecting data that can be translated into something meaningful and useful at a grassroots level. Also worth mentioning that I attended with a colleague who is a medical herbalist - not the most likely candidate to attend a ehealth exhibition, but such is the convergence of knowledge today.
There is real purpose in applying IT for healthcare innovation and is something that can make a difference to the lives of others in a profound way.
So how will we measure success? In both instances, we're looking at the people who are interested in contributing to the knowledge-base, accepting their offers of time and resources to see how we can together eventually build this into applications that can one day become mainstream and offer better health outcomes to everyone.
I've been on the roller coaster ride that paves the way for start-up to early stage businesses and seen how success one day, is tempered by disappointment the next. But you don’t get off the ride, there's still the bigger picture and whilst success may just be a definition, it's still a goal.