The Tech Disrupting the NHS Workforce Crisis Discover how Patchwork Health is empowering NHS teams and transforming the future of healthcare
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Dr. Anas Nader, co-founder and CEO of Londonbased healthcare technology company Patchwork Health, is on a mission to solve one of the most pressing issues in the National Health Service (NHS) – staffing shortages. In this Entrepreneur UK interview, Dr. Nader shares the inspiration behind creating Patchwork, how he navigated early challenges, and the lessons he's learned along the way, from embracing failure to building meaningful partnerships that drive long-term success.
What inspired you to start your business?
Many people presume that the NHS staff crisis began as a product of the pandemic. But the pressures facing healthcare staff have been mounting for much longer. When I joined the NHS as a doctor in 2014, I very quickly witnessed the scale of the problem. All around me, colleagues were being pushed to the brink of burnout, and many forced to leave their careers behind because of a combination of inflexible rotas, exhausting hours and a lack of control over their working lives. This was all ultimately being driven by outdated, manual and siloed workforce systems that make flexible and sustainable staffing impossible for NHS teams to achieve.
I decided to build a solution. Along with one of my colleagues, Dr Jing Ouyang, I set out to create new technology that would transform NHS staffing - empowering clinicians with access to truly flexible working that helps them remain in their roles, while supporting teams to adapt more dynamically to fluctuating patient demand and keep services safely and reliably staffed.
What was your biggest challenge and how did you overcome it?
Building a solution for an organisation as complex as the NHS is a unique challenge. There are infrequent commissioning cycles, long procurement processes, and a diverse set of stakeholders to contend with. Managing this as an early stage startup while sustainably growing the team and maintaining enough runway is complex.
One of the most crucial things we did was to start small and prioritise quality over quantity when it came to the partnerships we were trying to build. We focused on building strong relationships with a small number of initial NHS Trusts, rather than trying to partner with as many as we could at once. This enabled us to technology in a way that really worked for the NHS, while building genuine trust and generating results. When we later approached additional Trusts, we were able to demonstrate the success of our existing partnerships and gain buy-in faster. We're now working with over 50 NHS organisations, while maintaining those initial partnerships with the same level of collaboration, confidence and quality of service.
How did you secure your initial funding?
We secured our initial funding through angel investors and have since raised from a range of venture capitalist (VC) and investment firms.
Related: Increased NHS funding is not a blank cheque for success
How do you handle failure or setbacks?
Failure is a much bigger part of being an entrepreneur than I think we often acknowledge (or like to admit!) Certainly for me, embracing failure has been one of the biggest learning curves I've had to navigate since we founded Patchwork Health. When I started out as a first-time founder, I believed that failure was something to be avoided at all costs. But in reality, I've found that it is part and parcel of growth. Setbacks - big and small - are unavoidable when building a company. It's how we respond to these circumstances, and what we learn from them, that really counts. Whenever a setback arises or I feel that something has 'failed', I try my best to embrace it. I get curious about what we might be able to learn from it and opportunities it might present for us to adapt or change for the better.
What advice would you give to someone starting their own business?
Don't go it alone. Being a first-time founder can be like stepping off into the deep end. There is so much to learn and navigate. Having the right community and support around you as you enter this world is crucial.
The guidance that Jing and I have received from fellow founders, mentors and coaches over the past seven years has been central to our journey as entrepreneurs. From advice on navigating the complex process of fundraising as we were preparing to pitch to investors for the first time, to the executive coaching I received to support me in my transition from start-up to scale-up CEO; learning from others in the community has made us better leaders and entrepreneurs. Don't be afraid to reach out for help and advice, building your own network of fellow founders and experts is key to supporting your professional growth. And you'll find yourself giving back to other first-time founders along the way, too!
How do you stay motivated during tough times?
Remembering the why. We regularly speak to our colleagues on the healthcare frontline to understand the evolving challenges they are facing and how the pressures are impacting their working lives. It helps us to ensure our solution is genuinely serving their needs. And it also reaffirms our motivation for building that solution in the first place. It's all about building a better workplace that supports our incredible healthcare staff to thrive. Having this front and centre is what keeps us motivated to carry on.
Share your tips for achieving success
If I had to choose three top tips to share with my fellow entrepreneurs, they would be:
- Failure is your friend, embrace it - setbacks can seem disastrous and imposter syndrome will frequently rear its ugly head, but it is all part of the process. Remember that everyone fails and embrace the opportunity to learn something new or adapt your approach. You'll often find it leads to future success.
- Focus on partnership over profit - when you're first building your company, it can be easy to equate the number of new clients or opportunities you are gaining with relative success. But building a smaller number of strong, collaborative partnerships can ultimately be so much more profitable than spreading your team too thin and trying to serve too many people at once. Start small and you're much more likely to reap the rewards long-term.
- Beware of too much structure - as your team grows, a greater level of team structure and hierarchy becomes inevitable. But be careful not to introduce too rigid a structure that inhibits collaboration and creates unnecessary red tape. We've found that, wherever possible, creating a flatter team structure can help to maintain collaboration and keep innovation dynamic, both of which are key to keeping the business moving forward.
