LIVTOSHARE

✨This week’s prayer: Thank you universe for guiding me and bringing me to people, places and experiences that inspire me and remind me of what purposeful work means.

✨This week’s life update: I got to attend the inaugural HBS Women’s Health Summit in Boston this week and it was so inspiring. (My first time in Boston, and I absolutely loved it!) I’ll share my insights more in the dedicated section below. My dad ended up meeting me in Boston to spend the weekend here with me and I’m so frickin grateful. I’ve always wanted to go on a trip with my dad, just us. We have always been very close growing up and during this trip was the first time we really talked about the passing of my grandpa in January this year. I asked him what he learned from my grandpa, and his response was “How to be a good father”. He added “He has such a good heart”. He then started telling the story that when he was young they grew up in the famine in China, and my grandpa would sell his own blood to put food on the table first for his kids and eat anything left over. I obviously started bawling my eyes out. Knowing my grandpa, I’m not surprised at all by this, every time I went to china to see him, the first thing he would do would be to give me money, or when we called when I was here in Canada, he’d ask if I was ok and if needed him to mail me money. He always saved so much for the people around him and would never use it on his own. He was a simple man, but a happy one, always laughing and bringing everyone in his neighbourhood together. Him and my grandma took care of me when I was a baby, and I truly was always bundled with his love. I’ve been feeling his presence a lot lately. Growing up in an asian household, we don’t really ever talk about death. For example, I haven’t brought it up to my grandma yet since it happened… so this was a big step to talk about it with my dad and I feel like I get to keep his spirit alive when we talk about him. I’m tearing up as I write about this, but my grandpa truly was a source of unconditional love and my friends and people who know me and have said that “I am heart led, or have a good heart” I have my grandpa and grandma to thank. Love you grandpa. 

✨This week’s lesson: I had a call with a gentleman that has been in the Health Care innovation space for his whole career - 38 years. He was one of the first people hired on a pharma innovation team back when digital health wasn’t even a concept yet. I was yapping away by all the innovations and spaces I’m passionate about in the women’s health space (fertility… data gap… etc) and his advice was to just be open. The innovations are happening so fast, we don’t know what is going to exist in a few years. And like with everything in life, nothing is “perfect” so if something comes your way that isn’t exactly that you were thinking about, be open to it, it might not look like exactly what you envisioned, but be open to the fact that something better can present itself and don’t close yourself off to that. As a goal setting, vision building lover, that is something that I really needed the reminder of. I think it goes for many things in life, a partner, a job, an experience, a goal…  That we can set the vision, be as specific as we want, but the secret to manifesting, is also detaching from the outcome, and trusting that the universe has plans and even more for you as you continue to put in the work. Be open to what comes your way.

✨This week’s quote: “Nothing ever happens unless someone decides to do it anyways” Dr. Neel Shah - there will always be a million reasons for “why not”

✨This week’s audiobook: Unreasonable Hospitality by Will Guidara

✨This week’s song: Wild Dreams - Burna Boy ft Khalid

✨This weeks journal prompt: What is something I’ve been holding onto tightly, that I can learn to let go this season? What does it look like for me to trust that letting go will serve me? If I let go of this thing/person/situation, how would that feel in my body?

💜 HBS Inaugural Women’s Health Summit 💜 

We (Women) control 85% of spending decisions, 80% of healthcare decisions, and will control 60% of the wealth, yet we currently receive 2% of all VC funding. Wild? Yes.

My top takeaways:

• In startup land, you’ll hear the word ‘de-risking’ a lot. Especially when it comes to investors. Angelika Fretzen, COO of Wyss Institute stated something that resondated with me. She emphasized “How can we de-risk the investment where both startups and investors take on the risk?” Typically, it’s the startup that takes on all the risk, and investors hesitate to get involved because of how little we know about the space. Her advice for startups was to build expertise into their team. Bring on advisors, co-founders, team members that have the expertise you lack; this also helps build confidence to the investors and you can decide if the value exchanged is structured in terms of pay or equity.

• Dr Neel Shah, Chief Medical Officer, Maven Clinic, the largest virtual clinic for women and family health mentioned that his career path has been shaped by following people that he believed in. After the talk, I approached him and asked what those characteristics are. He admitted it was a hard question to answer, but responded first by emphasizing conviction. He then elaborated on how theres always a right thing to do, and an easy thing to do. “Pay attention to the people who do the right thing” he said. Something to think about…

• Vivian Ota Wang, deputy director, office of research on Women’s Health at the NIH added a grounding perspective to the conversation and reminded the crowd to put on the humanitarian lens in this as well. Investing in Women’s Health is simply the right thing to do.

• Lexi Henkel from Maverick Ventures made a statement on how often women’s health companies are compared to other women’s health companies when VC’s are evaluating. But that should not be the case. Rather, should be compared to healthcare startups/companies, agnostic of gender.

You can view the speaker list on their event page here.

The 🍒 on top! I got to learn, be inspired and explore with friends!! Grateful for 24 hours in Boston and attending the summit with Nadia & Harit, co-founders of Marlow (first ever lubricated tampon ft on Dragons Den!!)

🍒 WOMEN’S HEALTH NEWS THAT CAUGHT MY ATTENTION 🍒

• Hims and Hers appoints first Chief Medical Officer, Dr. Shepherd - emphasizing the company’s focus on Women’s HealthCare

• Oura expands women’s health features with fertile window tracking ft one of my favourite WH companies, Natural Cycles (non-hormonal birth control)

• AIMA launched OVY Relief Oral Capsules, created to help reduce inflammation throughout the body for period pains! (I personally haven’t tried yet but excited to try, as someone who suffers from horrible period pains)

⚡WHO’S HIRING?⚡

Learned about this amazing Women’s Health Jobs newsletter, subscribe here!

💸 SALES 💸

For my sales gals who have to also do cold calls, this book has been a game changer for me. Cold Calling Sucks by the guys from 30 mins to presidents club! The section on openers was especially helpful for me.

This was my first time writing this, and I don’t know if you can tell, but I really took a journalling approach to this, and how I would tell my friends. Let me know if you like this format or if you’d prefer something more concise? What you’d want more/less of…Would love your feedback.

Have a BEAUTIFUL WEEK!!!

With love & light,

Livia Han 💗