After returning to his home country post-graduation, Kyriakos Eleftheriou (MSc Management 2017) was frustrated with the difference in technological progress between London and Cyprus. He saw a unique opportunity to disrupt the market and decided to launch Cartaroo, the first online mall in Cyprus to provide same day delivery to the island. 

What gave you the idea for your business?

A better future is a future of progress. It won’t happen if nothing changes, but it might happen tomorrow if things progress rapidly. Inventing new things can be considered as vertical progress. Improving things that work can be considered as horizontal progress.  

Places like London and Silicon Valley are considered to be hubs of vertical progress - technological progress. Living in London gives you the opportunity to embrace new technologies every day, in everything you do. From fintech mobile payments, to food delivery networks. Greece or Cyprus are not yet quite at the same level of progress, with minimal e-commerce and no wireless payments for example. 

After graduating from Imperial, I was back in Nicosia thinking: ‘Why do I still have to visit stores when I want to purchase anything?’, ‘How can I not know if a store has the product I want to purchase in a 4G connected world?’ And at the same time, ordering from Amazon or eBay would involve 10-30 day shipping.  

I realised that minimal progress equals opportunity, with minimum threat of new entrants or the threat of substitutes. Moreover, starting a new startup in Athens or Nicosia, addressing a horizontal progress perspective, gave me a much better probability of long-term success, in comparison with well-known hubs.  

Using the skills and knowledge gained at Imperial, I launched a minimum viable product to verify product market fit, and soon enough created Cartaroo, an e-commerce marketplace model, which facilities a network of stores, providing online ordering with same day deliveries across Cyprus.

I was privileged enough to study and learn from the best students worldwide, while connecting with a global network of experts who I contact on a daily basis. I consult with my fellow alumni for financial, strategic and entrepreneurial advice, plus insights into the multiple markets. 

Greatest challenge in starting out

Most people in my cohort joined some of the best companies worldwide, such as Google and McKinsey. Having graduated as the top student across all pathways, I could have had similar chances in joining those firms. So on a personal level, I was potentially losing on a very rewarding corporate career path. 

When we launched, we faced imminent challenges in value creation. There were issues – with the technology, the stakeholders, as well as marketing. This led to a constant fight with uncertainty and thus the high probability of failure was my greatest challenge. 

Key lessons

1. Polished business plans are unimportant. Planning is mostly guessing.

2. Target market and culture understanding is very important. A conservative culture is very reluctant to change, and thus radical new ideas will have a hard time, so incremental advances may be ideal.

3. Ideas don’t matter. Execution matters.

4. Sales matter more than product. An unpolished product that sells is far superior to a polished that doesn’t. In fact, focusing on the lowest cost of acquisition at the beginning is ideal.

Advice to budding entrepreneurs

Entrepreneurship is uncertainty.  In a world of uncertainty, the only certainty is that you are going to make major mistakes. Since good decisions come from experience, and experience comes from bad decisions, the fastest learner wins.  There are two ways you can deal with that a) learn how to learn faster than anyone else and b) learn from people that been there. Isaac Newton said ‘stand on the shoulders of giants’ for a reason.

Think of things thoroughly by not relying on norms. Assuming no investment and no sustainable profits, the customer is not always right, data isn’t important, neither are business plans. By trying to satisfy the first customers, you lose the scope of growth. Data without scale can tell you very little. Instead of polishing business plans, spend the time on verifying the product market fit. They are massively important when you reach scale, or when you have a major investment, but you can’t rely on them before you have a stable core business that has sustainable profits.  

Do things unconventionally. If you send a pitch deck to a VC in London, and they already receive 100 a day, what are the chances they see yours?  If the average person sees 10,000 ads a day, what are the chances they recognise yours?

How did the Business School prepare you for setting up your own business?

It’s difficult to articulate how pivotal Imperial was in preparing me for the business world. Imperial is located in the heart of the London. Many distinguished CEOs and professors that spent their careers leading companies in technology, consulting and finance end up teaching at the School, and I learned both theoretical and practical knowledge, including cutting-edge technologies and innovations.

I was privileged enough to study and learn from the best students worldwide, while connecting with a global network of experts who I contact on a daily basis. I consult with my fellow alumni for financial, strategic and entrepreneurial advice, plus insights into the multiple markets. 

The Business School also actively helped me on multiple occasions even after I graduated. We were lucky enough to collaborate with 6 impressive postgraduate students (pictured above), who consulted us for 3 months on growth marketing techniques.  In addition, Imperial’s Enterprise Lab still provides me with business coaching even today.
 

Executives and clinicians from across the healthcare ecosystem discussed innovation and digital transformation at the latest Imperial Business in the City event.

Participants heard from Professor James Barlow, Professor of Technology and Innovation Management (Healthcare) at Imperial College Business School; Dr Pramod Prabhakaran, NHS Consultant and Imperial College Health Partners’ (ICHP) lead for international business development and partnerships; and Omar Butt, a healthcare innovation expert at ICHP and Imperial College Business School alumnus.

Plenty of papers but slow progress

Academic papers have been written about telemedicine for over a century but adoption rates remain low aside from a few pioneering facilities like Mercy Virtual Care Centre in the USA.

This was one striking example given by Professor Barlow to show how health systems struggle to adopt new innovations.

Dr Prabhakaran outlined the need for health systems to innovate the healthcare business model to a new model based on prevention and population health, integrated primary care services, and a value-based approach to healthcare spending.

His colleague Omar Butt argued that the key to accelerating innovation is to ‘de-risk’ by reducing costs for all stakeholders, increasing the speed of innovation, and promoting collaboration and communication in the innovation process.

Three examples of how to ‘de-risk’ healthcare innovation

The speakers and audience members shared examples of projects that had successfully ‘de-risked’ the innovation process.  

1.  “Get the health system to sell your innovations”

Omar Butt noted that many health products are traditionally brought to market in a very resource-intensive manner through large sales teams engaging with separate parts of the healthcare system.

Butt contrasted the traditional approach with how AliveCor took a system-level approach when introducing their Kardia mobile ECG devices to the NHS. AliveCor was supported by NHS innovation infrastructure such as the DigitalHealth.London accelerator, NHS Innovation Test Beds, NHS Innovation Accelerator Fellowships, and the Academic Health Science Networks including Imperial College Health Partners. These NHS initiatives helped AliveCor to demonstrate relatively quickly and cheaply how their products supported clinical priorities, to identify use cases in collaboration with end-users, and to roll-out their product across GP surgeries, pharmacies and community centres.

2. Collaborative healthcare

Dr Prabhakaran explained that as little as 10 per cent of a population’s health is linked to access to healthcare. The remainder is made up of factors outside of the control of the health system such as housing, transport and education. This makes it challenging to deliver integrated services and patient-centric care.

Dr Prabhakaran pointed to Ko Awatea in New Zealand as an example of good practice - a health system innovation and improvement unit embedded within the Counties Manukau district health system. Ko Awatea has pioneered an integrated approach to healthcare improvement focussed on reducing health inequalities. The Counties Manukau system fosters collaboration between services including education, health, housing, income, and policing.

3. Building a positive innovation culture

An audience member asked how the normally risk-averse healthcare system could learn to embrace the potential for failure that comes with innovation.

Professor Barlow highlighted that the Unscheduled Care Collaborative Programme (UCCP) launched in Scotland in 2005 as an example of a healthcare innovation programme that successfully promoted a culture of experimentation. UCCP was launched as hospitals were set an ambitious target to treat and admit or discharge 98 per cent of patients arriving in A&E within four hours. He said that this target and the UCCP programme’s whole system approach and ‘plan-do-study-act’ model of short term and incremental experiments gave clinicians a form of permission to try out new ideas within a clear risk management framework without fear of penalty.

More opportunities for health leaders

Professor Barlow and Dr Prabhakaran have developed the Executive Health Innovation Management programme at Imperial College Business School. This programme is the only international executive education programme that brings together participants from all parts of the healthcare ecosystem to address challenges in healthcare innovation.

Imperial Business in the City is a regular series of free evening events for executives. To receive information about our events and resources please subscribe to our newsletter and follow us on LinkedIn.

Theodora Kalentzi (MSc International Health Management 2004), a specialist in women’s health, experienced medical practitioner, director, consultant and entrepreneur. With a long and distinguished career in the NHS, Theodora now runs her own private clinic offering specialist menopause care and a wide range of GP services. Providing a holistic approach to her work, we spoke to Theodora about how this could be applied across the healthcare system as a whole, improving patient experience and overall efficiencies.  

Tell us about yourself

I started as a trainee doctor in the UK in 1996 and trained across various clinical specialities before I became a GP in 2001. My career has seen me delivering a variety of roles, ranging from clinical as an NHS GP, to educational during my time as a GP tutor for the London Deanery, University of London, to mentoring in primary care, to senior management as an NHS Medical Director and Responsible Officer. I now manage my own private practice, Medical Prime. It’s been a busy portfolio career!

Early on as a GP, I chose to specialise in women’s health issues, specifically the menopause, as I realised this was an area of healthcare which was underrepresented and yet something that potentially affects half the population.

I also became a healthcare trainer providing experienced support in the delivery of multidisciplinary clinical management training. This has involved consultancy and project work, with a focus on developing management skills, teaching employment law awareness, performance management and clinical investigations.

Institutions such as Imperial have a very important role to play in this – both in terms of lobbing government and in training the managers of tomorrow. Any research that backs up the needs of the healthcare profession is most welcome and training is vital.

During your time at as consultant, were there any key themes?

A reoccurring theme was the challenge in communication and systems within practice teams and between healthcare providers such as primary and secondary care. I would work with teams focusing on best practice solutions, improved organisational behaviour and communication channels, encouraging openness and accountability.

This openness is also something I would love to see between the private and public healthcare sector. It would save time, money and improve patient care.

What do you think are the greatest challenges facing the healthcare sector?

I believe the greatest challenge is making change happen. There are many people with lots of good ideas and the drive to commit, but the NHS is a massive operation. Implementing change does not come easily or quickly.

There are many stumbling blocks to change. Many of the processes are centralised, and while it is important to have governance and overall control, too much regulation and emphasis on systems and processes can hinder change.  Providing local managers with greater autonomy would help and allow for local adoption of relevant processes. The focus of all our work is the patients themselves, their needs are paramount.

Now that I work in the private sector, I see how much hostility there is to private healthcare. I don’t believe it should be ‘them and us’, we must all focus on the treatment and care of our patients. As doctors, we are all ultimately regulated and revalidated by the same governing body, the General Medical Council, so if we all worked as one healthcare community, there would be benefits and efficiencies for all involved.

The thing that saddens me the most is the fact that healthcare professionals are suffering. When you see talented and dedicated professionals leaving due to stress, mental health issues, long term sick leave, or taking early retirement, it is time for radical change.

What can institutions such as Imperial do to help support this change?

Institutions such as Imperial have a very important role to play in this – both in terms of lobbing government and in training the managers of tomorrow. Any research that backs up the needs of the healthcare profession is most welcome and training is vital.

Having held senior positions in the healthcare profession, and attending many training sessions, I was sometimes surprised that management tools such as PESTEL and SWOT analysis were only being taught at director level. These are basic managerial skills that everyone should have. If managers and clinicians are equipped with these principles at the beginning of their career, it is much easier to effect change – your starting point becomes implementation, not the concepts behind why change management is important.

Healthcare professionals also need to see the end to end process, so that they can continuously scan the environment, and adapt and improve accordingly. It is crucial to understand the need for change, if you resist this you become part of the problem.

How did your time at Imperial impact on your career?

My time at Imperial changed my life! I loved the course and everything about it. It truly opened up a new world to me.

I gained a great deal of self-awareness, particularly in how I work in a team, as well as how others do. Being aware of your own and others’ natural preferences, personalities, working approach etc. means it is easier to manage a team and share relevant tasks accordingly.

It is important to look at the complimentary skills of the whole team.  When I was group coordinator, I took time to look at the personality types and team environment to assign tasks more effectively, matching people to what they did best. This was a skill I carried forward with me and used in my consulting also. Being able to coach teams in how to manage each other’s strengths and weaknesses improves overall performance and working environment.

What is next for you?

I set up my own clinic last year and received a huge response to women’s health services, specifically around the menopause. I believe women deserve a choice and the option for different treatments. I would love to see a more joined up approach to private and NHS care. Until then, I will continue to do the best for my patients, providing treatment, advice, care and choice.

We are pleased to announce three of Imperial College Business School’s programmes have been ranked in the global top five in their subjects in the 2020 QS World University rankings.

MSc Strategic Marketing was ranked second in the world, and MSc Business Analytics and MSc Management were both placed fifth. In addition, MSc Finance was placed 14th, and the Full-Time MBA 19th.

On the ranking results, Dean Francisco Veloso said, “It is very pleasing to see us affirm our place as a top five university in subjects across our portfolio.”

Strong thought leadership

Another area the Business School excelled in the rankings is thought leadership. In addition to all of the industry panel events organised by Careers Clubs and beyond, thought leadership is also Integrated into all of our programmes. Internal and external experts share their industry insight with students in modules and electives.

One of the highly popular Finance Master's programmes is the Private Equity & Venture Capital elective. The elective teaches students how to apply what they have learned in class to real life work situations by inviting seven industry speakers to present on campus throughout the module.

Our connection to  Imperial allows us to leverage the wider network of various leaders of STEM right here at the College to share their insights with students. The convergence of science and business is what makes studying at Imperial College Business School truly unique. 

Going online: MSc Strategic Marketing

This is the second year in a row that our MSc Strategic Marketing is ranked second in the world for marketing.

Sitting at the crossroads of where marketing fundamentals intersect with the latest technology and innovation, MSc Strategic Marketing teaches students the science behind marketing, equipping them with valuable skills in data-driven decision making.

Based on the success and demand of the programme, we are launching the MSc Strategic Marketing online in addition to our on-campus offering (subject to College approval).

Find out more about the new online format of the programme

Hannah Salton is a freelance Career Coach. In this blog she shares her advice on how to get better at the things we dread from interviews to presentations. 

As a career coach and ex-corporate recruiter, I’m often asked “What’s your no. 1 piece of interview advice?” or “What’s the best tip for to networking?”

I have often struggled to sum up everything I’ve slowly learnt over the years about these activities in one handy hint. If I was forced to give just a single piece of advice, I think it would simply be to practise. This may not seem particularly revolutionary or fancy advice, but the vital importance of simply investing time, energy, and effort into things we want to get better at (but often dread) can often be overlooked.

It’s tempting to want to get better at something by thinking about it. By researching, reading, and talking about it until the cows come home. I used to be terrified of giving feedback. Whether it was interview feedback for a candidate I wasn’t hiring, or performance feedback to someone I manged – I used to dread it. I had a tendency to become tongue tied, inarticulate, and could end up softening the feedback so much that I was unclear and inconsistent in my messaging.

Since then, I have given a LOT of feedback. I’ve had to; because various aspects of my career have required it. And over time it’s something I’m a lot more comfortable with. The only way I have done this, is through practise.

I have spent hours practising and refining my technique of delivering people’s strengths and weaknesses back to them. I have learnt through practising both alone and with a mentor, and I’ve also learnt through reflecting on real life experiences when I have had to deliver feedback to others.

Nowadays, I do a lot of mock interviews and provide detailed and specific feedback for each individual interview answer. I’m still always improving my feedback technique, but I have become a lot more comfortable with how to get across difficult messages in a constructive and useful way.

Remember that interviewing, presenting, and networking are all skills that get better with time and practise.

Almost everyone finds them challenging at some stage, and finding them difficult is a sign that you care.

Here are my top tips to practise interviewing, presenting and networking more effectively:

Interviewing

• Don’t practise specific answers to very specific questions. Instead, annotate your CV with 20 stories (potential interview answers) that could be applicable to a range of different interview questions.
• Don’t practise by scripting out full length written answers – you will sound rehearsed and inauthentic if you repeat them verbatim. Write down key words or bullet points, and practice your structure by practising out loud to a wide variety of different questions.

Presenting & Interviewing

• Practise aloud in front of a mirror. Observe your body language and work out how you can improve it.
• Record yourself on a mobile phone and watch it back. This will be highly awkward, but if you can honestly reflect on what works well and what you want to improve on, this REALLY works.
• Practise in front of a friend or relative (via Skype works too). Ask for honest and specific feedback on what works and what can be improved. Offer to return the favour to your friend – you’ll also get to practise giving feedback.

Networking

• Nudge your comfort zone! Go to events that are outside your university or workplace, in areas that genuinely interest you. Check Eventbrite, LinkedIn and Facebook to connect with communities of interest.
• Networking improves with time and practise. You will learn something from each and every networking interaction you have, even if you think it goes badly.
• Set yourself the target of going to a certain amount of networking events per month, and write down what you plan to go to. Consistency creates momentum for long-lasting change.
• If you choose not to go to events, create connections and professional relationships by proactively reaching out to people on LinkedIn, or reconnecting with previous contacts.

And finally…

Remember that interviewing, presenting, and networking are all skills that get better with time and practise.

Almost everyone finds them challenging at some stage, and finding them difficult is a sign that you care.

The more you practise, the less scary and intimidating they will feel. You can learn something from each and every time you present, interview, and network, even if (especially if) you think it went really, really, badly.