Meredith didn't seek out health tech—it found her. She started consulting while keeping her bedside job, learned how to curate clinical data for machine learning, and validated that nurses absolutely belong in SaaS companies. Then she built Illuminate's remote navigation department from scratch, grew a team with zero turnover, and now leads AI-driven implementations while juggling sales support, product development, and client management.

👋 In this episode, you'll learn:

How Meredith landed a health tech role by literally being someone's nurse
Why critical care nurses make excellent health tech hires
What "the follow-up problem" actually means; how thousands of incidental findings fall through the cracks
How to translate clinical experience into tech language when talking to engineers and data scientists
The difference between sales, customer success, implementation, and product management roles
How to get your foot in the door: consulting gigs, building CDI/utilization review skills, getting published
Why FPU (first productive use) matters in SaaS
How nurses influence product development just by being end users
Why LinkedIn doesn't have to be a toxic comparison trap

Meredith Hickerson, RN, BSN, is Lead Clinical Consultant at Illuminate Health. After a career in ICU and PACU nursing, she took a contract role with a health tech startup in 2018, and stayed for seven years. She's built patient navigation workflows, managed remote nursing teams, supported sales, influenced product roadmaps, and proven that clinical experience directly translates to solving tech problems. She believes curiosity and asking tons of questions are the keys to thriving outside the bedside.

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