Today we’d like to introduce you to Krish Chopra.
Thanks for sharing your story with us Krish. So, let’s start at the beginning and we can move on from there.
The idea for NPHub was stemmed not personal experience– I’m not a nurse–but out of a separate, related business. After graduating from the University of Michigan in 2012 with a degree in international studies, I landed a job in corporate sales at AT&T. Despite making close to six figures within a couple of years, I was getting antsy. I was overpaid and underworked! I was the definition of unfulfilled. In 2014, I was hunting for gratification, so I co-founded Rehabber’s Academy, an educational course aimed at teaching people how to invest in real estate. The issue was that I was 24 and didn’t know how to invest in real estate.
So, Rehabber’s Academy flopped after only nine months. I had left AT&T at this point and moved to Atlanta, GA to work on the company. When Rehabber’s Academy folded, I was left just $6,000 left in my bank account. That same year, actually two weeks later, I tried again–this time starting a company called United Medical Rotations, which offered clinical placement services for medical school students in the Caribbean. My co-founder at Rehabber’s Academy (and now, NPHub) had worked at a company in a similar industry in 2000’s, so he mentioned that the model might be something quick and fast to start.
That business generated revenue in 3 weeks and started my first successful business. For context, Rehabber’s Academy made $0 in 9 months. That business went on to operate until 2019 when we started winding down operations to focus more on NPHub, So back in 2015 in March, I got a frantic call from an NP student in the U.S. who needed help finding a nurse practitioner instructor. One call led to another and another. Some students would even call us crying in frustration.
I reached out to a good friend and my former partner in business at Rehabber’s academy, and we quickly hatched the idea for NPHub (original name was NPCR), which would connect U.S. nursing students with instructors. When we first started offering its services to U.S. nursing students, one part-time college intern worked with us and virtually all matchmaking was done over the phone. We realized the potential size of the market, and the gap for NP students nationwide. We decided to develop a marketplace app (like Airbnb) so NP students can find clinical sites quickly and efficiently. This decision was made in September 2017.
In 2018, things picked up and we started growing our team. We made some good hires and some poor hires but ended with a team of 9. By June 2019, when we launched its online matchmaking website, our team was closer 11. and by February 2020, our team from to 16. The future of NPHub is to work more with universities! Back when we started in 2015 and 2016, we reached out to 40 graduate nursing programs. 39 of the 40 told us to F- off. I love the work we do because while some NP programs provide resources, such as lists of local clinical educators to contact, a vast majority of programs do not, Especially among distance-learning programs, most programs are underfunded so students are left to themselves to find placements. B/c of this, students often resort to Googling, cold-calling, and dropping into clinics to find working professionals–just like with door-to-door sales. When students find clinical preceptors (trainers), there’s no standardization of quality or vetting. When you’re desperate, you’ll accept the first clinical site that says Yes. It’s unfair to NP students, to the Nursing profession, and degrading as graduate nursing is the only advanced degree that undergoes these issues. Look at what we see with COVID-19. Our Nurses are our front-line heroes. Let’s treat them better.
Overall, has it been relatively smooth? If not, what were some of the struggles along the way?
No, it has not been!
1. We initially tried selling its matchmaking services to NP programs. Within a year of NPHub’s launch, we reached out to 40 graduate nursing programs. 39 of the 40 told me to “F off.” That was mostly in 2015 and 2016. In March of 2017, we decided to pivot and switch to a direct to consumer focus. That’s when we grew from 20 students to over 300 students in 6 months.
2. When we launched our app in June 2019 (after 15 months of development), it barely worked and we had 0 tractions with the marketplace. We continued to refine it over several months and in August 2019, saw more students and clinical sites use the platform (about 20% of placements). As of February 2020, over 65% of all placements are occurring on the platform. Many placements happen organically as well!
NPHub – what should we know? What do you guys do best? What sets you apart from the competition?
NPHub is the first online marketplace for clinical training that matches Nurse Practitioner (NP) students with clinical sites nationwide. Currently, we operate in 29 different states across the United States. We’re the Airbnb for clinical training sites. All healthcare professionals (MDs, DOs, PAs, NPs, RNs, etc.) have to practice clinical training while in school, and typically their respective universities supply these sites for them. However, with Nurse Practitioners, they’re required to find it for themselves. As a result, thousands of students delay graduation every semester because they have difficulty finding their clinical training program. That’s where NPHub steps in by supplying peer reviewed clinical sites for NP students.
We’re the only organization in our niche that serves the volume of students that we do. We’re also the only organization that has invested and created an application for students speeding up the time it takes to find a clinical rotation from 6 months to sometimes 3 hours.
We also pride ourselves on delivering a fantastic service. We have 79 reviews, 76 of them at five stars. Lastly, we offer a 5 point promise to every student guaranteeing that we’ll help them off they get 100% of their money back. For us, we put our students first and try our hardest to reduce any risk on our client’s end.
What is “success” or “successful” for you?
I believe that you can build an incredible business, have a fantastic staff that loves working, and serve customers that appreciate the work you do. For me, I define success and loving my organization, doing great for an underserved community, and proving to the world, especially corporate America – that profits, your employees’ morale, and your customer’s success aren’t a zero-sum game. They can go hand in hand. As a start-up business, we’re always looking at growth metrics. We’re driven by a vision to solve the preceptor shortage so NPs can graduate on time and go on to provide healthcare to those who need it most. That being said, the customer’s experience is critically important. So for us, we value our customer’s feedback. Success to me is building a business by actually caring. There’s no substitution for caring. You can’t fake caring.
Contact Info:
- Address: 57 Forsyth street nw Atlanta, GA 30303
- Website: www.nphub.com
- Phone: 678-329-9029
- Email: coordinator@nphub.com
- Instagram: nphub_
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/EmpowerNPs/
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