Working Student Loren: Practical experience at Caro Health

From Study to Practice at Caro Health

Since March, Loren Bulsink has held the role of working student at Caro Health, where she focuses on Customer Success & Communications. In addition to working at Caro, she is working on her thesis for her Master's degree in Corporate Communications at the University of Amsterdam, which is scheduled for completion in June. We sit down with Loren to talk about her experience as a working student at Caro over the past few months. 

"Looking for a side job that could enhance my studies in Corporate Communications and provide hands-on experience alongside my studies, I found my way to Caro Health," Loren shares. Although she initially had no background in healthcare, she always nurtured a passion for innovation and a people-focused approach. 'During my studies, I discovered my interest in health communication,' she explains. There, she learned to design communication strategies for positive behavior change and health goals. Her previous work experiences in marketing and communications allowed her to explore various aspects of the communications field. 'At Caro Health, I saw the opportunity to further expand this knowledge and gain experience within a fast-growing healthtech start-up specializing in digitization and healthcare innovation,' she adds. 

Diverse tasks and creative challenges

'In my position as a working student at Caro Health, I contribute to two main tasks,' Loren explains. 'On the one hand, I am responsible for the implementation process of new clients. These projects range from setting up a digital recovery monitoring system for bladder clinic patients to supporting a dental clinic that wants to digitize the entire treatment process, including information brochures.' Thus, Loren plays an important role in digitizing and optimizing treatments and surveys. 'It's really cool to see how patients track their health and recovery through our app, and it feels good to contribute to that,' she adds. 

For the second main task, Loren can make full use of her creativity. "I am responsible for our communications through social media and blog posts. I also work on designing product updates when we have new features in our app or our CMS (Content Management System), which are then sent to our customers. For these updates I get to design a lot of visuals, as we work with AI and cool features, it's great to see how the product updates get more and more beautiful with our teamwork.'

In addition to her duties from the job description, Loren appreciates the space to share her own ideas and contribute to projects such as the renewal of the website and career page. "When I come up with ideas, they are always responded to enthusiastically and we immediately see if we can do something with them.

Supporting collaboration

'Whenever I get involved in an implementation project for one of our clients, an evaluation is always performed,' Loren explains. 'Given that we are dealing with patient and health information, it is important that this data is always handled carefully.' Once a job is completed and can go live, there is always a colleague ready to take a look with her. 'I can always reach out to a colleague for feedback,' she continues. 'With their valuable feedback, together we lift the work to the next level.' In addition, Loren appreciates the open and honest atmosphere at Caro. 'It gives me room to make mistakes,' she says. 'This encourages me to pick up things quickly on my own and to keep constantly improving myself.'

Preparing for new work

Working with implementation processes and a CMS were initially completely new to Loren. In her first weeks of work, she was thoroughly prepared to fully master the CMS and information about various care pathways. 'Whenever I don't understand something, I can ask my colleagues,' Loren explains. 'Each of them has extensive knowledge of the field and the various care treatments and clinics.' As a result, Loren is very satisfied with the on-the-job supervision.

The best way to learn is by doing

'From day one I felt at home on the team. There was an immediate click during the job interview, and in my first week I immediately fell head over heels at the team outing and dinner,' Loren shares. 'I was quickly introduced to the different clients and projects, and was soon able to work independently when they saw that I was picking it up. I liked that very much, because I believe you learn best by doing. Loren emphasizes the open atmosphere at the office, which specifically attracted her to working at a start-up. 'Here you feel like you can relate to everyone and you notice that your contribution is immediately of great value to the team.'

Advice from Loren

'If you have a passion for innovative solutions, digitization, healthcare, communication and a people-oriented approach, this work-study position at Caro offers you an excellent opportunity to learn the tricks of the trade in practice,' Loren advises. 'I would definitely recommend it. I really felt I had the space to develop myself, including the freedom to make mistakes and come up with my own ideas. She adds, 'In addition, I have rarely worked in a team as open and welcoming as this one, where we also engage in many fun activities, such as paddling, having drinks and eating out. This strengthens our team spirit and this is how we celebrate our successes.'

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