4/19/12

Telegraph-Journal

Entrepreneur embraces mentorship role

QUENTIN CASEY FOR THE TELEGRAPH-JOURNAL Trisha Coady made the leap from nurse to entrepreneur in 2005. She was 29 and possessed no business experience. Her questions were many:"How am I going to develop a board? How am I going to source funding? And how are people going to react to me?" she recalls of her early thoughts."It was a very steep learning curve. Thankfully I had a lot of family around to support me." Coady also found a network of mentors, which helped to cushion her landing from the nursing ward to the business world. Among her mentors were Gerry Pond - the godfather of New Brunswick's technology sector - and Tim Barnett, a telecommunications executive who has been referred to as Canada's "father of cellular communication." Coady's company, MedSenses Inc., was also accepted into Propel ICT, an organization that accelerates startups with guidance and access to funding. Despite Coady's inexperience, MedSenses grew quickly - developing roughly 150 continuing education courses for nurses. The company eventually caught the attention of potential suitors. Last October, Bluedrop Performance Learning, a St. John's-based e-learning company, bought up MedSenses for an undisclosed amount of money. Once the green but ambitious student, Coady now serves as a mentor to entrepreneurs attempting to follow the path she once walked. Coady's entrepreneurial journey began during her time as a nurse in Moncton. Not content to remain in one position for more than two years, she jumped from ward to ward. She logged time in units ranging from neonatal to intensive care. Each transition required learning new skills and procedures, but Coady thoroughly enjoyed the challenge of being a "new learner." "I needed to be learning new things all the time,"she recalls. Yet those departmental sojourns sparked a realization: There was very little on-the-job training material available to nurses. "I didn't have anything to choose from if I didn't built it myself," she says. So that's exactly what she did combining her experience as a Universit de Moncton nursing instructor with the tech knowledge of programmers and developers. The result was MedSenses' line of continuing education courses, covering topics from pediatrics to critical care. As Coady puts it, MedSenses offered education material for nurses by nurses. (More recently, Coady launched NursesNetwork.com, a website where nurses can share information and seek out training.) MedSenses' material was quickly adopted - in hospitals as far away as Kenya and Ireland. But the company's largest market was the U.S. At the time of its acquisition, more than 35,000 nurses had used MedSenses programs to further their knowledge and skills. MedSenses' programs are now housed under the Bluedrop umbrella. As part of her buyout, Coady joined the PLEASE SEE -ROLE, B2

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4/19/12

Telegraph-Journal

Trisha Coady reached a wider demographic when her business that offered online professional development courses for nurses was acquired by Bluedrop Performance Learning last October. She is shown here at her home near Riverview.PHOTO: GLEN VIENNEAU/FOR THE TELEGRAPH-JOURNAL

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'I call her my whip-cracker' ROLE - B1 Newfoundland-based e-learning company and now oversees Bluedrop's health-care offerings. She's also embraced the role of mentor - hoping to return some of the goodwill she received during her entrepreneurial struggles. Paula Morand, the founder and CEO of JumpStart 720, has sought guidance from Coady over the past year and a half. "I call her my whip-cracker," says Morand, whose Moncton-based company offers leadership and executive coaching. "When you want to give up, she doesn't let you." Looking back, Coady says securing mentors earlier in the process could have reduced her early struggles. "I spent a lot of time trying to learn on the fly I made tons of mistakes," she says. "Mentors help shorten the and learning curve."

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