No Operating Manual
A podcast about building healthcare companies when there’s no clear path and no one tells you what comes next.
Each episode features candid conversations with founders and operators working at the earliest stages, where decisions are made with incomplete information and roles are undefined. The focus is on the real work: what you learn, what you have to unlearn, and what it actually takes to make healthcare companies function in the real world.
No Operating Manual is a podcast about building healthcare companies when there’s no clear path and no one tells you what comes next. Each episode features candid conversations with founders and operators working at the earliest stages, where decisions are made with incomplete information and roles are undefined. The focus is on the real work: what you learn, what you have to unlearn, and what it actually takes to make healthcare companies function in the real world. In this episode of No Operating Manual, host Erin O’Brien sits down with Ben Kuhn, serial healthcare entrepreneur and co-founder & CEO of Everbright Health, to explore what it really takes to build innovative companies from scratch. Ben shares the three core skills every builder needs: a clear, long-term vision; the discipline to take one step at a time; and the flexibility to adapt when reality diverges from the plan. He talks candidly about how he coaches his team to reframe setbacks as progress, and why letting go of “pride of ownership” is essential to building the right culture. Ben then dives deep into Everbright Health, an AI-enabled MSO on a mission to bring advanced mental health interventions — specifically TMS and Spravato — into everyday clinical practice. With over 7 million people eligible for these FDA-approved treatments and fewer than 500,000 receiving them last year, Ben explains how they are working to fill the gap. Everbright’s model embeds directly into independent mental health practices, using AI to identify eligible patients from complex EHR data and providing the turnkey infrastructure providers need to offer these life-changing treatments. Ben also reflects on lessons learned from bootstrapping, PE-backed turnarounds, and scaling Strive Health, and why getting back to business basics can be the best move a founder can make.
