How to Get Your First Job in Health Informatics

Breaking into any field is NOT easy! Trying to get your first job is not a simple task and can feel like a daily uphill battle trying to get anyone to give you a chance, as you send your resume into the dark void. In this blog post, I would like to provide you with some alternative tips to simply applying online, although this is a necessary step, oftentimes it’s important to find ways to build your network and stand out from the crowd of potential applicants. Here are some tips to break into the field of health informatics when you have no formal work experience

1. Participate in a Kaggle competition with a health focus

Kaggle competitions are a great way to bolster your data science skills by practicing with messy datasets, you can compete as a team or by yourself and can win money if you have the winning solution. One example of a health focused Kaggle competition was a project run by The Radiological Society of North America and the Society of Thoracic Radiology, the purpose of the competition was to help improve the use of machine learning in the diagnosis of pulmonary embolism.

Even if you don’t win the competition, using GitHub to showcase the code you used during the project and being able to explain your workflow in an interview, if asked about it, will allow you to display you have an analytic mind and are self-driven.

2. Attend relevant hack-a-thons

Another idea is to attend hack-a-thons in your area, I attended a hack-a-thon called Hacking Health. This hack-a-thon was not just set over a few days, the hack-a-thon was the main event but there were also additional workshops and events where I could meet and network with others in the health informatics field. In addition, by attending these events I gained skills communicating and interacting with people with varying backgrounds from doctors to students. The ability to communicate with people from diverse backgrounds is an underrecognized skill which is important when working in a cross disciplinary environment as health informatics is. This shows that you are able to interact and work with people from varying backgrounds and this is quite common working in a hospital.

During the actual hack-a-thon my team was comprised of students, clinicians and software developers, our main project was focused on developing an app which would help clinicians be able to talk about their mental health struggles. We also had to give a pitch for this app, these are all tangible soft skills that employers are also looking for and which one could speak to when you don’t have formal experience on your resume.

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3. Start your own health informatics blog

Finding ways to get your message out there is key when it comes to standing out in a crowd. One option is to create your own health informatics blogs and investigate and write about interesting healthcare analytic problems. I recently watched a webinar put on by the Healthcare Information and Management Systems Society. This webinar consisted of a a panel from three young people early in their careers and they were providing guidance on how they broke into the field.

One of the panelists was a pharmacist, who was able to make the jump and he talked about the blog he started which got him noticed by a recruiter. Although it is important to apply to online job sites, it is very hard to stand out from the masses applying. By getting out your message either through blogging, starting a Youtube channel etc…, this allows you to take control of the narrative and show to others your passion for the field of health informatics, afterall, you never know who is watching! In the very least, it can be a welcome distraction during the waiting game that often occurs when applying for your first job.

4. Volunteer or freelance

If you have no experience and want to prove your skills, one option is to volunteer for health informatics projects within your organization. This might be an option if you have a clinical background in a hospital and want to transition to a job in health informatics, as you might be able to take on extra projects by reaching out to IT. Another option is to visit sites such as: upwork, toptal, freelancer or fiverr and take a freelancing job in healthcare analytics, biostatistics etc…, if you impress your client, you might be able to expand the freelancing job to a full time position.

I hope these unconventional tips can be helpful when it comes to breaking into the field of health informatics with ZERO experience. One of the best ways to find a job is through your network and these above tips are tailored to help build your network and get your message out there, seperate from solely applying online. Comment down below, how did you get your first job in health informatics? If you like this content, please consider following the podcast where I delve in greater detail regarding how to get that first job in health informatics!