Inside the Career Club: April 2025 Updates

This is a new monthly series to provide you with updates on events happening inside the Public Health Career Club community:

The Public Health Career Club has moved to an always-open enrollment model to provide support whenever public health professionals need it, with a new seven-day free trial available for both premium and light memberships.

Here's what to expect in April:

• Four-part workshop series on "Launch Your Idea" for turning concepts into reality - Part 2 & 3 continues this month (April 1 & 12)
• New member orientation (April 3)
• Peer session on global mental health (April 5)
• Monthly social hour for networking and connection (April 17)
• Office hours with mentors specializing in job applications, industry transitions, and policy (April 23, 29, 30)
• Special presentation on the Consumer Drug Take Back program (April 24)

Head over to phspot.org/club to learn more about the community and sign up for the seven-day free trial of either the premium or light membership.

Chapters

• 0:00 Welcome to PH Spotlight Podcast
• 1:06 About the Public Health Career Club
• 3:30 April Events: Workshops & Orientation
• 7:16 Social Events & Office Hours
• 12:42 How to Join the Community

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:02

Welcome to PH Spotlight, a community for you to build your public health career with. Join us weekly right here, and I'll be here too. Your host, sujani Siva from PH Spot. Hey everyone, welcome back to another episode of the PH Spotlight podcast, a space for public health professionals like you and me to build our dream public health careers. Once again, I am Sujani, your host, and I'm so glad you're tuning in today, because today's episode is a tiny bit different. It's part of a new series that I'm introducing and it's essentially a monthly update from inside our membership community, the Public Health Career Club.

Speaker 1: 0:50

I really just wanted to create a space and a way where I can keep you in the loop about all the exciting things happening inside the community and really also give you a chance to plan ahead, mark your calendars and get involved if you are interested. So, for those of you who may not have heard about our membership community, it's called the Public Health Career Club, where public health professionals from around the world are able to connect, learn and support each other in building meaningful and impactful careers, and what we do is help you go from feeling confused, alone and overwhelmed in this whole journey of you know, just figuring out our careers and we, you know, essentially help you go from having that confused and overwhelmed and feeling alone to feeling confident and in control of your life and your career. And so for the month of April, I'm going to tell you what we have happening inside of the club and I'll be releasing a monthly episode right here on the podcast to just like keep you in the loop, like I said. And so if there is something interesting that catches your ear and you want to explore, you are welcome to join. And the exciting part and I'll tell you a little bit more at the end is that we are committing to always keeping the enrollment open. So if you've been with us since the beginning of the Career Club, we used to do I think it was less than quarterly quarterly opening kind of enrollment. So you can only come inside the membership community on a quarterly basis. And what I've learned is that that doesn't really work, for when you're needing help, you know when you need support, when you need help, when you need that community, it doesn't go on a schedule. So we wanted to make sure that we were available the moment you needed that support. So that's why we've kind of pivoted, changed our way of welcoming new members into the community, into the Public Health Career Club, and we've changed into this new model of always keeping enrollments open, so I hope that really helps anyone who's been interested in joining the club.

Speaker 1: 3:30

So let's get started with April 2025 events. The first one is a continuation of a four-part workshop that I launched last week called Launch your Idea, and part two of that will be taking place on Tuesday, april 1st, 8 pm Eastern, and it's refining your idea, and part two of that will be taking place on Tuesday, april 1, 8pm Eastern, and it's refining your idea, and it'll be essentially a work session and office hour. So the four part workshop series was designed to provide clarity, structure and actionable steps to help you move from idea to execution right. So many of us have ideas we'd like to bring to life, whether that's a podcast, a blog, a nonprofit organization, a consulting service, a business, a book, a social media page or a website. But getting started can often feel overwhelming, and what I've heard inside the club from our members is it's nice to have that support, because they really want to get started on some of these ideas. So I developed this four-part workshop series. The first one was an introduction, so you know, if you haven't joined the club yet and you're thinking about it, don't worry, the recording is available. And the second part of that workshop is going to be April 1st. You'll come to the session. It's a one-hour office hour type setup for part two and there was homework from part one. You'll get to either use that one-hour time slot with me to work through the homework or we can talk through some of the challenges that you're facing and really just like define and refine your idea into a structured plan and then get some guidance and feedback from your peers as well as me. So that's the first event for April.

Speaker 1: 5:19

Second event for April is going to be on April 3rd, again evening time, eastern time, and that's orientation. So every two months or so we'll be having an orientation to the community and it's essentially Janice, our community manager, walks you through our member portal, gives you advice on how to get the most out of the club Essentially a nice welcome so you don't feel like you just got thrown into this community. And we really take these orientations seriously because we want to make sure that you're onboarded in a way where you feel like you've been taken care of. So if you have any questions, you can come and ask Janice about it. So the first 30 minutes of that, janice essentially helps you understand and orient yourself to the career club and then the last half of that session is more of like a social. You get to meet some of the new members that may have joined and really just a fun way to socialize. So that is happening April 3rd. That would be the second event for April.

Speaker 1: 6:29

The next one is a peer session. So we introduced peer sessions very recently and it's a new initiative and it's for members, so our community members, to have the stage to discuss a public health topic that they're passionate about, page to discuss a public health topic that they're passionate about, and it also gives you an opportunity to practice your communication skills in a safe space, in a space where you know everybody's up here, everybody's there to help each other grow and support each other on their journey. So this is a session that will be taking place April 5th it's a Saturday and it will be by one of our members, rima, and the topic is global mental health, and so she'll be facilitating a conversation on the status of public mental health globally. She comes with a counseling psychology background US trained counseling psychologist. She's also a prospective public health student and a poet, based in Dubai, and that's where she was born and raised. So you know she's got a very neat background and she's going to be facilitating this conversation on April 5th. And she's going to be facilitating this conversation on April 5th.

Speaker 1: 7:51

Following that, we will be having the third session of that Launch your Idea workshop on April 12th and this will be a strategy and execution type event and it's going to be about preparing for your launch. So it's a two hour session. And what we're going to be doing during part three of Launch your Idea is we're going to be talking about kind of like the essential tools and strategies that you need to launch your idea, because in part one and part two you've been kind of planning and thinking about it. We're going to develop a practical launch plan and a timeline and I want you to essentially take some concrete steps towards implementing and then we're going to talk about. You know how do I sustain that momentum beyond the initial launch, because the launch is exciting but kind of being consistent after that is a little bit more challenging. So we'll talk about that, hence why the session is two hours long. So that is part three.

Speaker 1: 8:55

It is taking place on April 12th and then, following that event, we have our April social hour. So we host monthly social hours where everyone comes. You get broken down, broken out into different breakout groups. You get to meet some of your peers, new people, just a way for you to socialize and hang out, and I love these social events. I've heard stories of people you know connecting in person after these social events and really supporting each other throughout their journey. So one of my favorite events. So one of my favorite events.

Speaker 1: 9:37

And then we have on April, so that that social hour is April 17th and then April 23rd we have our office hour with one of our mentors, latika, who specializes in the job application process. So quarterly she holds live clinics where she walks through somebody's real job application from inside the club and she kind of like provides tips on how to improve that job application and then, kind of like, on the alternating months, she will hold office hours so you can bring your specific questions on job searching resumes, cover letters, interviews, anything else uh related to job hunting. So that is happening on april 23rd with latika, who's been a long-time mentor inside, uh, the, the public health career club. So that's exciting. And then April 24th we have a talk by Catherine Kane Nielsen on the Consumer Drug Take Back program. So Catherine is a Senior Manager of Regulatory and Compliance at this program at the Texas Department of State and Health Services and she will be presenting on this program and you'll get to kind of have an opportunity to also ask questions about this program and just kind of learn about her experience managing this program.

Speaker 1: 11:16

So that's taking place April 24th and so, as you can see, as I'm walking through some of these events, like we have a variety of ways to support you on your career journey, right, we have these office hours, we have workshops, we have talks and really, like we've designed some of these programs to ensure that there's a space for everyone inside the community to find something that connects with them. So don't feel too overwhelmed that there's so much going on. You get to essentially pick and choose. You know what is relevant to you, what is meaningful, what is important for you at this stage of your career, and you kind of go to those sessions, okay, um. So that's april 24th, um.

Speaker 1: 11:59

And then april 29th and april 30th we have more office hours with some other mentors of ours. On april 29th we have office hour with megan haifi, again long time mentor of ph spot, and megan is able to help you with job application support, especially if you want to transition from academia into industry or private sector. She also has her drph and her mph, so any questions around those degrees and also generally she's really great at helping you figure out your career path in public health. So so that session is with Megan. These are typically about an hour. You drop in, quite intimate. You can ask Megan questions about anything that you need with your career. And then on April 30th, another office hour with Terri-Ann Lynch, another great mentor of ours, and she often is able to assist our members with building a public health career in pharma, navigating the next steps in your career, learning more about working in public health policy, which is where her expertise is in, as well as pursuing a doctor of public policy and administration degree, which is kind of her education and background. She can also, you know, talk to you about any roles around advocating for patients and health equity discussion. So those are some of Terri-Ann's expertise and areas that she's able to help our members.

Speaker 1: 13:32

So that was a lot. What was that? So that's one. So we had the Launch your Idea Part 2 workshop series and we had the orientation, the peer session, global mental health Part 3 of our workshop of launching your idea. Then we had a social hour on April 17th, office hour with Latika talking about resumes and job application. Then we have an inside look at the Consumer Drug Take Back program, which is a special talk that we'll be having, and then we have two more office hours, one with Megan and one with Terri-Ann.

Speaker 1: 14:04

So that's about nine events in April, a little more than one or two a week and, like I said, you know lots going on but it doesn't mean you have to go to all of them. Uh, pick and choose uh what fits uh into your schedule. But also you know which of these uh support you need at this phase of your career. So I hope that was helpful for you to um get an understanding of what's happening inside the club. So if you're listening to this and you're already a member, make sure to log into the member portal. Um and um. You need to be a premium member to attend many of these sessions. So RSVP in the upcoming events calendar and then you'll get a reminder email closer to the event so you don't forget, if you're not a member yet of the Public Health Career Club, it's a great time to join.

Speaker 1: 14:58

Like I mentioned, we've officially moved to always open enrollment, which means you can join anytime and start tapping into this amazing community of public health professionals who are really just like building very cool careers. And for a very short period. We've enabled a seven day free trial, so it doesn't hurt to just go in there, explore around, see what you like, what you don't. You know, does this suit you? I guarantee you you'll be drawn into the community and everything we have to offer. So if you head over to phspotorg slash club, you can learn more about the community. You can sign up either to the premium membership or the light membership, and we've enabled a seven day free trial for both of those memberships. So give it a try.

Speaker 1: 15:56

If you wanted to come to any of the events other than the orientation, the social hour and the peer session, which are available to everybody, all the other events and training programs are for premium members, so make sure you select premium, and then that seven day trial should be available there as well. So yeah, phspotorg slash club, I'd love to welcome you inside. You can explore more, see if this is a good fit for you, and that is it for our April update. We'll be back with another roundup next month, may, but in the meantime, I really hope to see you at one of our events inside the community or during the office hours. I also hold office hours. I just finished mine last month I'll definitely be holding well, I have the workshop office hours. So I'll be holding a couple of events this month and I hope to see you there. And, as always, thank you so much for listening in, for tuning in and keep taking inspired action towards your public health dreams, and we'll see you soon.