From Med School to Med Tech: Omar Khateeb’s Unconventional Journey

In this episode of "So You Want to Work in Healthcare," host Leigha Barbieri interviews Omar Khateeb, an entrepreneur and host of the "State of Medtech" podcast. Omar shares his unique journey from medical school dropout to successful medical device sales and marketing professional, and eventually to starting his own company. He discusses the challenges and rewards of making significant career changes, emphasizing the importance of intuition, curiosity, and continuous learning. Omar also offers insights into the value of networking, mentorship, and investing in oneself. This episode is packed with practical advice and inspirational stories for anyone considering a career in healthcare or entrepreneurship.

Links: 

• Make easy money with InCrowd surveys:  https://incrowdanswers.com/register/?referredId=32&referredDescription=helloimthepapodcast&utm_source=partner&utm_medium=podcast&utm_campaign=helloimthepa&utm_content=RegisterNow
• FREE Upgrade My LinkedIn Course: Upgrademylinkedin.com - Use code: OMARSFRIEND 
• Omar's website: https://khateebandco.com/
• Omar's Podcast: The State of Med Tech  
• Omar's Socials: @omar.m.khateeb 
• Living in the Light by Shakti Gawain: https://www.amazon.com/Living-Light-Guide-Personal-Creative/dp/1577310462

*Not Medical Advice. Our views do not reflect the views of our employers.*

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• Watch on YouTube: https://youtu.be/AWMKmDjxxc4?si=IXUG9mBg2vnH1i_-
• Socials: @soyouwanttoworkinhealthcare
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Transcript

Leigha Barbieri [0:13 - 1:56]: So you want to work in healthcare but youre not sure where to start. Im Leah, your host of this podcast and Im bringing you the inside scoop on healthcare professions, from doctors to pas to healthcare administrators and crnas. My goal is to let professionals tell their stories and give honest reviews of the careers they have chosen. Whether you're considering a job in healthcare or you simply have an interest in what we do, this show is for you. This podcast episode is sponsored by Incrowd. In Crowd is a healthcare market research organization focused on collecting feedback from diverse medical professionals on a wide range of healthcare topics through brief micro surveys. They partner with leading names in the life sciences industry and pair them with healthcare professionals who are instrumental in providing expert feedback to research. On average, most microsurveys take less than ten minutes to complete all of their micro surveys and qualitative interviews are paid, and you can even receive partial compensation if you screen out. Take part in as many or as few surveys as you'd like. When your schedule allows, participate with your mobile phone, computer or tablet when it is convenient for you. Research is anonymous and all information is protected by their data privacy compliance. I just took a survey yesterday. It took me about five minutes. I made $40. That's better pay than my job as a pa. Join Incrowd today. By clicking on the link, I'll share in this episode's show notes and earn money sharing your medical expertise in crowd is a brand within the Apollo intelligence family of companies. Welcome to the so you want to work in Healthcare podcast today. I'm excited to introduce Omar Khatib. He is an entrepreneur, a proud husband and father, and the host of the state of med tech podcast. So welcome, Omar. 

Omar Khateeb [1:57 - 2:09]: What a great intro. Leah, thank you so much. It's great to be here. Excited to be on your show. I've been following it for a while. You have some great guests, and as you can tell, one guest you don't want is my son who's crying in the background. 

Leigha Barbieri [2:10 - 2:15]: Well, I'm glad I included the father part in my intro because it was like right on cue. 

Omar Khateeb [2:15 - 2:20]: Proud father. As my son's losing his mind in the background, I am. I am a proud father. 

Leigha Barbieri [2:21 - 2:50]: So I just have a little disclaimer. This is not medical advice, and the views here on this podcast are not the views of my employer. So just had to throw that out there. So I always start with, why medicine? Why did you get into healthcare? Your answer, I know, is going to be a little different. You're actually the first non clinical professional that I'm interviewing, which is exciting, but I know that you started in med school, so tell us why you wanted to go to med school, I guess, and then we'll get into the change. 

Omar Khateeb [2:50 - 3:37]: Yeah. So I'm a first generation american. My dad's from Iraq. My mom's from Turkey. My father was a general surgeon with his own private practice. So growing up, seeing my dad in the heyday of general surgery and private practice is like eighties and nineties where I was like, you know, he runs his own business. He's the chair of surgery at a hospital. All these things. I was like, man, being a surgeon seems like such a great idea, you know, including all the respect you get and everything. It's one of those things at the moment. I think it's like lawyer, doctor, engineer, that if you mention any of those three, most families are just not going to question it and everyone just encourages you. So that's really what got me into medicine. And I guess for me, I loved biology growing up. I loved science. And so that's kind of how I got into medical school. 

Leigha Barbieri [3:37 - 3:43]: Wow. Okay. So did your dad do his training outside of the US then and then? 

Omar Khateeb [3:43 - 4:02]: No, he trained at the world famous knife fighting Institute, otherwise known as Cook County Hospital, in the seventies and eighties. Yeah. So he trained at Cook county. Yeah. So he saw some pretty wild things there again, like heyday of general surgery, where general surgeons literally, like, they had to do everything back then. Everything. Yeah. 

Leigha Barbieri [4:03 - 4:07]: So he kind of was your, I guess, inspiration in the beginning and then. 

Omar Khateeb [4:07 - 4:07]: Totally. 

Leigha Barbieri [4:08 - 4:15]: Yeah. Okay. Yeah. Were you in med school then when you made the change or did you finish med school? 

Omar Khateeb [4:16 - 5:15]: Yeah. So I tell people, you know, so I got accepted to Texas Tech University on an academic scholarship, spent about three years there. I repeated my first year. And it's one of those things where I think this is the first time I really, I think what gets you a lot of times into medical school or into healthcare, because, you know, going to nursing school, like, it's extremely competitive. No matter which one you pick, it's usually ego. Right. Your ego is pushing you and gets you to work those long hours. But once you're in, a lot of times we don't listen to our intuition. That was the first time my intuition was screaming like, this is not for you. I tell people, I don't have an md. I just got the m and I got out before I ended up with the doctor part. I left right before I was going to take my step one exam. My father was the most supportive person, which is, to this day really surprises me. Just because, you know, I'm first born son, you know that we had, like, dreams of me graduating, going to surgery, maybe we practice together and stuff, and so he was extremely supportive of that. 

Leigha Barbieri [5:15 - 5:18]: Oh, that's great. That must have been a relief. 

Omar Khateeb [5:18 - 6:26]: Yeah, no, totally, totally. But, you know, I think one of the things, and we kind of talked about, like, the idea of changing your career, is that when you. When you go into healthcare, because of how much we put in work wise, we obsess over it. We have to do. It's not like, no offense to any other profession. You want to be a lawyer, you go take the l side. You get into law school. To get into healthcare, you have to not only score high in your grades, you have to volunteer. You make it your identity when you change careers. Part of the reason why I think a lot of people don't shift in healthcare or change their careers, and it was very hard on me, is that your identity gets trapped up in it. So then, for the first, like, I think three years out of medical school, I kind of had this, like, I was depressed because I had this identity crisis where, you know, I had this unearned respect. You know, you tell people, oh, I'm a nursing student. I'm a medical student. Everything, immediately, people equate that with something in their head once you leave, and that's no longer your identity. And that's the identity I had from the age, I don't know, eight years old. I'm gonna be a surgeon. I'm gonna be a surgeon now. I'm a medical student now that's gone. I didn't know who I was. 

Leigha Barbieri [6:26 - 6:54]: Yeah. I mean, it must have been hard. I guess my question is, I know that there are probably a lot of people in your position who may not even ever admit it and might just go through with it because they feel like they have to. But was there one specific thing that made you feel like it wasn't the right move, or did it, overall just feel like, my passion's not in this somewhere else? Like, what? What was it that made you say, I'm done? 

Omar Khateeb [6:55 - 9:05]: I think what happens in life is your intuition, which we can call it a gut feeling, never pushes you. It's like a very subtle nudge, which is why when we have to listen to our intuition, it's really scary, because, like, we. There's, like, no details, there's no nothing. But when you get to a certain point where your intuition is literally screaming out loud, like something is off, you're out of character. And I think for me, when I was in medical school, I loved seeing patients. I loved it. But there's something about the process, everything. It just wasn't working for me. Like, a perfect example. I was an average student in medical school. My classmates, who were the best, studied for the exam. I did not study for the exam. I would literally go and read very deeply. So I understand physiological processes. How do I do this with the patient? Everything. That's not what you need to do. Like, you got to play the game. And I think the first rule, whether you're in school or especially in entrepreneurship or anything, you got to know the game, and you got to know the rules to the game and play by them. Otherwise you're going to constantly be behind. So I think that was what it was. It was out of character. And then I heard about somebody who was a resident, anesthesiology, residents at UCSF, amazing program. And this person went through something similar that I did, but they kept putting off, like, making that decision. They're like, oh, maybe I'll get better. And then they take step one. Maybe we'll get better, maybe get better. And now they're in residency, and that person said something like, I can't quit now. Like, I'm in too deep. And that really scared me. That really, really scared me because I was like, man, what if this does not get better? And, like, you know, it's not like I'm having a great time. Yeah, exactly. So, regret. I try and apply a regret minimization framework to my life. I think I accidentally did that in medical school. But now I am actively applying that framework of minimizing regret. Which part of the reason why, after twelve years serving in the industry and having a great career, I decided I am going to start all over again and launch a business. 

Leigha Barbieri [9:05 - 10:14]: Another big change. We'll talk about that in a little bit. I get it, though. Like, I. It's not this totally the same, because obviously I stayed in healthcare, but I was, like, totally on path to become a doctor. I was getting ready to study. I was studying for the MCAT, and I just had. I realized that I. I know this is the thing you're not supposed to say, right? But, like, I didn't want to take the test, you know, like, I. I didn't want to go through years of residency after years of med school, and I found Pa as an option. I was like, oh, this is for me. Like, this is it. I still get to take care of patients. I still get to have, like, a pretty good amount of medical knowledge and do the things that I think I love to do, and I get to do it with a surgeon in my case. So I kind of get it. And it's good that, you know, people say if you're not totally in it to, in healthcare and you don't, like, love what you're doing and you don't get excited by it, or if you're trying to just do it for the money, it's not going to work. 

Omar Khateeb [10:14 - 11:28]: Oh, 100%. I talk to students all the time, and people want mentorship. And I'm like, if you want to become a doctor because you think you can make really good money, there are other things you can do to make money. And I always tell people, ain't no money in easy things. Like, it's, if you want to get paid, you want to make good money. Even if you look at surgeons who are doing very well, like, they work, like, it requires a lot of work and sacrifice. But I think the worst. Let's talk about the worst advice. The worst advice that exists out there is follow your passion. It's the worst advice. Like, you shouldn't follow your path. You should follow, I think, what your interests are, and more importantly, like, what are you really good at that people are willing to pay money? You know, a lot of people are like, oh, I'm not passionate about this. I'm like, well, become the best in the world of that and make. And start making really good money. I promise you, you'll get real passionate about it. Yeah. But as an example, like, my father, when I talked about surgery, even now, he's 78 years old, and he would say, he's like, you know, when I'm doing general surgery and I'm looking at organs and the vasculature and the blood and all this stuff, like, it just. I can't believe that this exists. Like, who created this? Like, he gets excited when he talks about that, right? 

Leigha Barbieri [11:28 - 11:29]: Yeah. 

Omar Khateeb [11:29 - 11:32]: You know, so. And I think. I think that's really important. 

Leigha Barbieri [11:32 - 11:44]: Yeah, yeah. Getting excited, for sure. I mean, it's just, I get excited about ortho, but to a point, right. Like, I'm not gonna sacrifice parts of. 

Omar Khateeb [11:44 - 11:48]: My life to just ain't your identity. Right? Yeah, that's the thing. 

Leigha Barbieri [11:48 - 11:55]: It's not. It's not. So you were about to take your step one. You decided this wasn't for you. Where did you go next? What was your next move? 

Omar Khateeb [11:57 - 13:50]: I dropped out. And a big indication that you made the right decision sometimes is when you feel like a sense of relief, like weights being lifted off. Granted, it was very scary because I was like, man, I just derailed my life. I went from full scholarship, medical student, and my parents can brag about me to friends now. Like, I'm like, I'm just. I'm like some dude. I don't have. I don't have any. So my uncle and amazing man, doctor Bahij Nuehit, who is the chair of Ob GYN, he passed away a few years ago over at Tech, gave me really good advice. He said, listen, he's like, you will figure it out. Don't put so much pressure on yourself right now. Take a couple months off and just be open. Go to barnes and nobles, go read, go learn some things, and just. And everything will take care of itself. And it's almost like he gave me permission to do that. I needed somebody to do that because I felt like I was a screw up and I had to do something. So I did do that. And then that's when I was like, I really like talking to people. I love to patient encounters, because you never know who you're going to run into when you open the door. So I was like, maybe I do something in med device with sales, and I couldn't get in right away. So I was like, okay, let me. Like, I did door to door sales in my hometown, calling on doctor's offices, which is really humiliating and humbling because they're like, oh, aren't you Doctor Katib's son? And then, oh, aren't you in medical school? And then after we get through that, he's like, oh, so what are you doing here? I'm like, oh, I work for XYZ company, and I'm here, you know, very, very humbling. But I think the more you start to embrace the sucky part of the journey, when you start forgetting about the destination, you start focusing on the growth. And, hey, this is part of my journey, and I just need to embrace this. A movie. Things actually get a lot better. 

Leigha Barbieri [13:50 - 13:52]: Did you like medical device sales? 

Omar Khateeb [13:53 - 15:17]: Yeah, totally. It was great. Because first off, I'm very big on not believing in rules, right. I think with rules, a lot of rules are made by people no smarter than you and I. And so there is this rule in my industry where they said, oh, you know, you don't have any sales experience. You're gonna have to start out selling, like, random disposables and stuff, those no way implants and med devices, especially not robotics, because back then, there's only two. Well, I was able to get into a surgical robotics company. I just did not choose to believe that, right? I think there's a big difference between facts and truth. You know, facts are like, you know, they exist in the world, but when I take those facts and make my own truth behind it, that's how you see the most, like, amazing stories in entrepreneurship and everything happen, right? Because people decide to create their own truth and perception and act on it. And so getting into med device sales, where I was doing robotics and I was covering surgeries and everything, I love it because I took what I knew from healthcare. So that way it wasn't a complete wash, but I just applied it in a new way. Right. And I think that's a lot of times when you think about changing careers, creating something net new takes a lot, and sometimes you need to do that in life, but a lot of times it's better to take what you've already built on and skill stack and say, you know, if I put these skills all together, maybe if I bring them over here, it can work really well and just try that way. 

Leigha Barbieri [15:17 - 15:41]: Yeah, it's smart. Also, you probably, in a way, maybe you didn't have sales experience, but you had the experience that most sales reps probably didn't have. And that's like an extensive education in anatomy, biology, all the things you need to explain to a doctor, surgeon what needs to be done or what's being done wrong or right. 

Omar Khateeb [15:41 - 17:08]: Yeah. Well, so I'll say this, is that, you know, not every rep is like this, but I worked with the best of the best in the industry. There are reps that I personally believe know more about a procedure and the anatomy and everything than the doctor, and they're really, really, really good. I'll tell you, Leo, what, and I think most people in healthcare have this. The superpower that I left medical school with wasn't clinical knowledge. The superpower I left medical school with was the ability to teach myself anything. You know, I don't know. I can't speak to nursing or pa school or anything else. But like in medical school, the very first two years, no matter where you're at, you teach yourself medicine. Yeah, you have some faculty lecture thing. You really teach medicine? Like I have Harrison's internal medicine guidance, physiology, Robin's pathology, pathology back there a few more. I read those books inside. I had to teach myself medicine just like my classmates. So when I left getting into the business world, I was like, man, what books do you guys read? And they didn't really have many answers, so I just went and I taught myself a lot, and so I was just doing what I thought was normal, like, oh, like, I'm in a new field. I gotta read the texts and apply the frameworks and everything. And so then, out of the blue, within a year, management in my company heard about this kid in Texas who's amazing at marketing and market development. Right. All I was doing was reading books on marketing and strategy and applying them, you know? 

Leigha Barbieri [17:09 - 17:09]: Yeah. 

Omar Khateeb [17:09 - 17:26]: So I think that's a big superpower for people who work in healthcare, which is we learn how to take in copious amounts of information, apply it constantly. Right. In a very high stress environment. I think that's a superpower a lot of people don't realize. I mean, think. Think about some of the exams that you have to sit down and study for. Like, those aren't easy exams at all. 

Leigha Barbieri [17:26 - 17:39]: No. So much information at once. And, yeah, it's so true. I never even thought about that. Like, it's just obvious that if we're going to go into a new field or learn something new, you read about it, or you, or in some use, research it in some way. 

Omar Khateeb [17:39 - 18:11]: Right, exactly. And I'd say reading. Reading really is a superpower. If you look at actually three people come to mind, Bill Gates, Warren Buffett, and I think, Mark Zuckerberg. Even when they're asked, like, hey, if you were to have, like, a superpower, would it be? They all answered, like, the ability to, like, just read a lot faster. Warren Buffett, 80% of his day, 90% of his days just spent, like, reading, reading and devouring information. So that way he's able to make decisions, like, on a split of a second on the right ones, and then commit to them for, like, decades at a time. 

Leigha Barbieri [18:11 - 18:37]: Yeah. It's a good trait to have or a good goal to have. I am admittedly a very slow reader, but when I actually am, like, applying myself and reading, it's. It really changes everything, honestly. Like, it changes how, but just as personal for me. Like, I'm on my phone less, like, I'm watching tv less, you know? So are you good? 

Omar Khateeb [18:38 - 18:47]: Yes. My son, I tried to do that as slick as possible. My son was walking on the side of the house, so I just went and closed the window. 

Leigha Barbieri [18:47 - 18:57]: Okay. Like, I knew it had to do with a kid. Yeah. Reading fast would be a superpower. I would love to have, for sure. 

Omar Khateeb [18:57 - 19:42]: Go to YouTube and YouTube. My name, Omar Khatib. How to read fast. I have a YouTube channel that was a book show, and the main video is literally how to actually read. So I took all the books I read on speed reading, and everything and actually came up with a format that makes it easy. And I think the key to reading books is knowing that at least non fiction books, business books, 80% of it is garbage. So really applying Pareto's principle of 20% of that book is going to give you 80% of the yield. So the key is, how do you find that 20% and getting really good at just flipping through books and knowing how to read them and get the information you need, and you come back, and that's why I'm a big fan of a physical library. Like, you're seeing barely, like, a 10th of the library that I have. 

Leigha Barbieri [19:42 - 19:42]: Oh, wow. 

Omar Khateeb [19:42 - 20:35]: But, yeah, I feel like books, it's a really magical technology. You know, we underestimate books, but I tell people there's the magic behind books is when you buy them and you throw them up on the shelf, just like, ideas. Like, people don't have ideas. Ideas have people. That's why, like, one idea can exist, you know, somehow, magically, with a bunch of people who have never met before. The same thing with books. And sometimes when I go to my shelf to pick a book, I'm not picking the book. The book is picking me. And so I recommend to people, build a library, because I'll tell you, whenever I need to solve a problem or just something's going on in my life, I just go and stand in front of my library, and I use a little bit of my intuition. I start, like, looking, and all of a sudden, somehow this book picks me. I pick up that book, and I. And I open it. I'm like, this is exactly what I need right now. And it's a book, usually, that I bought four or five years ago that I haven't yet read yet. 

Leigha Barbieri [20:35 - 20:53]: Cool. Oh, I love that. I need. I am building my library now. It's very small, but I just need a bigger house. But I love that you said that, because it's a different answer. Like, I have never gotten that answer before. It's like med school teaches you how to teach yourself. So cool. 

Omar Khateeb [20:53 - 21:37]: Yeah, no, totally. I think anything in healthcare, because back in the day, before I was married, I was a single bachelor. There's a nurse I dated. I saw the copious amount of texts that she had to read. So it's not like there's, I think, misnomer that medical school is the hardest. Maybe it is in some ways, but pas, nurses, they all need to learn that level of depth. And I would even argue sometimes that I don't know much about pas, but, like, nurses, I feel like, sometimes they have to learn even more because they're having to learn across, like, multiple specialties. And, you know, you can be a nurse in one area one day, and then you have to go cover case something for something else, you know? So it is. Yeah, it really is. 

Leigha Barbieri [21:37 - 21:46]: And they're right in there. They're, like, in the. In the mix and dealing with all the drama, too. So I don't know how the nurses do it, but I commend them. 

Omar Khateeb [21:47 - 21:49]: Big shot shout out to nurses. 

Leigha Barbieri [21:49 - 21:59]: Yeah, for real. All right, so how long did you stay in medical device sales, and what did you start with? Like, what specialty were you in? 

Omar Khateeb [21:59 - 23:20]: Yeah, so I think I've always been in medical device sales. I just changed my title. So when I was an actual rep, I was a rep for almost two years, like, a year and a half. And I started off in robotic surgery, specifically spine and neurosurgery. So I was with a company called Mazzor Robotics. So world's first robotic spine company. And then I got promoted into marketing, which, for me, a lot of marketing in med device is product management, which is not marketing in my mind. Marketing in my mind is sales at scale, meaning that I can't talk to the customer. I have to come up with the right messaging, the right visuals, and everything that they'll see it. It'll immediately resonate with them and uncover an underlying desire. And so that's the kind of market I went into. And coincidentally, because of working at this robotics company, I kind of got this bug where I'm only attracted. And even now in my business, I'm only attracted to really new, expensive, complex, first of its kind technology, because it takes a very special type of approach to sell and market it, versus, like, I don't. Like, I'm not like a me too product guy. Like, some company comes to me, he's like, hey, we got this, you know, gadget or gizmo, even robot. There's certain robotic companies I will not take on as clients because I'm like, you know, this is like a poor man's, you know, XYz robot, for example. I will mention company name, but, you know. 

Leigha Barbieri [23:21 - 23:34]: Yeah, I get it. I get it. And then when. How long were you in sales and marketing before you decided to make another change and start your own company? 

Omar Khateeb [23:34 - 25:05]: My w two med device career lasted about 1213 years. And in that process, like I had, if you scope out and look at my career, the radical changes were dropping out of medical school and then dropping out of startup corporate America life. Start my own company. But within that, I think it's important in your career that you have to every year do something big that's very different and uncomfortable because then you start normalizing it. I think that if you look at evolution, it's not necessarily the organisms that are the fastest or strongest that survive, it's usually the ones that are most adaptable, which means you handle change. I worked in a startup environment where there's always a lot of change. It was chaos and everything that became normal. You have to get used to going to bed with fires going on around you. It's a certain type of person that can do that. Within my own career, I made a lot of radical changes, you know, so I went from marketing manager to deciding, hey, I'm going to be the first like head of growth marketing in our industry, which is more something that's more of a tech terminology. And I sort of introduced that to the entire industry five, six years ago. And finally now, like, I have some proteges and then some other people who are taking that playbook and like making growth a thing in med tech. So yeah, that was kind of a long answer, but essentially it was twelve years and that's when I started. Decided to start my own company. 

Leigha Barbieri [25:06 - 25:16]: Okay, cool, so and what made you want to start your own company? I mean, it sounds like it was what you just were speaking about, but. 

Omar Khateeb [25:16 - 25:24]: Yeah, it's like, you know, starting your own company is just like getting married and have, or, and, or having a baby. There's like never a good time to do it. 

Leigha Barbieri [25:24 - 25:24]: Yeah. 

Omar Khateeb [25:25 - 30:13]: And again, something I want to recommend to your listeners and let me see if it's. There's a book that I recommend called living in the light by Shakti Gwan that I read a lot of books. This is one of the books that's changed my life. Which teaches you how to actually train your intuition because of what happened in medical school. That was such a traumatic thing. I said, I can't make a decision like that. Again, I constantly trained my intuition to pay attention to it. Again, as I said before, listening to your intuition is the scariest thing because it's very subtle, it does not give you details right, but it's the right thing to do. But following it is the scariest thing to this day. And so I left med device and I was in software for a year because I knew that like, oh, if I go and get software experience, like I'm going to be the most attractive. Like, can't. Like, that's just like insane experience coming back into med tech and this is 2021. I was getting all kinds of offers, like, even offers to be vp of marketing at publicly traded companies. So my ego was, like, going nuts. Like, oh, like title, money, all the things that an ego wants, details, but deep down inside, subtly, like, I was just like, I know that feeling, which is just like, I don't think that should do that. And again, so just to add it, following your intuition is the scariest thing you'll ever do. At the time, I didn't have a bunch of savings or anything. I just moved into a house. My wife was two, three months pregnant. No, she was three months pregnant. At that time, I didn't have a business model, nothing. And I remember I went and talked to somebody, because I was like, sometimes when you have that feeling, that intuition, what you have to do is explore it with another person and give it a little bit more qualitative data. So I went and talked to somebody. It was just a friend. It was purely not coincident. I don't think any coincidence really happened. And he said, hey, he's like, Omar, you've been going hard for over a decade. You haven't taken a break. Why don't you just take a break for four, five months and just consult or something? I'm like, oh, yeah, I could do that. And then that's when I started talking about it and verbalizing. So you gotta. That's why the first amendment is so important in this country, because when you speak, that's what articulates and creates thoughts in your head, right? And so those vibrations that came out of my mouth into my ears and into my wife's ears, you know, about, like, yeah, I think I should do this. And I was like, but if I'm gonna consult, I gotta market myself. And I've like, I've never been able to market myself, ever. Like, now, like, nobody's holding me back. My wife, she's like, you should start your own business. Like, I've told you should always do that. And I remember how scared I felt, because we're not, like, in the summer thing. This is in November, so holiday season. Like, this is a terrible time, right? And so I followed my intuition, and in my mind, perceptually, I just knew that I was like, you know what? And this happened before in my life where I started a business, but I didn't really come out. This was a burn the boats moment, because I was like, I got a baby coming in May. I was like, I need to make this work. This is my one chance. And I kept thinking about my soon to be son. I was like, am I going to not do this? And my son's 18 years old, and I'm going to tell my son that, yeah, your dad was a coward because I was afraid to start a business, because I was afraid to incur some debt. I didn't know how to get health insurance. Like, nonsense like that. So I decided to go full force. And in December, I just dedicated the month, kind of like what Doctor Nue had told me when, when he was alive. He said, just be free and open. Just kind of be, you know, so I just explored for December. I was like, my goal right now is just, I'm going to read, I'm going to talk to some people, explore, and just kind of figure out, like, okay, what's the first step? And then that led to me getting an idea of like, oh, I'll launch a course. I presold that course. I didn't even make anything that put a, you know, I think maybe four or five grand in my pocket from one webinar, right? Gave me some encouragement, like, kind of, you know, got me some momentum, you know, and there are definitely hills and valleys since then, but that's essentially how I started. And I spent a lot of time explaining that because if your listeners replay this and listen to that, there's a lot of insight there that they have to pay attention to in themselves. When it comes to when is the time to change your career? Because the time that you should change it is the time when it is most scary for you. It's not this easy. Oh, I'm just going to ease it. It doesn't exist. Whether you believe in God or the universe, great things in life are given when you have to go through the fires of hell first, and that's usually within yourself. 

Leigha Barbieri [30:13 - 30:59]: I believe it. I believe in that so much and just not myself because I don't have kids. But I do see a pattern here where, like, I have some friends and colleagues who made a change, a really risky change, either when they were pregnant or their wives were pregnant or they just had a baby and everyone was like, you shouldn't do this right now, but it, like, lights a fire under your ass. But it does. And it's, and I think that's probably, like, part of maybe what made you successful and at least in the beginning or that pushed you to do it. But let's get into then what you are doing now. When did you start your company? What is it called? Tell our listeners the name of it and what you're doing and what it provides. 

Omar Khateeb [30:59 - 33:16]: Yeah, totally. So my company's, you know, main name or the holding company is kind of boring. It's just Katib and company. You can go to Katibanco.com, and essentially, there's two parts of it. The flywheel. Right? Part of it. Flywheel is something that, like, you know, when you see those things that kids have that spin in the air, as air goes through, it spins faster. My flywheel is my podcast, which is the state of med tech. State of Medtech is the number one podcast in the medtech industry, based on downloads, reviews, and subscribers. And so in that podcast, I have investors, I have clinicians, I have CEO's and startups. For those who are in the spine world, Larry Lankey, who's a legend in the spine world as a surgeon, he came on the show recently. And so I do that podcast to create content, to also have a media arm. So if you want to learn a lot about business, don't read business books. You should actually read what was done in history. You can learn a lot about wartime propaganda and everything. So there's a reason why owning a news station is valuable. So by owning a media asset, I put myself at the foundation of all business. This is multimillion dollar advice here. If you look at the pyramids of Egypt, that foundation is unmovable. That foundation of business is attention. You cannot persuade unless you get attention. You can't do anything unless you get attention. There's energy behind it, which is why social media companies are worth billions of dollars. So the podcast serves as that piece where I have my pulse on the market. I interact with the most high leveraged, highly sought after experts and leaders in my field, and it serves as a way for me to identify companies that I can push into my commercial offering, where either a company is trying to raise money and or commercialize a product, in which case they come to me. And we do this specifically through dynamic content on social media. And that's essentially what I do. My belief is, in order to change and revolutionize how we sell on market medical devices, digital health technology, et cetera, in our industry, we have to do it through digital channels that scale and in a way that's dynamic and engaging. Showing up in person at the scrub sync to sell doesn't work anymore. 

Leigha Barbieri [33:17 - 33:35]: Yeah, I know. So who or what kind of company would be, like a typical client of yours, a medical device company, or one of these kind of tech startups? Like, I've done work with one of a startup called Mycare, and they do, you know, like, wearables yeah. 

Omar Khateeb [33:35 - 34:14]: Any, anybody which would qualify as b two b. So business to business. So a med device company, biotech, digital health, if they have to sell to clinicians, that's what my company does. Can we help you if you're doing b two c? Yes. I prefer not, though, because, you know, you have to also be very good about identifying, like, what is, what is your superpower? Right. And again, when you start getting more successful, you get a lot more opportunities. And I think the key, key to wealth and success in life is also learning when to say no and to start getting very, very good at it. 

Leigha Barbieri [34:14 - 34:14]: Yeah. 

Omar Khateeb [34:14 - 34:15]: You know. 

Leigha Barbieri [34:15 - 34:18]: Mm hmm. I've learned that the hard way, so. 

Omar Khateeb [34:18 - 34:20]: We all have to learn it the hard way. Right. 

Leigha Barbieri [34:20 - 34:20]: Yeah. 

Omar Khateeb [34:20 - 35:41]: You know, intuitively we know this, but then, like, you know, I'll tell you, like, I'm, if you haven't been able to tell from the conversation, like, I. I'm very much into, I guess, sort of the metaphysical and psychological that you can't explain. And a lot of times, like, I'll be acting out a process or I'm consciously saying I'm like, I know this is not what I should be doing, and I'm doing it anyway. And I'm like, all right, well, if, if I'm not going to teach myself, reality will teach me a lesson, and then I'll change, you know? So, like, that just happened recently where, you know, there's some, you know, systems of processes that I didn't have in place, and I was like, I really gotta take care of that because if not, something's gonna go wrong. Well, something went wrong this past week. Oh, no, not like terrible, but like, it was kind of, I was like, oh, I was like, yeah, I knew this would happen a few months ago. Why didn't I take action on it? I think the most important conversationally that anyone's going to ever have is not a conversation with you or me or anybody. It's going to be a conversation with yourself. And the more you're able to have a conversation with yourself and understand your own mind, like, why do I make certain decisions? Why do I have certain reactions to certain people or what they say, etcetera, and understanding that is really important. You know, it's almost like the unlock to the next level of the universe. 

Leigha Barbieri [35:42 - 35:57]: Yeah, yeah. I think a lot of the same way as you, where it's like, there's, oh, something happens. It happens for a reason. There's something behind it, like you said, whether it's universe or God. But, yeah, I'm loving all of this insight you're giving us here. 

Omar Khateeb [35:57 - 38:07]: I'll just make a quick comment, comment on that. But like if you look at, I'm looking up on my shelf, it's like Viktor Frankl's man search for meaning, where this guy was literally in an Auschwitz Nazi concentration camp, right? And he realized that people who survived, who seemed like they're not as weak and they're weak and not that strong and everything, and the people who died who seemed really strong, the people who survived was because they're able to create meaning behind the suffering that they're in. So one of the keys to life, I think, in success and career change and everything is perception really is reality. Like you get to decide what this means to you. At the end of the day, I have no control of what's going to happen outside in that world. I have no control in my own house to some extent because I don't have full autonomy over all these people. The only thing I have control of is my own mind and taking this qualitative data that's occurring in my reality and saying, well, what do I want this to mean to me? So in my first year of business when revenue is going great and everything, but then I hit some hard spots. I could have interpreted that as, oh, you know what? And this is when the ego really comes back to get just like, you know, you were never good enough. Like, you should have, you should have taken that job, you should have done this. You see what happened now? The ego is the first thing to turn on you. Or I reframed it and I was like, you know what? This is happening because this is part of the come up. If my life is a movie, no movie is interesting where it's like, oh, Omar Khatib decides to quit corporate America and startup life and start his own company and then make millions of dollars. That's a boring movie. There's got to be some turns right? And so when things start going wrong, I start telling myself like, oh, great. I'm like, there's lessons for me to learn here so that I correct them and take action and move up a level in this game of life. And when things don't go my way, I always tell them like, this is being sacrificed for something greater. The universe owes me. So anytime stuff really hits the fan, I'm like, that sucks. Gotta figure out like how to fix that. I was like, but the universe owes me something now. And whether that's true or not doesn't matter. 

Leigha Barbieri [38:07 - 38:09]: It's the way you think about it. 

Omar Khateeb [38:10 - 38:27]: Exactly. That's exactly right. That's all. We have control of somebody that was on my show who maybe I would love for you to have him on. I'm happy to connect you. Doctor David Vago, who's the pioneer of contemplative neuroscience out of Harvard, he talks a lot about this concept. 

Leigha Barbieri [38:27 - 38:44]: Yeah, I'm so into that stuff real quick. I just want to make sure I didn't miss it. After med school, did you take any other courses or get your MBA or go back to business school, or did you kind of just like, figure all this out as you were going, reading. 

Omar Khateeb [38:44 - 40:43]: All of the great questions? I did not go to business school. I didn't get an MBA. I did take courses, like when I was in between, like after my first job, like there was an acquisition, I was laid off. And so I took this course by Seth Godin called the alt MBA. It's like an ulterior MBA. It's not an MBA, by the way, but it's a month long course. The one thing I do recommend to people, and I wish I learned this sooner in my career, which is reading books are great, but the best investment you can make out there, especially in your twenties, is in yourself. Take that extra money, go take courses, go get an executive coach, go to a conference, and there's something magical that happens where the more money you spend, the more expensive this education you get is, the more you get back from it, minus MbA. I'm not very crazy about those, by the way. Depending on what you're doing, if you're going to go work in corporate America and you want to like, climb the corporate laptop, get an MBA, it's going to help you out a lot. But even an MBA, when I surveyed all the people I know who went to Stanford, Harvard and everything, the value of the MBA isn't the education. The value of the MBA is the network you get. And I decided not to. Yeah, I decided not to pursue that because I'm the best networker around. I know literally how to make friends with anybody. So I was like, I don't really need that MBA. You know, there's a lot of value in it, by the way. I don't want to dismiss it, but it wasn't, it was not for me. So I do want to encourage people. Like, yes, definitely read books, but, you know, you're so much like, I think spending five grand or ten grand to work with like an expert or specialist, even for like two, three months, coaching wise, shortcuts your way a lot. That's the only time traveling mechanism I can discover these days, which is you can, you know, go figure something out on your own, and I'm a pretty smart guy. Or you go pay somebody and they teach you all these things over a weekend, and now you've just bought back, like, maybe six months of your life, right? Just in a weekend. 

Leigha Barbieri [40:43 - 40:44]: Yeah. 

Omar Khateeb [40:44 - 40:44]: You know? 

Leigha Barbieri [40:44 - 40:45]: Yeah. 

Omar Khateeb [40:45 - 41:16]: This is why. Like, just a. Just a side note, as an. As an example of what I mean by this. There is an entrepreneurial mastermind that I'm a part of where, you know, every week they have a Saturday call. There's, like, a little portal where, like, courses and stuff are uploaded, and then every quarter, they meet in Miami for a weekend. Okay. Pay $1,500 a month for that. Okay. And a lot of times, I'm not, like, learning anything specific. A lot of times, it's literally just the energy of talking to these people and interacting with them so that I look at my business in a different way. 

Leigha Barbieri [41:16 - 41:45]: Sounds like a lot of money, but I understand why it's so worth it. I mean, even when. What was that app that came out during COVID That, like, took off, and now I feel like nobody talks about it. Clubhouse. I loved being on Clubhouse. It was like that. That outlet, it was just so valuable. Like, the information was getting from strangers, and I loved it. I don't know. Does it still. Is it still around? Are people even. 

Omar Khateeb [41:46 - 42:48]: It took a big face plan. What I would say is, like, there's a lot of value. And again, if you look at history, they did stuff like this, you know, where they do, like, quote unquote masterminds. But it's like, I see it as me being part of a professional country club. You know, this is part of the reason why people love country clubs. Like, it's like, oh, why do rich people love country clubs? It's because when you're there, you're with other rich people who make a lot more money than you, and, you know, you hear something, you're like, oh, wait, that's how you make more money. This way, a lot of times, it just takes a simple conversation, and I think that the world, God, universe rewards you, the more vulnerable you are. So in this group, we are very open about money. How much are we making? How much have we made, etcetera? The more open I've been about my numbers, which, again, there's people in this group who are like, I'm the second oldest guy in there. Everybody in this group are in their twenties, and some of these guys are making. There's a couple brothers in there, they're 25 years old, they do about six mil a month. 

Leigha Barbieri [42:48 - 42:48]: Wow. 

Omar Khateeb [42:48 - 43:39]: Right? But being open with those people and saying, hey, like, here's my business, here's what I'm doing, like, what's your thoughts? And they'll identify something where I'm like, I didn't think about that. Like, something very simple. And so I think the more curious you become, where you're very aggressive about seeking knowledge out. And more importantly, I don't care about my emotions or how it makes me feel. What I care about is the truth. Right? And sometimes all you need is just to be given a different perspective and, and you just take that little perspective and add it to your mental model. And now, like, the world is different. And then I think that's part of the reason why maybe consciously or subconsciously, you started this podcast, which is kind of bring those perspectives of like, healthcare and different career changes and everything, because sometimes it just takes one sentence to kind of flip an idea on its head and now, like, you're almost like a different person because you're acting differently in the world. 

Leigha Barbieri [43:39 - 44:02]: Yeah, it's so true. And it's true in all aspects of life. Like, you can be having this one way to think about an important aspect of your life and then you have a random conversation with a friend you haven't seen in ten years and you're like, how did they just say the same thing, but in a slightly different way? And now I, like, my mind is blown, you know, it just takes that sometimes. 

Omar Khateeb [44:02 - 44:42]: Yeah, and sometimes, I mean, that's why I love reading books is that, you know, there'll be one page in a book you'll find and it, and it's all you need. And that's kind of the magic, I think, of continuous learning and education and it's a great time to be alive because look, you can go and download chat GPT into your, you know, as an app on your phone and go get one of the GPTs that are for certain books or certain ideas or whatever, or you can make one and upload PDF's, have a conversation with like, chat GPT four, and then like, that'll really blow your mind, you know, because then it asks you questions. You're like, oh, I didn't think about that. 

Leigha Barbieri [44:42 - 44:54]: You know, I have not had a conversation with chat GPT yet. AI scares me. I'm like, I love it and I hate it. Right? It's so helpful, but at the same time I'm like, oh, is this going to be the end of us? 

Omar Khateeb [44:54 - 45:07]: No, I don't think so. Look, I'll make. I make this, like, crazy prediction. AI is not going to, like, directly make anybody, like, unemployed in the next ten years, maybe even 20. I personally believe that. 

Leigha Barbieri [45:07 - 45:27]: We talked about your podcast, and it sounds awesome. I did listen to a couple tidbits of an episode, but I have to listen to a bit more. What I ask everybody is what they love about what they're currently doing or their current job and what they don't love about it. So what do you love and hate about what you're currently doing? 

Omar Khateeb [45:28 - 49:38]: I love and hate that question. Okay, so I'm going to play along, and I'm going to give an answer. I guess what I love most about what I'm doing now is that, granted it's financially better for me, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. It gives me the most important thing, which is freedom, I think, being an entrepreneur, and especially I'm not a venture backed entrepreneur, meaning that nobody's given me money. This is all my money, or I've taken out a loan from the bank and stuff, whatever, but it's all about freedom. I make, I don't know, like, I made a dumb decision last year that cost me $10,000, right? Yeah. You know, I'll make ten k back. That's not a problem. What I don't get back is my time. And so what I love about what I do is that literally, even though, like, there's a little bit of an interruption any given day, I spend more time with my son in between meetings, just like, you know, I'll take them out to play or go for a quick walk or just, you know, see him in the hallway. Then most people see their kids in a week. I could spend quality time with my wife. I could do what I do whatever I want, whenever I want, with whoever. Whoever I want. So I think that's. That's something that I love. I'm very, very grateful for that. I worked hard to get to that point, but I'm grateful for that. What do I hate? I don't know if I. I don't know if I hate anything, and I don't want to say that I hate it, but I'll be. I'll be honest, which is sometimes I know it's hard, and I know that what I'm going through is certain growing pains still doesn't make it easy sometimes. Some days I wake up and I'm like, man, can't this just go, like, zero to 100? Like, can I just get there. Can I just shortcut my way? And whether it's God or the universe, it's just not like that. As I always say, like, ain't no money in easy things, you know? And, you know, on the same token, there's no fulfillment in easy things either. Like, you want a great marriage, you want great relationship with your children. You want a great career, you want a great friendship thing. It takes work. It takes pain and suffering. It takes reflection and growing pains. And so sometimes that's the part where I'm like, can it be just a little bit easier? Can it just, like, you know, can I just get a break? You know? Yeah. But again, this is where. That's the ego. The ego is never going to go away. I think it's important to know why the ego exists and feed it what it needs. But this is where it becomes more obsession with the destination, right? Versus. It's a constant battle of, like, embracing the process and journey, which is so cliche to say, but it really is true. It's like sometimes, to quote one of our generation's great philosopher and stoic minds, Mike Tyson, who very beautifully, I might add, said that discipline is very important. Discipline will get you the freedom you want, but discipline means doing the things that you hate like you love them. And I think that we're all serving, again, if you want to see this as a theological or metaphysical thing, we're serving as our own symbols to our immediate friends and family. So it's almost like to my wife and to my son, I serve as some symbol in this house. And so even the days that suck, like, I have to, you know, I have to keep it together. I got to keep going forward and pushing. That doesn't mean I don't have bad days and I'm not human. But as a response, my responsibility to my family as a husband, as a father, as a son is that I have to show strength and wit and humor and all these things. And on days that I can't do that, it's not on me to go and, like, throw my dirty laundry on the floor, you know, for my wife to handle. Sometimes I need, you know, that's where I think, again, this is going to sound sexist, but I think it's true. I think men are really bad about this, you know, which is like going to other men and opening up and saying, hey, man, like, you know, I'm having a really bad day, you know, like, I. I don't think I'm being a good husband. I don't think I'm being good at this or that. Like, what should I do? You know, a lot of times, they just kind of pent that up. 

Leigha Barbieri [49:38 - 49:38]: Oh, yeah. 

Omar Khateeb [49:38 - 49:39]: So. 

Leigha Barbieri [49:39 - 49:40]: I know. 

Omar Khateeb [49:40 - 49:46]: Yeah. That was a great question. It unlocked an answer. I don't know if you're expecting, but. 

Leigha Barbieri [49:46 - 49:52]: No, it's great. It's great. I'm loving this conversation. I do want to wrap it up with one more question. 

Omar Khateeb [49:53 - 49:55]: Yeah, I'm on your time. I'm having a blast. 

Leigha Barbieri [49:55 - 50:03]: So awesome. And I feel like you've already given so much advice and so many little, like, great little nuggets, but ideas. 

Omar Khateeb [50:03 - 50:09]: I have no advice. I only have ideas to share. I'm nobody to be giving advice, so. 

Leigha Barbieri [50:09 - 50:32]: I won't say advice then. So what ideas would you give someone who's maybe struggling in a PA. School? Med school. Right. They're in school. They're not loving it. What advice would you give to them to make that scary career move? And then what advice would you give to someone who's, like, an aspiring entrepreneur or to be in the position you're in now? 

Omar Khateeb [50:32 - 52:29]: Yeah. For somebody who's in medical school, Pascal, everything, it's gonna suck. Like, it's just part of it, right? There's no getting around that. Sometimes I would really explore, why do you feel that way? And then when you think in the future, like, picture yourself as a clinician, is that the wife you want? And sometimes you just have to go look. Go look at the people, right, who are living that life. So, like, for me, at one point, I was, like, in startup world, and part of it was starting to suck. And I was like, oh, I gotta do this and that. Like, I didn't like the politics. Sometimes I was like, oh, one day I get to be a vp, maybe even a CEO. Then I looked at those people's lives and I was like, man, I don't. None of that excites me. I mean, they're making more money, and they got, like, you know, this title and everything. I was like, but they. They're on the hook for a lot more responsibility. I was like, they're like. Like, my life is kind of hard now. I was like, they're getting calls on the weekends from board members and stuff. I was like, I don't think I want that. So I think the more curious, I recommend just being really curious. But again, like, this is the part that's hard, which is, again, teasing apart your ego from your intuition. So that's why I tell your listeners, go by living in the light, by Shakti, go on read that book, okay? And bonus content. Go to Spotify and look up how to stay motivated by zig Ziglar. That audiobook saved my life. Listen to it 16 times. It'll get programmed in your head that's going to serve you for life. So. Yeah, but for a lot of things, there's no way of getting around it. Just like, it's part of, it's like, hey, you want to, like, I want to get jacked. I'm in pretty damn good shape, but I want to get jacked. You know what that's going to take? It's going to take me, like, tracking my macros and, like, you know, weighing things on a scale and, like, working out harder. You know, that's what it takes. There's no getting around it, you know? And then your other question was, like, for entrepreneurs, my advice to them. 

Leigha Barbieri [52:29 - 52:31]: Yeah. Or aspiring entrepreneurs. 

Omar Khateeb [52:33 - 54:11]: Yeah. Nobody knows what they're doing. Nobody knows what they're doing. So there's not like, you know, it's just, again, like, it's like having a baby. You know, you can get advice from other parents, you can read books and everything, but you just got to have the baby and then you'll figure it out as you go. But I think, like, in career, in entrepreneurship, in life, the best thing that you can do is just be aggressively curious about, you know, being, about finding out, read books, talk to people, just be very good and be open about looking at things. And you have to get some point, have a filter. Like, I don't take. I don't take advice from everybody, but I do take into consideration, say, how does this fit into my model? Does it agree with what I believe is to be true? You know? And so I think that's the best thing I can tell people, which is be curious and like, look, it's 2024. The world has changed. So, like, for example, a lot of surgeons reach out to me for advice, and a lot of times I tell them, like, look, like you might hate your job, right? Let's say you're burning everything. Don't throw the baby out with a bath water. Maybe what you need to do is do something at night or on the weekends that you look forward to that your job enhances. This is where a lot of surgeons, they work with me or they come to me for help because they want to, like, work with startups, and now, because they're advising startups and they're going to events and, like, getting involved in tech and everything. Now, their day job is great because it enhances their ability to do more of that. Right. So now, like, nothing changed except their perception of it. Right. So that's what I would recommend. 

Leigha Barbieri [54:11 - 54:35]: Cool. Yeah, I could really relate to that for sure. Just having something to look forward to in general, even if it doesn't involve medicine. Like, just something else. For me, it's, you know, sometimes it's. It's social media and being creative, and sometimes it's just like playing soccer or whatever it is, you know? But like, yeah, I think these are great ideas for our listeners, not necessarily. 

Omar Khateeb [54:35 - 55:07]: Advice for anybody who listened all the way to this part. Like, you stayed to the very end. So I'll give you something like a. Like a nice, nice thing to use whether you're in school or not. I think LinkedIn is such a powerful platform. It helped me launch my business. So I think using it and using it effectively is important. I created a simple coursing. Go over through the weekend. I'm going to give it to you guys for free. It's like $200, but use this code. So go to www.upgrademylinkton.com, use the code. Omar's friend. And yeah, just go through the course and apply what you learn on LinkedIn. 

Leigha Barbieri [55:07 - 55:10]: Awesome. That's so nice. Thank you for doing that. 

Omar Khateeb [55:11 - 55:11]: Totally. 

Leigha Barbieri [55:11 - 55:25]: I was just reading about your LinkedIn course right before this, so I'm glad you brought it up because I wanted to ask you about that. Awesome. Yeah, it looks like a great tool for anybody who has LinkedIn, which is probably most people listening to this podcast. 

Omar Khateeb [55:25 - 56:03]: It's. It's insane how again, it's not like the best social media, but I learned so much from it. And there's some, like, really influence. Like, mentorship is big. I get connected to some people that I just can't believe that I'm on the phone with. Like, you know, there's. I will mention his name, but there's one major investor in our industry who I just saw, I sent a message to, and I didn't think anything. Next thing I know, like, he actually calls my cell phone. It's like, hey, I actually got your message. Like, you know, yeah, I'd love, like, happy to, like, give some advice and stuff. Now we're friends. He wants me to go golfing with him. This happened over a period of two weeks, so, like, you just never know until you put yourself out there. 

Leigha Barbieri [56:03 - 56:32]: Yeah, so true. Well, thank you for doing this. I know sounds like you're very busy and you have a lot going on, so I really appreciate you taking the time. I think this has been a very different episode and I'm all about it. And I think our viewers and listeners are going to get a lot out of it. So I really appreciate this and I look forward to seeing what else you do and all the cool things you're coming up with. And, yeah, so thank you so much. 

Omar Khateeb [56:32 - 56:47]: Absolutely. And reminder to your audience, if your audience is listening, they haven't subscribed to your podcast and given you five stars. Shame on them. Give Leah five stars and write a review now. It helps. It takes 1 minute. Just 1 minute. 

Leigha Barbieri [56:47 - 56:58]: Yes, and same. Go listen to Omar's podcast, the state of Medtech, because I'm about to do that right after this. Where can our viewers and listeners find you on social media? 

Omar Khateeb [56:59 - 57:24]: I'm on all platforms, even TikTok, although somebody's, somebody else is managing that for me. I'll be honest, I'm not crazy about that. But I would say in this order, the top platforms, LinkedIn is number one. Quick follow after that is Instagram. Just look me up. Omar mkatib. And then also I'm on Twitter. Twitter, omarmkt and YouTube. You know, I'm everywhere. But like, if you want to engage me, LinkedIn, Instagram, Twitter, those are, I'd say those are the best ones. 

Leigha Barbieri [57:25 - 57:44]: Awesome. Well, thank you, everyone, for tuning in and hopefully you caught that little extra piece of advice at the end. And you get to do Omar's course for free. So don't forget about that. I'll link everything below or in the show notes. And thanks for, for listening. Thanks for coming on the show. 

Omar Khateeb [57:44 - 57:45]: Absolutely. 

Leigha Barbieri [57:49 - 57:56]: This is the so you want to work in Healthcare podcast with new episodes every month. Don't forget to subscribe to stay up to date on the latest releases.