Aileen Lai is the founder & CEO at HealthBeats, a product based on the belief that regular monitoring outside of healthcare settings will only lead to better results.
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1) To kick things off, could you tell us a little about your career background and current role?
I have spent more than 20 years in healthcare and life science in the corporate world focusing on technology and innovation. Mainly from a business background and across various portfolios at local, regional and global level, the passion in what I do somewhat made me stay in the industry.
Quitting the corporate world and running my own start-up, I am currently CEO and Founder of HealthBeats, a global platform in the digital health space. We provide remote patient monitoring solutions where we equip patients with medical grade devices for proactive monitoring by both patients and their health providers as they collaborate and work together for improved health outcomes.
2) What does a day in your life look like for you? Can you take us through a recent workday?
My work day starts 730am where I get 1.5 hours of quiet time. It helps me prioritise for the day, catch up on strategies and plans or simply to figure out how to solve difficult issues. Rest of the day is pretty much packed with meetings and tactical handling of a wide range of tasks.
On days without business dinners or events, it is important to leave the office around 530pm to be home and to spend time with family. Evening relaxation helps recharge for the next day.
3) Does your current role allow for flexible or remote working? If so, how does that fit into your life and routine?
Yes, definitely! We are a digital health company so anyone can work remotely anytime, anywhere. But the sheer number of meetings and appointments meant there is not a lot of room to manoeuvre things flexibly. I am a structured person so I prefer to stay focused and complete work within stipulated time and evenings are freed up where possible.
4) What does work-life balance mean to you and how do you work to achieve that goal
Work-life balance meant everything! I am not a believer in the number of hours of work but results. Long hours does not lead to results and in fact, I believe quality will suffer from tired brains.
Being structured professionally by nature, I fix the hours where I will just stop my work and go home. ’Stop my work’ also means to stop it mentally as I switch from running a business to that of a wife, mother, daughter and friend to my loved ones.
5) In the past 12 months, have you started or stopped any routines or habits to change your life?
Yes Covid-19 has changed many things. For one, I stopped travelling for 2 years until late 2021 when borders started opening up. Sedentary lifestyle of sitting on the chair all day long doing calls is one thing I stopped immediately and went back to the office so I built physical activities back to daily routines.
6) Do you have any favourite books, podcasts or newsletters that you’d like to recommend?
Work related content aside, love The Story of My Life by Helen Keller and full-range of Roald Dahl’s works!
7) Are there any products, gadgets or apps that you can’t live without?
I am a very gadget person and sometimes geeky so I will have a long list! People like us move from item to item, not about following the trend, but just plain curious about new tech, new features or just automating something. If I had to choose, it would be the mobile phone.
8) Do you have any last thoughts on work, life or balance that you’d like to share with our readers?
Running a business, trying to achieve something significant or simply to live life itself is a marathon, not a sprint. Stamina comes literally from work-life balance. Whatever your goal is, the end goal is to reach the goal itself!
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