María Sole is an Alumni of Dentistry at Universidad Europea de Madrid. Now, as well as working as a dentist in France, she is the founder of the project EmployMed, a recruitment platform for the healthcare sector.
Please tell us when you studied and which faculty and campus you were at. How was your journey after completing your studies at Universidad Europea until the creation of your project?
I studied Dentistry and graduated in 2018. I studied in Madrid, at Villaviciosa de Odón Campus.
As it is a highly international university, I learned a lot about the healthcare systems in different parts of the world. The one that interested me the most was the French healthcare system, where health insurance effectively covers all treatment given to patients, which is very practical for us as doctors and many opportunities that are free or almost free for them. This really sparked my interest, although I didn’t speak a word of French. I started learning the language in my fifth year all by myself, because I didn’t have enough time to do a course or join an academy.
To perfect it, I did have to sacrifice my summer following graduation, since I had to shut myself in at home for many hours to study. I know that I can learn quite quickly, which helped me to achieve my goal.
I started doing interviews with French clinics in my fifth year and found a job before graduating. I graduated in June 2018, but by December 2017 I had already got a job in France.
When I got to France, I had the idea of becoming an entrepreneur, and to do that it was really important for me to have a mentor figure in the clinic. He tracked me and revised all my cases and treatments, and had a very similar profile to mine. This is what inspired me and I told myself that I wanted to contribute something more to society beyond my work as a dentist. That’s where I came up with the idea of founding Employmed.
How do you balance working as a dentist at the same time as leading your project EmployMed?
That’s the challenge of being an ambitious person. Without a doubt, you have to focus on two challenges at the same time: the personal and the professional.
My personal challenge is to balance two jobs with my personal interests. I have always enjoyed learning new things. In fact, during my degree, I was always curious to learn more beyond Dentistry, such as languages, psychology, reading articles, etc. You have to be well organised.
My method is not to separate my tasks. In other words, when I work as a dentist and I have gaps or a bit of free time, I make the most of it to work on my tasks for EmployMed. This way I realise that at the end of the day, I’ve managed to do both things. It always depends on the daily workload, but good organisation is key to being able to do a little bit of everything and make progress.
The challenge from the professional point of view is to ensure my work is of quality. I like it when what I do is done well.
Tell us a little more about your work. What do you enjoy the most? What challenges do you face on the daily? Do you have an anecdote you would like to share?
Employmed is a medical recruitment platform. As well as recruiters, we are health professionals, so we are effectively coaches for healthcare staff.
Apart from the recruitment side of things, there’s also the administrative and digital marketing side. Usually, for digital marketing, we schedule a few days to prepare content and we come to an agreement about it in weekly meetings, where we prepare material.
The interview part requires understanding the candidate, although the fact that they are dentists like me makes it all easier, as the interviews all go through me and I am familiar with psychological and professional profiles. This helps us to find clinics or job positions for them that are best suited to what they are looking for.
The administrative side of things is the most boring part, but we always have time to do it and complete all pending tasks. We’re a team. I’ve been lucky to be able to surround myself with people who are like me, who don’t feel burnt out from the high quantity of tasks and who are always motivated. We don’t have a fixed work schedule. Instead, it’s a constant flow of exchanging ideas.
Who is on your team? Where do you operate?
Although I’m the CEO and founder, there’s a board for decision-making.
We work in medical centres and dental clinics across France, although I physically work from Paris.
In terms of students, they come from all over Europe: Romania, Italy, France, Spain, Portugal etc. It’s really diverse.
Why did you choose Universidad Europea? What values and characteristics do you think it has that have contributed to your professional development?
I chose Universidad Europea because I was born in Madrid and I had always wanted to return. I was impressed by the syllabus, which was very hands-on, and I liked its lively intellectual and interactive environment. I visited the Villaviciosa Campus and it was beautiful, it gave me a really good impression as a great place to start a new chapter. The truth is that the good first impression I had was on the mark.
I have a lot of wonderful memories, although the best one of all was graduation. It was really exciting. They were able to organise an event where we all felt like we had done something important in our lives.
What advice would you give to those who have just finished their studies and are now going out into the working world?
Don’t be afraid of being ambitious, know exactly what your personal and professional goals are, and strive to find a balance between the two.
Change brings new challenges and can improve your quality of life, so it’s worth putting in the effort and having no fear.