Hi there,

Welcome to Issue #127!

⬇️ This week’s highlights! ⬇️

• From Invisible Need to Institutional Change— Insights from Aunt Flow’s Claire Coder on building durable women’s health companies

• The Quiet Shift That’s Redefining Careers in Women’s Health— Why the people who can hold systems together are the ones shaping the future of women’s health.

• Upcoming Events—More events on the horizon like What’s Your Plan in 2026? Take Action on Building Your Career in Women's Health and Office Hours (Members Only).

• Women’s Health Jobs — Women’s health careers are booming — 100+ new positions just posted this week!

Thanks for being here.  Let’s keep building the future of health — together.  

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What Aunt Flow’s Founder Learned the Hard Way — and What It Reveals About Scaling Women’s Health

Women’s health is often framed as an emerging market — full of innovation, momentum, and opportunity. But for those building inside it, progress is rarely driven by a single breakthrough. It is shaped by the ability to operate across systems that were never designed with women in mind — navigating policy, procurement, regulation, and institutional behavior at the same time.

This is why building in women’s health consistently feels harder than expected. The need is rarely in question. What slows progress is the work required to translate lived experience into systems that can function at scale — across school districts, employers, public facilities, and regulatory environments where ownership is fragmented and incentives are misaligned.

In a recent In Women’s Health Mini-MBA session, Aunt Flow founder and CEO Claire Coder shared what nearly a decade of building inside those constraints has taught her. Not a retrospective and not a success story — but a candid look at the decisions, tradeoffs, and forms of persistence required to move from early adoption to durable impact.

The insights below reflect lessons earned through years of education, policy navigation, enterprise sales, and operational execution. Together, they offer a clearer picture of what actually determines whether women’s health companies scale or stall — and why the work of building lasting access is often slow, complex, and largely invisible from the outside.

Here are five of the patterns that emerged from the conversation, and what they reveal about building — and sustaining — impact in women’s health.

1. In Women’s Health, You’re Not Just Building a Company — You’re Building the Market

When Aunt Flow launched, the challenge wasn’t convincing people that period care mattered — it was convincing institutions that it was their responsibility.

Schools, employers, and public facilities didn’t have a clear owner for the issue. It didn’t sit cleanly with facilities, HR, procurement, or student services. Budgets weren’t designed to accommodate it, and success metrics didn’t account for it. As a result, the need existed everywhere, but accountability lived nowhere.

Much of Aunt Flow’s early work focused on helping institutions answer basic but essential questions: Who owns this? Where does it live in the budget? What problem are we actually solving — compliance, equity, student outcomes, employee productivity? Until those questions were resolved internally, adoption couldn’t move forward.

What this reveals:
In women’s health, early-stage growth often looks like market education, internal alignment, and category definition — not sales velocity. Companies that underestimate this phase tend to stall. Those that understand it design for persistence, not speed.

2. Policy Creates Permission — Execution Creates Impact

Policy wins around period equity created visibility, urgency, and — in theory — demand. In practice, they exposed how uneven and fragile implementation can be.

Even when legislation passed, institutions still faced unresolved questions: which funding streams could be used, how compliance would be measured, and what “good enough” actually looked like. Leadership turnover, budget cycles, and competing priorities routinely delayed action. In some cases, policy created pressure without providing clarity.

Aunt Flow often had to step into that gap — helping administrators interpret requirements, map funding, and translate abstract mandates into operational decisions. The work wasn’t political; it was practical. Without that translation layer, policy risked becoming symbolic rather than impactful.

What this reveals:
In women’s health, policy is not an endpoint — it’s an input. Companies that scale are built to operationalize ambiguity, not just benefit from favorable legislation.

3. Scale Comes From Infrastructure, Not Innovation Alone

Aunt Flow’s long-term defensibility didn’t come from product differentiation alone. It came from designing systems that institutions could actually sustain.

Public bathrooms run on routines: maintenance schedules, supply chains, standardized layouts, and cost predictability. By designing dispensers, placement standards, and replenishment models that aligned with those realities, Aunt Flow made period care compatible with how facilities already operate.

This shifted the decision from “Do we want to do this?” to “Why wouldn’t we?” Once embedded into infrastructure, access stopped depending on individual champions or discretionary budgets — it became part of the system.

What this reveals:
In women’s health, scale rarely comes from breakthrough products alone. It comes from infrastructure that removes friction, reduces dependence on goodwill, and makes access the default.

4. Being Early Feels Like a Liability Until the System Catches Up

Being early in women’s health often means absorbing years of invisible labor: education, trust-building, regulatory navigation, and repeated “not yet” conversations.

For Aunt Flow, early traction didn’t come from rapid adoption, but from staying present across long decision cycles. Relationships were built over years, not quarters. Many contracts materialized only after leadership changes, budget resets, or new compliance pressures surfaced.

The advantage of being first only became visible later — when the market matured and institutions looked for experienced, credible partners rather than new entrants.

What this reveals:
In women’s health, first-mover advantage is delayed and conditional. Survival through slow cycles is what ultimately creates category leadership.

5. Mission Scales Only When the Business Does

Claire was explicit: mission without financial discipline is fragile.

Education, compliance, product quality, and infrastructure all require sustained investment. Without a viable business model, companies are forced into tradeoffs that ultimately limit impact — cutting corners, stalling expansion, or relying on inconsistent funding.

At Aunt Flow, commercial rigor enabled patience. It allowed the company to stay engaged through long sales cycles, invest ahead of demand, and maintain standards even when growth was slow.

What this reveals:
In women’s health, profitability isn’t a departure from mission — it’s what makes mission durable. The companies that last treat financial sustainability as a strategic capability, not a moral compromise.

This conversation is one example of the kind of systems-level insight Mini-MBA participants get direct access to — not in theory, but from leaders who’ve built inside the constraints of women’s health.

This Isn’t Just an Aunt Flow Story — It’s a Snapshot of Where Women’s Health Is Headed

Aunt Flow’s journey is not just a company story — it’s a case study in how women’s health is actually evolving.

For decades, the sector has been defined by fragmented solutions: individual products, pilot programs, or point interventions addressing obvious needs, often without the infrastructure required to sustain them. What’s changing now is not the existence of those needs, but the recognition that real progress requires systems-level design. The next phase of women’s health is being shaped by organizations that can operate across policy, procurement, operations, and market education at the same time — translating mission into durable execution.

What Aunt Flow illustrates is that impact in women’s health doesn’t come from identifying gaps alone. It comes from building resilient systems that work inside institutions that were never designed with women in mind. That means aligning incentives, navigating regulation, embedding solutions into existing workflows, and maintaining commercial discipline — all while holding a clear point of view about why the work matters.

For founders, operators, and professionals in the space, the implication is significant. Success in women’s health increasingly favors those who think in systems rather than silos, who understand how ideas move from advocacy to policy to operations, and who are willing to do the unglamorous work of infrastructure-building over time. This is not fast work — but it is compounding work.

Women’s health is no longer a collection of isolated innovations. It is becoming an interconnected ecosystem where well-designed interventions can ripple across schools, workplaces, communities, and public systems. The leaders shaping its future are not just launching products — they are setting standards, redefining categories, and proving what scalable, mission-driven execution actually looks like.

That is the work ahead. And that is why learning how this system truly operates — from those who’ve built inside it — matters more than ever.

Women’s Health Is Entering Its Infrastructure Era

Something about women’s health feels different right now.

The work is more complex. The questions are harder. Hiring conversations sound less speculative and more grounded. For many people, that shift can feel disorienting — like the industry is cooling or losing momentum.

It isn’t.

What’s actually happening is a move from experimentation to infrastructure. And as women’s health grows up, the careers inside it are changing too.

From Visibility to Leverage: How Influence Is Actually Shifting

Aunt Flow’s story reflects a broader shift underway in women’s health.

For years, the sector rewarded visibility: launching fast, proving demand, and building compelling narratives around unmet needs. That phase was necessary. It made women’s health legible — to investors, institutions, and the public.

But the question the industry is asking now is different.

Not “Can this exist?”
But “Can this hold?”

As women’s health companies expand into longitudinal care, multi-condition platforms, and integrated delivery models, the center of gravity is shifting. The most influential leaders are no longer just those who can ship quickly or build a strong brand — they are the ones who can make complexity operable. That means sustaining clinical quality at scale, navigating payment and procurement, translating outcomes into durable systems, and integrating care across fragmented stakeholders.

We see this shift clearly in companies like Maven Clinic and Tia. These moves aren’t just product expansions — they require deep operational, clinical, and payer-facing expertise. They change who holds influence inside organizations and what skills compound over time.

Investors are signaling this shift as well. The questions that matter now are about defensibility, payment durability, ownership of longitudinal relationships, and operational resilience at scale. Careers tend to follow those questions.

Pause & Reflect

Where in your current role are you closest to execution — and where are you still operating at the edges of the system?

This distinction increasingly determines who compounds influence — and who gets stuck.

Where the Real Leverage Is Now — and How to Position Yourself for It

If there’s one throughline across the Aunt Flow conversation and the broader shift happening in women’s health, it’s this:
the roles with the most long-term influence are no longer the loudest ones — they’re the ones closest to execution.

As the industry moves from proving relevance to building endurance, leverage is concentrating among people who can make fragmented systems work. Those who can translate between clinical reality and business constraints. Between policy and operations. Between mission and financial sustainability.

That’s exactly why we built the Career Mastermind.

This isn’t a resume workshop or a job-search sprint. It’s a small, high-touch program designed to help professionals in women’s health develop the judgment, positioning, and systems-level clarity that the industry now rewards.

We keep this group intentionally small — and the feedback reflects why. Past participants consistently point to clearer positioning, stronger decision-making, and tangible career momentum within months of completing the program.

There are only 4 seats remaining in the current cohort.
As a reader of IWH, you can receive $100 off with the code IWH100.

If you’re serious about positioning yourself where women’s health is actually going — not where it’s been — this is the room we built for that work.

📆 Upcoming In Women’s Health Events

Opening a 51& Event to the IWH Community

This is a question we’ve been getting again and again from the IWH community—so we’re opening up an upcoming 51& event to IWH members.

How Does Money Actually Move Policy? is a practical conversation with Ariel Gonzalez that breaks down what really happens between donations, influence, legislation, and outcomes—beyond headlines and soundbites. Ariel Gonzalez leads the healthcare practice at Vogel Group, has been named one of The Hill’s Top Lobbyists multiple times, and has advised organizations including AARP and March of Dimes on how money, influence, and strategy shape federal health policy.

For those working in women’s health, policy often feels opaque: you’re told it matters, you’re asked to engage, but the mechanics are rarely explained in a clear, grounded way. This session is designed to change that.

We’re excited to make this accessible to the IWH community, given how central policy literacy has become to building, funding, and advancing women’s health work.

✨ Now … let’s make your career magic happen

Feature Roles:

Gaia is bringing value-based care to fertility. They focus on improving outcomes for their members through flexible, protected plans and personalized care that maximizes the chance of success. Gaia takes on the risk so that the clinic partners get paid regardless of outcomes.

Kiersten Medvedich is the CEO and co-founder of Gaia, where she’s building a modern, whole-person approach to women’s health that integrates medical care, nutrition, and lifestyle support. A former competitive athlete, Kiersten brings an operator’s mindset to creating scalable, evidence-based care models designed around how women actually live and age.

📌Head of Marketing

Natera is a global leader in cell-free DNA and precision medicine, dedicated to oncology, women’s health, and organ health. Natera aims to make personalized genetic testing and diagnostics part of the standard-of-care to protect health and inform earlier, more targeted interventions that help lead to longer, healthier lives.

Steve Chapman is the Chief Executive Officer and a board member of Natera, where he leads the global genetic testing innovator in expanding cell-free DNA diagnostics across oncology, women’s health, and organ health. Under his leadership since 2019, Natera has launched transformative tests and earned industry recognition for advancing personalized care through cutting-edge genomic technologies.

📌Staff Software Engineer

International:

Freelance Social Media Manager (Portuguese Speaking), Flo Health (Menstruation, Series B), Brazil.

Influencer Manager, Flo Health (Menstruation, Series B), Vilnius, Lithuania, $36K.

Lead Security Specialist (HIPAA), Flo Health (Menstruation, Series B), London, UK.

Business (Ops/Strategy/Legal/Quality & Regulatory & HR

Associate Manager, Performance Marketing, Ro (Digital Health, Public), New York, NY, $102K - $120K.

Product Manager, Experience Platform, Everly Health (Lab Testing, Series E), Austin, TX · New York, NY.

Senior Product Manager, Clinical Platform, Everly Health (Lab Testing, Series E), Austin, TX · New York, NY.

Director International Brand Management, Integrated Marketing, Frida (Parenthood, Private Equity), Miami, FL.

Director, Design Engineering - Hardware, Hims & Hers (Digital Health, Public), United States · Remote, $200K – $235K.

Staff Accountant, Treasury, Hims & Hers (Digital Health, Public), United States · Remote, $75K – $85K.

Product Manager, Intelligence Platform, Everly Health (Lab Testing, Series E), Austin, TX.

Associate Product Operations, Everly Health (Lab Testing, Series E), Austin, TX.

Research Associate 1, Natera (Lab Testing, Public), Austin, TX.

Supervisor, Histology, Natera (Lab Testing, Public), San Carlos, CA, $113,200—$141,500.

Regional Director, Transplant, Natera (Lab Testing, Public), United States, $226K—$263K.

Product Manager, Delivery Platform, Everly Health (Lab Testing, Series E), Austin, TX.

Accessioning Team Runner, Natera (Lab Testing, Public), Pleasanton, CA, $20 - $23/hr.

Manager, CLS, Natera (Lab Testing, Public), San Carlos, CA, $123,400—$165,000.

Event Marketing Manager - EAST, Natera (Lab Testing, Public), United States, $1—$1/hr. 

Event Marketing Manager-WEST, Natera (Lab Testing, Public), United States · Remote, $1—$1/hr.

Product/Engineering/Data & Analytics

Senior Analyst, Strategy and Operations, Allara (Speciality Care, Pre-Seed), New York, NY, $121,290-$141,505.

Senior Design Engineer, Creative, Hims & Hers (Digital Health, Public), United States · Remote, $150K – $180K.

Senior Analyst, Inventory Control, Ro (Digital Health, Public), Romeoville, IL · New York, NY · Remote, $88K - $105K.

Senior Software Engineer - Frontend, Natera (Lab Testing, Public), United States · Remote, $125,600—$157,000.

Staff Software Engineer, Growth, Hims & Hers (Digital Health, Public), United States · Remote, $200K – $240K.

Principal Software Engineer, Ro (Digital Health, Public), New York, NY, $251,200 - $340,000.

Marketing/Growth/Sales

Marketing Intern, Dame (Sexual Wellness, Series A), Brooklyn, NY, $17/hr.

Clinical Roles & In-Clinic Business Roles

FL- FT Telehealth Registered Dietitian | Florida License, Allara (Speciality Care, Pre-Seed), Florida, FL, $65K - $105K.

IL- FT Telehealth Registered Dietitian | Illinois License, Allara (Speciality Care, Pre-Seed), Illinois, IL, $65K - $105K.

GA- FT Telehealth Registered Dietitian | Georgia License, Allara (Speciality Care, Pre-Seed), Georgia, GA, $65K - $105K.

PA- FT Telehealth Registered Dietitian | Pennsylvania License, Allara (Speciality Care, Pre-Seed), Pennsylvania, PA, $65K - $105K.

TX- FT Telehealth Registered Dietitian | Texas License, Allara (Speciality Care, Pre-Seed), Texas, TX, $65K - $105K.

MD- FT Telehealth Registered Dietitian | Maryland License, Allara (Speciality Care, Pre-Seed), Maryland, MD, $65K - $105K.

NY- FT Telehealth Registered Dietitian | New York License, Allara (Speciality Care, Pre-Seed), New York, NY, $65K - $105K.

OH- FT Telehealth Registered Dietitian | Ohio License, Allara (Speciality Care, Pre-Seed), Ohio, OH, $65K - $105K.

MA- FT Telehealth Registered Dietitian | Massachusetts License, Allara (Speciality Care, Pre-Seed), Massachusetts, MA, $65K - $105K.

Note: This newsletter is for informational purposes only. For any legal questions or issues, please consult outside legal counsel. Any opinions expressed in this newsletter are solely my own and do not necessarily reflect those of my employer. I cannot guarantee the credibility of the sources or job listings I share. It's advisable to do your own research before engaging with them.

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