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Serve as an Entrepreneur-in-Residence (EIR)

Join Us For A Tour of Duty

Serve Your Nation + Make A Difference in Health and Healthcare

How would it feel to know that you are applying your excellent skills towards making an impact in the healthcare space and serving your country? Join us for a 13-month tour of duty.

join us for a 13-month tour of duty. You’ll be able to:

  • Use Your Powers For Good. It’s an opportunity to use your talents and skills to benefit the public good.
  • Challenge Yourself. You will work on some of the most pressing challenges in health, health care, and the delivery of human services.
  • Be Backed Up At the Highest Levels. Your project will be supported at the highest levels of HHS leadership.
  • Gain Insider’s Access. You get a unique chance to gain experience and insights into government from the inside and the chance to develop a network of contacts inside and outside of HHS.
  • Unite with Other Innovators. You will have access to a network of internal and external innovators affiliated with HHS IDEA Lab who work in government and industry.

Who Can Be An Entrepreneur-in-Residence?

Anyone except current federal employees may apply to be an EIR.

What Characteristics Do We Look For In An EIR?

As with most questions in life: it depends! In this case, it varies depending on the needs of the project. But all of the projects need creative and talented problem solvers with a can-do attitude – an entrepreneurial spirit.

Typically, EIRs are mid- to senior-level professionals. EIRs may be academics, technology entrepreneurs, software designers, policymakers, business gurus, or non-profit leaders who have led innovative achievements in their field. Every project requires different skillsets but across all projects, EIRs resonate with these three sentences:

  • The word “risk” does not scare me. You have lots of experience taking risks for a new product or solution.
  • I know open innovation techniques like the back of my hand. You enjoy leveraging, discussing, and meditating on things like agile development, human-centered design, lean methodologies, and/or iterative program design. (You might even think about them on rainy days or on long car rides.)
  • I love working on teams. You enjoy working with people with different professional backgrounds and can move cross-functional teams towards a common goal.

What Does the Recruitment Process Look Like?

This is what our recruitment process looks like if you were to apply:

Step 1 – A project is selected and we post the opportunity/call for entrepreneurs.

Step 2 – [INSERT YOUR NAME] submits an awesome application for review. This consists of submitting a resume and answering one short answer question.

Step 3 – We do our internal thing (see Step 4) and typically get back to candidates within 30 days.

Step 4 – After an internal shortlisting of qualified candidates, the HHS staff who are working on the project team will interview candidates and make the final EIR selection.

How Do I Apply?

Sign up for our mailing list to find out about new EIR positions as they become available: https://cloud.connect.hhs.gov/IdeaLab

Content created by Office of the Chief Technology Officer (CTO)
Content last reviewed on September 25, 2018