My freshman year, I participated in the Deloitte Case Challenge alongside a few other students interested in consulting. Our team, Ray Consulting Group, had six days to analyze the telehealth market and develop a go-to-market strategy for expanding care access to underserved rural communities. The challenge required us to think like consultants, we had to research market trends, identify gaps, and propose a direct-to-consumer approach that was both innovative and realistic given real business constraints. Our approach was to produce an easily accessible app and website that corrected patients directly do doctors.
What surprised me most was how much I learned about client communication and business thinking in just a week. I'd never done formal consulting work before, so presenting our findings and defending our strategy taught me how to communicate technical ideas to non-technical stakeholders. The judges recognized our visual design and the innovation of our approach, which felt validating given how much effort we put into making our ideas accessible.
This project showed me that I enjoy solving real-world business problems, not just engineering challenges. It's reinforced my interest in applying technical and analytical skills to healthcare innovation.