The Dr.Des Show
How to Start a Public Health Consulting Business While Working Full-Time (With Jody Bogle, MPH)
▶ Before we dive in: Join The Public Health Club The Public Health Club is where public health professionals come to grow their careers, start businesses, and build community with 1,000+ members who get it. Weekly events, career clinics, consulting opportunities posted every week, and the warmest group of public health professionals you'll ever meet. Join us at publichealthclub.com Starting a public health consulting business while working full-time is the path most consultants actually take — and Jody Bogle, MPH, is doing it right now. Jody is the founder and principal consultant of Conduit Consultants, LLC, and Senior Director of Community Engagement at Shatterproof, with nearly 20 years of public health experience spanning syringe access research, recovery services, nutrition, and government. In this episode, she walks through why she built her business plan, shelved it, then picked it back up — plus how she vets RFPs, recruits proposal partners from inside The Public Health Club, and protects herself with teaming agreements before a single word of a proposal gets written. In This Episode, You'll Learn Why Jody built her consulting framework, walked away from it, and what made her come back a year later How to screen RFPs fast so you stop wasting weekends on opportunities you were never going to win The exact steps to bring on proposal partners — vetting calls, skill matching, and signed teaming agreements What to ask for after you lose an RFP (hint: most funders will hand you the scoring rubric) How to spot an opportunity you can't apply for yourself and subcontract under an organization that can Why "build the plane as you're flying it" beats waiting until your business feels ready Frequently Asked Questions Can you start a public health consulting business while working full-time? Yes — and most consultants do. Jody Bogle built Conduit Consultants while serving as Senior Director of Community Engagement at Shatterproof. She's clear that it feels like two full-time jobs during the build phase. Dr. Des ran the same path from 2022 until she went full-time in October 2024, once she had consistent revenue and repeat clients. What is a teaming agreement and do you need one for a proposal? A teaming agreement is a signed document between partners collaborating on a proposal that spells out who does what, who gets paid what if you win, and what happens if you don't. Jody requires them before anyone touches a shared proposal doc. Unpaid proposal work is still work — the agreement protects everyone involved, including friends. What is the FUSE Fellowship? FUSE embeds experienced executive leaders inside government agencies for one year to work on a specific problem the agency defines. Fellows spend their first 90 days doing listening sessions before building strategy. Jody served as a FUSE Fellow at Travis County Health and Human Services on vaccine equity for Black and Brown residents. Details at fuse.org. How do you find public health consulting RFPs? Most public health RFPs never show up in general internet searches — they circulate through sector networks and community lists. Jody pulls hers from The Public Health Club's consulting opportunities list plus her own network, then runs each one through an AI screening process that checks for red flags, minimum contract value, and realistic timelines. What should you do after losing an RFP? Reply to the point of contact, thank them, and ask for feedback. Many funders score proposals against a rubric and will share it — Jody had one funder send hers, showing exactly how she compared to the winning bidder. That feedback shapes the next proposal. And a rejection can resurface later: Dr. Des was invited into a new opportunity three months after losing one. Do you have to be a nonprofit to apply for foundation funding? Sometimes yes — but that doesn't shut you out. Jody attended a foundation's info session, realized the RFP required nonprofit status, and reached out to a nonprofit CEO she thought was a strong fit. He said yes, and she subcontracted under that organization. Bringing someone an opportunity is its own way in. About The Dr. Des Show The Dr. Des Show is the go-to podcast for public health career development, consulting, and entrepreneurship. Hosted by Dr. Desiree "Dr. Des" Strickland — DrPH, public health CEO, and founder of The Public Health Club. https://www.drdesshow.com/ https://www.publichealthclub.com/
