Spotlight on: Ben Spiro
A Q&A with Accurx’s brilliant Growth Lead
In the first of a new series of blog posts spotlighting members of the Accurx team, I sat down and picked the brain of our Growth Lead Ben Spiro, who joined when Accurx was a team of just 10 people. Here’s our conversation:
Q: So Ben, quick icebreaker. What do you like doing outside work?
A: I really like watching live comedy. I used to do improv comedy at university. Besides that, seeing friends, catching up post-COVID, and trying to do some exercise (… but probably not doing as much as I should).
Q: On to Accurx. You’re the company’s Growth Lead — what does that involve?
A: My role’s all about growing how many people use Accurx, and helping them use our platform in a way that offers the best possible value.
Right now, my focus is on our Patient Triage feature, which is a link GPs can add to their practice’s website so that patients can submit requests without having to wait on the phone. We’ve learnt loads since launching it 18 months ago and feel confident we’re in a place where the more people that use it, the better we’re supporting the NHS.
Q: And how has your role changed over time?
A: Well I was about the 10th Accurx employee so joined pretty early on. My role’s changed so much since then. When I first started Accurx only had one feature and we were used by about 20% of GP practices nationwide. The goal was to move that figure all the way up to 70% — a huge task.
Before Accurx, I came from management consultancy, on the operational and data side, so I had lots of experience breaking down challenges like this. But there was a difference between my old experience aligning teams to create growth rather than moving the metrics myself. And that’s what I needed to do at Accurx!
I remember once saying to the CEO Jacob: ‘I just don’t know how to do it.’ And he said: ‘No one does. If we knew how to do it, we’d have done it by now. The team can take guesses but you’re equipped to make the best guess here’. That transparency really helped and has really remained a consistent part of Accurx as we’ve grown.
Q: Interesting! And how’ve you seen Accurx change over the last three years?
A: The obvious thing’s that we’re bigger, more widely used and have more features out there. Gone are the days of a couple of people sat around a coffee table brainstorming ways to get people using Accurx. Those brainstorms still happen — but now in all sorts of specialist teams across around 150 people.
Beyond that, it’s been really exciting to see these teams grow from scratch. I’ve been glad to be in the room so many times when people have spotted a problem or need that requires full-time ownership and leads to a new member of the team.
That’s one thing that hasn’t changed at Accurx actually. Across the team, people have the autonomy to shape the culture around them. If you spot something that isn’t working so well, people are open in saying ‘We set things up this way because that’s what made sense at the time. If you have any thoughts on how we can improve it, great, let’s get our heads together!’
Q: And what do you like most about working at Accurx?
A: For me, it’s the impact. I believe really strongly that the time I spend at Accurx is going to be the most impactful thing I do in my career. The scale of what we do is huge. You hear numbers like three million messages going out a week, three quarters of the population have received a message from us. But it can be hard to get a meaningful grasp on that. It’s not like that’s been done by ‘Accurx, the organisation’, we know the names of every person who has contributed to those achievements — which is great.
I remember when we launched our COVID vaccine booking feature, accuBook, at the start of 2021. An article came out for the number of vaccinations that result in saving one year of life by age cohort. We cross-referenced that with how many vaccination bookings accuBook had made happen, and realised that accuBook had supported the NHS to extend 25,000 years of life in just that one week. That literally means 25,000 more people round the table at Christmas, and 25,000 more birthdays celebrated.
When you get gems like that, it’s like wow, we’re really making a difference. For me, that’s where Accurx has to be pretty unique as a company. Don’t get me wrong, there’s lots of brilliant startups that have great people and a great culture, but where we’re exceptional is the impact we’re having. I can’t imagine working at another company like that.
Q: What’s your fondest memory of working at Accurx so far?
A: A couple of months before the pandemic, the focus was on scaling accuRx and getting into new GP practices. It wasn’t easy! In my first six months after joining, every month we had fewer practices joining than the month before. Taking the long view, the number of GP practices using us is an upward curve, but it was anything but simple or straightforward when we were doing it back then.
I remember in January 2020, we’d set ourselves these really crazy, ambitious targets. But then one week, it just felt like everything from the previous few months came together. Our experiments landed and we crossed the 50% mark, meaning more than half of GP practices across the country were now using Accurx.
Today, Accurx is used by over 98% of GP practices, but crossing that 50% mark was a transformative moment for me. Knowing I’d been part of the team that reached this milestone was incredible.
Q: What would you say to someone thinking of applying to Accurx?
A: In terms of why you should apply? There’s 101 reasons. Gosh. Do it. Accurx has amazing things going for it. The people, the culture, the impact we have. Reach out to current employees on LinkedIn. In fact, reach out to ex-employees on LinkedIn — there’s not many. Most people stay. But if you’re worried that you’re speaking to employees with rose-tinted spectacles, look for people who’ve left. I’m confident they’ll say really good things.
Also some advice for applying: everyone at Accurx is really proud of what we do and the culture we have. Whenever I’m looking at CVs or through applications, the first thing I look out for is someone’s answer to the ‘Why Accurx?’ question, and making sure it’s not generic or left blank.
We definitely don’t expect Accurxto be the only company people are applying to and understand it takes time to research companies. But it gives the application so much more weight to see someone who’s done their homework and is genuinely excited by Accurx.
If you’re interested in joining Ben on the Accurx team, check out our careers page for our current roles. You could help accuRx to connect healthcare professionals and the patients they care for.
