Building Healthcare Solutions That Matter: Jelle Schuitemaker's Journey of Faith, Purpose, and Innovation
How a Dutch entrepreneur is revolutionizing healthcare in Africa and redefining our understanding of purpose-driven business
In a world where technology often seems designed exclusively for wealthy nations, there are innovators working to bridge the gap between advanced healthcare solutions and the places that need them most. I recently had the privilege of speaking with Jelle Schuitemaker, co-founder of Goal 3, whose patient monitoring system has achieved the remarkable feat of reducing child mortality by 42% in African hospitals.
Listen now on Apple, Spotify, and Web.
Our conversation explored not just the technical innovations behind Goal 3, but the deeper philosophical questions that drive Jelle's work: What does it mean to use privilege responsibly? How do we create sustainable change rather than temporary solutions? And what role does faith play in shaping our approach to global challenges?
From Privilege to Purpose
Jelle's journey began with a backpacking trip to the Philippines at age 18—his first real exposure to extreme poverty.
"I grew up in the Netherlands," he shared. "I didn't have much exposure to a global context at a young age. When I was 18, I said to myself, I need to see the world. I started backpacking in the Philippines on my own, and that's the first time where I really got exposed to poverty at a level that I hadn't seen before."
This experience sparked what would become a lifelong commitment to addressing global inequalities. But what's particularly interesting about Jelle's approach is how he frames this commitment within his faith tradition.
"I have a very strong feeling that this is also about the parable of the talents in the Bible," he explained, "where everyone is given a certain amount of talents and it's requested from us: what do we do with the talents? Do we double them or put them in the ground and not do anything with our talents?"
For Jelle, the biblical passage from Micah 6:8—"Act justly, love mercy and walk humbly with your God"—provides the framework for his mission. It's a refreshing perspective in a world where discussions of global development often either ignore faith entirely or reduce it to simplistic missionary narratives.
Technology With Context
One of the most fascinating aspects of Jelle's work is his deep commitment to understanding local contexts. Rather than simply dropping technology into African hospitals, he and his wife relocated to Rwanda to truly immerse themselves in the environment where their solutions would be implemented.
"When we started out, we actually started working in Malawi and visiting various African countries to see what are some growing economies where we believe that we can build a sustainable business in the future," he recalled. "Somehow in Rwanda, a lot of things clicked for me. I really saw a nation that was maybe very divided tens of years ago, now really coming together into a perspective of growth."
This approach—of going beyond tourist-level engagement with a place to deeply understand its healthcare challenges—is what allows Goal 3 to create solutions that actually work in their intended context.
The Impala system they've developed addresses a critical gap: while access to healthcare facilities has improved across many African countries, the quality of care remains a significant challenge. By providing continuous patient monitoring that's specifically designed for low-resource settings, Goal 3 helps healthcare workers identify critical conditions earlier and intervene more effectively.
The False Dichotomy of Impact vs. Profit
When asked about how he reconciles using capitalistic mechanisms to solve problems partly created by capitalism itself, Jelle offered a nuanced perspective that challenges some common assumptions in the social enterprise space.
"None of us as an organization are really in it with a capitalistic mindset," he explained. "We're a social enterprise and we have a for-profit model because we see the need to keep on innovating further and making bigger innovations."
During our rapid-fire questions, Jelle made a bold statement that particularly struck me: "Impact and profit don't go together." When I asked him to elaborate, he shared an insight that many social entrepreneurs eventually discover but few discuss openly:
"If you really start focusing on impact in healthcare in Africa, you often end up in low-income countries, rural settings, and very complex financing systems, very long sales cycles, very low margins. And somehow as an innovator, you have to balance impact and profits."
This honest assessment of the tensions inherent in social entrepreneurship highlights why building sustainable solutions for global challenges requires moving beyond simplistic "win-win" narratives to grapple with complex trade-offs.
Beyond the Savior Complex
Our conversation also touched on the delicate balance between taking responsibility for creating change and falling into a "savior complex"—a particularly important consideration for Western entrepreneurs working in Africa.
"I think the savior complex is indeed a very difficult mechanism because a lot of leaders fall into this trap when they start becoming successful," Jelle noted. "I think though it is often a consequence of a positive mindset of having the idea that you can make a difference."
His approach to avoiding this trap? "Channeling that positive mindset to relentlessly and really hard working on solving things and improving things is in my opinion the way to go. It shouldn't be more important than actually doing the work."
This emphasis on consistent, dedicated work over self-congratulatory narratives offers an important counterbalance to the sometimes ego-driven world of social entrepreneurship.
Looking Forward: Sustainable Change at Scale
As Goal 3 continues to grow, Jelle's vision extends far beyond the 11 hospitals where their system is currently implemented. Their North Star goal is to improve care for 100 million patients by 2030 by enabling and empowering 1 million health workers.
What makes this vision particularly compelling is its focus on local leadership. "We are trying to build a global company," Jelle emphasized. "It's even in our vision to one day have more people working in Africa than in Europe."
This commitment to shifting not just resources but decision-making power to the regions being served represents a crucial evolution in how we think about global development.
Key Takeaways for Purpose-Driven Entrepreneurs
For those inspired by Jelle's journey and looking to apply similar principles to their own work, here are a few key insights:
Start with deep understanding: Immerse yourself in the context where you hope to create change before designing solutions.
Build sustainable models: Rather than relying solely on donor funding, develop approaches that can sustain themselves financially over time.
Balance impact and scale: Recognize the tension between maximizing impact and building a scalable business, and make conscious choices about your priorities.
Ground your work in purpose: Whether through faith or other frameworks, connect your day-to-day efforts to deeper values that sustain you through challenges.
Empower local leadership: Work toward models that shift decision-making power to the communities being served.
In a world often dominated by tech solutions designed for privileged markets, Jelle Schuitemaker's work with Goal 3 offers a compelling alternative vision—one where innovation serves those with the greatest needs, and where purpose and profit find a more balanced relationship. It's a vision worth learning from as we confront our own global challenges.