Featured Galante Fellow: Heather Gerstley
Heather Gerstley is a fifth-year student at Northeastern University graduating this December with a Bachelor’s Degree in Bioengineering and a Master’s degree in Engineering Management.
Gerstley knew that she wanted to work in healthcare and help people in a rapidly changing and innovative industry. With her interest in mathematics and life sciences, Bioengineering was the perfect fit. While working in healthcare has always been her goal, it was only later in her undergraduate studies that she decided that the Galante Engineering Business Program and Engineering Management was right for her.
Gerstley has completed two co-ops during her time at Northeastern. Her first co-op was as a process engineer for HH Technology, a process technology and chemical engineering company focusing on chemical loop reactors. As a process engineer, she worked with piping and instrumentation diagrams and was responsible for project management. At her second co-op, she was an R&D engineer for Hologic’s surgical division. This co-op, like her first, was very technical and related to the healthcare industry; however, was focused more on electrical and mechanical engineering. This experience proved to be invaluable as she gained significant engineering experience from it. Seeking to develop skills in business leadership, she joined Galante and the Engineering Management BS/MS program.
Gerstley has been an active member of the program, hosting the Galante Kick-off event for the 2021-22 academic year. Her favorite activities with Galante have been guest speaker events and dinners, highlighting the opportunity to connect and make friends with other Galante Fellows. In addition to Galante, she has recently been involved with CASE, a student-run organization focused on developing skills useful for consulting. Although she is new to the club, CASE has given her the opportunity to meet people in the same industry as well as peers both in and outside of Galante. Through CASE, Gerstley developed a greater interest in consulting, and in particular, healthcare consulting.
To her, healthcare consulting is a prime opportunity to merge her bioengineering and engineering management experience and fully utilize her skill set. Gerstley believes that through consulting she can apply her skills and impact the healthcare industry because she will be working on multiple projects with promising and established biotech companies. Furthermore, she will gain expertise in cutting-edge technology and business trends in the healthcare industry that she might not get in a non-consulting position.
After graduation, Gerstley will begin as an Associate on the consulting track at Artisan Healthcare Consulting, a boutique firm in Waltham.
By: Nick Zhang and Luke Kim, Galante Storyboard Coordinators