Mona Morales; The Future of Health Ep. 7

Healthcare keeps calling for job-ready talent while classrooms graduate learners who still need months of ramp-up. In this episode, we sit down with Mona Morales, Founder & CEO of E2i Partners—a performance advisory and partnership brokerage helping education and industry co-create the future of work—to unpack what it really takes to close that gap. Drawing on 25 years across education and industry, including her time as Industry Executive Director for Education at Microsoft, Mona shares a practical blueprint for aligning learning outcomes with business outcomes. Across the conversation, we explore partnership models that actually move the needle: clinical
apprenticeships, work-based learning, and on-site BSN programs that help hospitals pursue magnet status without pulling nurses away from patients. Mona explains why early exposure through HOSA and pre-high-school pathways matters, how to design competency frameworks that hold up on the floor, and what sustainable governance looks like when academic calendars and hospital operations rarely sync. If you’re an educator, you’ll hear how to co-create learning that is grounded in research, built with business insight, and designed to perform—leveraging shared expertise with employer partners instead to align learning outcomes to business goals. This is transformative collaboration in action. Imagine a world where education and industry co-create the future of work. We do. If you’re a healthcare leader, you’ll learn how to use data to name critical skill gaps, contribute preceptors and mentors, and build advancement pathways for future-ready talent pipelines— treating academic partners as strategic extensions of your workforce strategy, not just clinical sites. And if you’re a student or early-career professional, you’ll find guidance to stay bold, stay curious, and build meaningful experience early so you can add value on day one. Come for the strategy, stay for the playbook: a shared language, clear metrics, and partnership models that are resilient, tech-aware, and centered on better outcomes for patients, learners, and communities.

Learn more about E2i Partners here: https://www.e2ipartners.com/

Mona's Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/monamorales/

Chapters

• 0:04 Live From HOSA ILC: Meet Mona
• 0:37 The Education–Industry Disconnect
• 1:30 Co‑Creating Learning Tied To Outcomes
• 2:16 Real Examples: Apprenticeships And On‑Site BSN
• 2:43 HOSA’s Role In The Talent Pipeline
• 3:10 Why Work‑Based Learning Sustains Pipelines
• 3:45 Tech, AI, And Future Healthcare Skills
• 4:35 Action Steps For Educators, Leaders, Students
• 5:28 A Shared Language For Co‑Creation
• 6:05 Where To Find E2I Partners

Transcript

SPEAKER_00: 0:04

Welcome to the HOSA Future Health Professionals Future of Health podcast live at the HOSA International Leadership Conference here in Nashville, Tennessee. Today I am honored to have with me Mona Morales from E2I Partners. Founder and CEO.

SPEAKER_01: 0:21

Right. It's a pleasure to be here. It's so good to see you.

SPEAKER_00: 0:25

You know, it's an incredible moment in time, Mona, and we'd love to start by asking you about your background and what inspired you to start E2i Partners.

SPEAKER_01: 0:37

Yeah, I've spent the last 25 years building a strategy across education and industry. And what I found, and most recently actually, as the industry executive director at Microsoft for education, what I was finding is that there's a disconnect, a persistent disconnect between education and industry. And so you see employers that are actually having a struggle with creating or closing the gap with uh shortages, skill shortages. And then you also see uh education struggling with declining enrollments and with outdated models. So this is the solution to that.

SPEAKER_00: 1:17

Wow. And so we've all heard about the growing pressures on the healthcare system. And what do you, Mona, believe is missing from how we currently prepare the healthcare workforce?

SPEAKER_01: 1:30

The connection between developing skills that employers need and education and the curriculum that's tied to the skill development. So the goal here is to co-create learning solutions between academics and industry. So then that way learning is grounded in research, it is built with business insights, and it also has a design that is enables performance in terms of outcomes for business. So it ties learning outcomes to business outcomes.

SPEAKER_00: 2:06

And so you describe ETUI as a bridge between education and industry. What does that actually look like in practice? And can you share a real-world example?

SPEAKER_01: 2:15

Absolutely. So what we do is we help scale clinical apprenticeships, we can do work-based learning, we've done on-site uh degree programs for BSN programs. So if a hospital is looking to develop or um designate for magnet status and they need a certain number of their nurses degrees, so we actually will create degree programs on-site within an enterprise.

SPEAKER_00: 2:43

And so many of our listeners are host of students or educators across the world. How do you see hosts playing a role in the broader healthcare talent pipeline?

SPEAKER_01: 2:52

Oh, host is a vital part of the talent pipeline. Um, and that's because it's an early part of the talent pipeline right now. A lot of the focus is on post-secondary to employer, and we really need to start earlier. And so, um, even before high school now at this point.

SPEAKER_00: 3:09

Yeah. And so you've supported hundreds of workforce programs, Mona. Why is work-based learning so critical? And how can more institutions and employers get involved?

SPEAKER_01: 3:22

It's about building the right kind of sustainable partnerships. And so, what we're using is we're using partnership frameworks that have been proven to create sustainability so we can create full degree programs or create a pipeline that is strategic to the organization so that we can advance industry through innovation and through academic and skill development.

SPEAKER_00: 3:44

Wow. And so healthcare and education are both being transformed by technology. We talked a lot about AI and all these other things, right? Why is work-based learning so critical? And how does E2I use innovation to support better partnerships and outcomes?

SPEAKER_01: 4:01

So, I mean, there's a lot of change in the industry, and especially with healthcare, we're gonna have workforce shortages, we're going to have uh rapid technology adoption, we are going to see aging. What that means is it affects the pipeline. And so we need to get much better at creating the skills that are needed for the future roles of tomorrow in healthcare. Um, AI is gonna play a huge role in it. And so we use data and we use research and we use analytics and we use frameworks to create those partnerships so that they're sustainable, so that the skill gets developed in a way that's relevant to the needs of the industry.

SPEAKER_00: 4:35

And so, for those listening, whether they're educators, employers, or student leaders, what is one thing they can do today to help build a better healthcare future?

SPEAKER_01: 4:48

For educators, I would say build more employee partnerships. They're really important because you need the relevancy to curriculum from the employer point of view in terms of the skill set. I would say to healthcare leaders, I would say take an active role in closing the skills gap in a way that's meaningful to both education and to the business itself. And for a host of students, I mean, they're just so motivating when you're in the conference and you're seeing the students, they're just so dedicated. So stay bold and stay curious and go out there and continue learning and growing and you know, pushing the envelope so that we all get better.

SPEAKER_00: 5:27

Exactly. And so you've said imagine a world where education and industry co-create the future of work. What does that world look like to you and why is it worth fighting for?

SPEAKER_01: 5:41

Because it's no longer just the job of academic institutions to develop skill. Employers need it. So we have to start working together in terms of building the right and most relevant skill sets. Um, academia works from a different point of view, they speak different languages, they operate differently. So it's really important that we start to build partnerships that bring both sides together.

SPEAKER_00: 6:05

And so, how can folks learn not learn more about E2I?

SPEAKER_01: 6:09

Uh you can go to www.e2ipartners.com. There's information there, but we are actually working to build a profile so it'll make it easier for employers to um go to the platform and find different programs across the nation that will make it easier for them to identify partners to work with.

SPEAKER_00: 6:28

Awesome. Mona Morales, CEO and founder E2i Partners, changing the world.

SPEAKER_01: 6:34

It's always a pleasure.

SPEAKER_00: 6:35

Always a pleasure.