Fulfilled Through Family and Fun: Meet Healthtech Practice Lead, Joy Kurber

Joy and family

As a staffing and recruiting agency rooted in the Healthtech sector, we are passionate about connecting Healthtech talent with their dream careers in the industry. As we continue to grow, we are excited to share that we have appointed Joy Kurber as our new Healthtech Practice Lead! We wanted to take some time to better get to know Joy and discuss her plans for our Healthtech practice.

Born and raised in Green Bay, WI, Joy graduated from the University of Wisconsin-La Crosse with a degree in Organizational Communication and a minor in Professional Writing. When picturing her future career, she knew it had to involve people and talking. This led her to pursue sales after college, where she worked specifically in pharmaceutical sales for over eight years.

Joy’s sales role took her to Georgia, where she and her husband started their family and had three kids together. She took a family career sabbatical for 8 years and during that time, she was very involved in the PTA and other community mom/kid groups. Family is extremely important to Joy, and it’s at the center of what she does. Music is at the core of her family, and fun fact: she named all her kids after The Beatles! Joy is also a big Swiftie and has been a violinist since the age of four.

Joy and her family eventually moved back to Wisconsin and landed in Madison. She knew she would go back to work, but she wasn’t sure in what type of role or industry. She happened to find herself connected to Carex through a mutual connection to Rachel, our CEO. After sitting down and talking with Rachel, Joy immediately knew this was the place for her. “When I met the team at Carex it was apparent that they operated in such a different way from other recruiting firms, with a non-commissioned team centric model and really focused on the right fit for both the partner and the candidate. Plus, the overall value alignment, ‘Care, Be Real, Have Fun,’ really resonated with me.”

Joy could also tell from her first meeting with Rachel that Carex is a family-first environment, and work-life balance is a priority. For a company to embrace a former professional turned stay-at-home-mom and give her the opportunity to grow into a role was hugely appealing to her. “I knew that working for Carex, I could still be a mom,” says Joy. “Being a mom would be my priority, but I could also have a focus on a really fun and rewarding job.” She had also never worked for a strong and confident female leader, and loved that Carex is a women-owned business. All things considered, joining the Carex crew seemed like a no-brainer.

When she started with Carex back in 2019, Joy began as a Partner Success Specialist, where she mainly supported our Healthtech partners. She later transitioned to the recruiting side in 2020 and became the Team Lead for Recruiting in 2022.

In her new role as Healthtech Practice Lead, Joy still does all things recruiting, but will also lead strategy development for our Healthtech practice, which involves reestablishing core relationships with our existing partners and fostering growth with new candidates and partners. Joy has been a crucial component of our Healthtech practice since joining Carex, making her the perfect fit for this new position.

She noted that “I am thrilled to further our Healthtech business focus and collaborate with candidates and Carex partners. Here’s to new adventures and making a real impact in the Healthtech industry!”

As Joy embarks in her new role as Healthtech Practice Lead and works to build up our Healthtech business focus, she draws on her passion for collaborating with others and her extensive experience in sales to bring forth new connections. Congratulations Joy—we are excited to see where you will take us!

If you want to learn more about Carex Healthtech, click here!