Startup Boston Week Speaker Sneak Peek: BLKHLTH’s Matthew McCurdy on Building Community and Customer Relationships

Living a life in service has always been a goal for Matthew McCurdy.

His career has taken him to various roles in public health, both in the private and public sectors. It led him to co-found BLKHLTH, whose mission is to advance health equity through education, advocacy, research, and programs for Black community members. Along with his work in BLKHLTH, Matthew is also pursuing a Doctorate in Public Health at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health.

Matthew will be speaking on the panel, “Stop Building Random Things: How to Find Real Problems Worth Solving”, at the 10th Annual Startup Boston Week. Before taking in his first Startup Boston Week, Matthew spoke to us about who inspired his career journey into public health, BLKHLTH’s work in the Black community in the U.S. and abroad, the importance of customer relationships, and more.   

Startup Boston (SB): What drew you to a career in the healthcare industry? Was there a certain moment that you decided to move into it?

Matthew McCurdy (MM): I was raised to be in a helping profession.

My family's Christian, and I was taught that living a life in service to others is really a fulfilled life. I've always believed that and sought to do that. 

My grandmother was one of the first female ministers of the African Methodist Episcopal Church in Savannah, Georgia. She worked in the sick and shut-in ministry and would go house to house sharing the word. She also was understanding people's health and social needs, and connecting them to resources. It's been a huge inspiration and a model for me on what this work should look like — community based, service based, and people based.

I knew I wanted to go to graduate school and further my studies. I wanted to work in a field that allowed me to be helping, so I narrowed in on healthcare. I was thinking about it on an aggregate level and how I can have an impact. That's really what led me to public health. I’m trying to understand why we were seeing young people in care, why so many of them were black and brown in a predominantly white country, and what was causing that. That’s been my journey since then.

SB: Did this also inspire you to develop BLKHLTH? Talk to me more about what your organization provides. 

MM: We work across the country, but also a bit in South Africa. We're trying to grow across the diaspora wherever Black folks are. 

About the co-founders of BLKHLTH, we met during our Master's in Public Health training. We all went to Emory, and at that time, we were seeing the state-based violence against Walter Scott, Tamir Rice — the list goes on and on. We were thinking about why this is happening, and what are some of the public health implications. Through my studies, I started to learn about health disparities more broadly. When you look across most health outcomes, we see Black communities doing poorly, higher morbidity and mortality rates. It was upsetting; this shouldn't be the case. 

I think academics spend a lot of time describing issues, and we wanted to do something about it. BLKHLTH was created with the goal of providing resources, education, and opportunity for Black communities.

Even though our work has changed over time, the core of our work is providing programs about community education and resources on this connection between racism and health. But also what you can do about it from your position, either as a community member, healthcare provider, or a public health official. 

We do quite a bit of capacity building for those who are working in this space, but also for the future healthcare workforce. We have a fellowship where we get 20 to 30 students together, and we’re approaching our fifth cohort now. We're training them not only on health disparities, but what advocacy looks like for a community. We’re having them think about how you can take your individual story and what you see in your community, and change that into a tool to then tell that story, advocate for change, leverage for networking, and more. 

We do quite a bit of digital media to ensure that we bring culture and fun to the healthcare space. We bring creativity here and leverage the things that attract people to healthy resources and behaviors. 

We also work through partnerships. We partner with other non-profits, as well as with big brands like Advil to help promote health that’s culturally relevant to Black people.

SB: What kind of impact have you seen? How has the community responded? 

MM: The thing I love to hear the most when we have events is, one, ‘I learned something that I didn't know.’ We hear that often. And two, ‘I've been waiting for this space that made me feel so comfortable engaging with this topic.’ 

We're creating spaces where people feel really comfortable to have tough conversations. When we talk about health, especially in a context in the society that we live in, we treat health as an individual aspect. In reality, we know that so much of our health is the context in which you live and, and your ability to have insurance to pay for things. We're not all fortunate to live in Massachusetts. 

Healthcare, particularly in Georgia and the rural parts of our country, can be unattainable for people, so bridging that connection and providing resources have been hopeful.

We've worked in the colorectal cancer space for a while and distributed colorectal cancer screenings in 49 out of 50 states. We haven't reached Alaska yet, but we’ve screened over 20,000 people for colorectal cancer. 

SB: You mentioned you were doing work in South Africa. What's some of the work that you plan on doing there? 

MM: We've been working there for about the last four years, and we recently established a non-profit, BLKHLTH South Africa, that’s based in Johannesburg.

I spent five weeks in South Africa this summer, so during that time there, we've been developing relationships with the young people that live in Johannesburg. We want to know what their needs are, so that what we build is based on the community's needs. We had two community events where we brought together close to 40 young people. We talked about everything from online safety to this need for a collective vision for health. 

The goal is to have a youth advisory board and a youth staff. I was blessed to spend some time there, and I'll be back there later this year.

SB: Switching gears up a bit. You're part of the panel, "Stop Building Random Things: How to Find Real Problems Worth Solving". What perspective are you hoping to bring to the discussion?

MM: I think the best founders and innovators have relationships with the people that they're solving for. That's why I spent five weeks in South Africa talking to people, developing relationships. I've had follow-up calls since then, and people are invested in seeing us do well.

When you work in the health space, you're also fulfilling a need. You can identify problems through being in relationships with people who have the problems that you're seeking to solve, and that relationship has to be continuous. It can't be a one-time customer discovery interview. We want to solve problems that we understand, and I think a personal experience with the problem that you're trying to solve is also tremendously invaluable.

I know what happens in rural communities. I know what happens in urban communities, and that's because I'm consistently in relationships and talking to people about what they're seeing and experiencing. It's an ongoing relationship, and problems evolve. If you do a one-time customer discovery, you may understand a problem that existed six months ago when you did that customer discovery. But it may change and you don't know that if you're not in a relationship with people. 

We're co-creating those solutions, and I'm not going to take information that I've learned, build a product, and never go back to the community. Sometimes things don't land, and you have to go back to the drawing board. We’re constantly getting feedback about our programs working, and that's humbling and sobering.

SB: This is the first time you're speaking at Startup Boston Week. What drew you to participate? What are you excited about attending? 

MM: Being new to Boston in general, I'm excited to meet people in the startup ecosystem.

I'm excited to learn about what is happening in other industries. I spend so much time thinking about health and healthcare problems, but I'm also a cross-domain thinker. I'm interested in what’s happening in the food space and other spaces that will be present there. I'm excited to hear what problems people are solving and what their stories are behind why those problems are important to them. I love to hear the inspiration behind innovation. 

I'm excited to meet people and talk about the work that we're doing, but also learn from what other folks are doing.

Discover Our Startup Ecosystem at Startup Boston Week 2026, September 14–18

Matthew is one of 250+ speakers taking the stage. Along with 120+ sessions, look out for other ways to connect at the Ecosystem Fair, Founder Office Hours Village, Mentor Groups, Fractional Fair, and more. 

Curious about the Boston and New England startup ecosystem? Snag a free ticket here and come by Boston University and Downtown Crossing September 14–18. You’ll get access to five days of programming, community, and connections.

About the author: Kathleen Ohlson is a Boston-based content writer with a background as a high-tech writer and storyteller. With a passion for creating content that resonates with audiences, you can connect with her on LinkedIn.