What had started with a bold question at a Ventures panel event has turned into a full-time role for UQ student Pragun Ramesha and a story that captures exactly what the Ventures ecosystem is built for.
Go Locum is a healthcare staffing startup founded by UQ alumni Josh Case and Phoebe Bardsley. Phoebe, a commerce graduate from 2018, participated in the 2018 Startup AdVenture to Tel Aviv. Josh, who completed his medical degree in 2019, joined the same program the following year.
It was through the Ventures ecosystem that they connected over a shared interest in startups and went on to co-found Go Locum - a platform that helps hospitals across Australia and New Zealand connect with medical and nursing staff more efficiently using modern technology. The company was also a part of the 2021-2022 ilab cohort.
Today, Go Locum has 6 team members, operates in more than 70 hospitals across Australia and New Zealand, and continues to grow.
The question that started it
In 2023, Josh attended a Ventures panel event where an undergraduate student, Pragun Ramesha, asked whether Go Locum had plans to expand into nursing. At the time, it was considered too ambitious.
But the question stayed.
Pragun later participated in the 2024 Startup AdVenture to Shanghai. Then, in January 2025, he joined Go Locum as a software developer; tasked with building the nursing infrastructure he had first asked about 2 years earlier.
What began as a question had come full circle.
Inside the startup
We caught up with Pragun to hear what startup life is really like.
What’s been the biggest learning so far?
“Finding the right balance between implementing features and understanding the business value behind them. I’m still developing confidence in decision-making and I do notice how many times I jump the gun just to execute something. On the flip side, executing features that people actually want is extremely rewarding — we notice it every time something lands perfectly, especially through the positive comments from our customers and admin team."
What’s been the most exciting part of working in a small team?
"Ideating and creating. Meeting up with the team always ends in us working on improving the system, it's like one big, continuous hackathon, just like how I used to do it back in Ventures. I also love that I know the quirks of every single team member, which is really only possible because we're small. What truly adds to the experience is bouncing ideas off each other, not only for the business, but also for goofy things like pranks and content videos."
Anything you wish you’d known before starting?
"Just how fun working at a startup actually is! But apart from that, nothing. Every task requires a deep knowledge of the specific systems and processes in the company, you can only really get the hang of it by actively working inside it."
Pragun's advice for students
"I actually met Josh at a Ventures Open Day about two years before I was hired, so your network and the events you attend really can play a huge part in the opportunities you land. What worked for me was being completely obsessed with what I did. Being involved in a community and building ideas into actual products is what got me into startups."
Network, build, and be obsessed.
Idea to impact
We sat down with Josh from Go Locum to learn more about how the company started, its connection to Ventures, and what it’s like building a startup.
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