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Can Better Leadership Save Vet Med? - With Chris White · Under The Fur

• speaker-0: Hello and welcome to this week's episode of Under the Fur. And today I am joined by Chris White. Chris White is the Operations and Development Director of Veterinary Management Group. VMG is a professional association for all those working in business management, leadership roles within the vet sector. He's worked in senior leadership roles within the veterinary industry for 17 years and runs his own training and consulting business, Mongrel Training Consulting. Today, we're going to ask him about working in the veterinary industry, whether when you're not a vet, measurements of achievement within the veterinary industry and how we deal with the latest workforce, Generation Z. And I said Z for you, not Z. Although I think Gen Z has the ring to it. speaker-1: I'll give you that it does flow off the tongue a little bit. speaker-0: Yeah. So Chris, shall we start by just like, what the hell do you do? You tell us. speaker-1: I often ask myself the same question. I do a mix of things. So I work part time for the VMG. I'm a director of the VMG. I've been a director for a good few years. And we're there, as you pointed out, for anybody that works in a veterinary or management or leadership position ⁓ in the veterinary sector. So I do a bit of that. We're a membership organization. provide CPD. We provide qualifications. ⁓ and I just manage the kind of operations side of things. And then on the side, I have my little side hustle of doing mongrel training and consulting where I'll go along to practices and do training in leadership and soft skills and those sorts of things, but a one-to-one mentoring, that kind of thing. It was basically on, we're all Mongrels, essentially, that's it. I'm not into the idea of pure breeds and that kind of thing. It seems a bit sort of 1930s Nazi party type stuff. So I've always thought, know, we're all the mix of different things and we're actually veterinary teams need to be a mix of different things in order to function effectively. And I think Mongrels speaker-0: You speaker-1: get a bad rep. And think actually we come up with all sorts of names for actually dogs that are really mongrels. Cockapoos. Cockapoos are mongrels. speaker-0: say that a lot of people have cockapooze that are listening. love them. do love mongrels. Yeah. Lovely. and I think I wanted to start off with, you're not a vet, ⁓ but you're leading vets and you're teaching us how to lead. that, is that where we are? speaker-1: That's okay. Yeah, I suppose so. Yes, I've worked in the veterinary world since about 2008 when came to Vetsnow, first of all, as a as a regional business manager. So at that point, I'd mostly been working in retail bookshops, that sort of thing, area management roles, director, regional director type roles. So unfortunately, retail went through a very bad period in the early part of this century, which makes me sound. very old, I hate calling it the noughties, it feels wrong. So retail was going through a very bad patch then. And my company I've been with for years went into administration and it was like, what do I want to do next? So I spent ages just applying for anything that looked really interesting. ⁓ And I remember I saw this job ⁓ as a regional business manager for Vets. Now I thought, Vets, I think I wanted to be a vet when I was younger. And then I realized actually, during my biology A levels with a terrible vet I would make. In those days, I don't know if it's still the case, but during biology, you would have to dissect a rat and label it all that kind of stuff. So I had beside me my friend who went on to become a dentist, another one who went on to become a doctor, and theirs would be perfectly laid out, perfectly labeled. And mine, I might as well just hit it with a mallet, be honest, it was that bad. So I realized I was never going to make it as a vet. speaker-0: physical skills might have been lacking. speaker-1: Perhaps internal medicine beckoned. But I thought, ⁓ yeah, that looks interesting. So I applied for it amongst a lot of other things. And then I ended up getting a call and I spent, I'd been applying for so many jobs and I was so up against it. And at that point we didn't quite have the online connectivity we had back then. And I sometimes. speaker-0: in the back of the newspaper. speaker-1: Not quite that bad. was monster.com I think it was called that we would use. I was probably not the most organized so I applied for lots of things and couldn't remember what I'd applied for. And I had this interview and I spent the first part of the interview thinking it was with Vets for Pets. ⁓ And then ⁓ the person mentioned Vets Now and I said, Vets Now? Who's that? Where Vets Now? And I went, ⁓ sorry. speaker-0: Your interview! speaker-1: In my preliminary interview, but fortunately the person interviewing me had a great sense of humour. laughed it off. I explained the situation and got through to the next round. So I ended up coming to work for Vets now, which I loved back in those days. was independently owned by Richard Dixon, who really invested. speaker-0: Yeah, I worked for them when he was in charge. Yeah. Great guy. Caring. speaker-1: And he really did invest in his business. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And built an incredible business. Absolutely. And invested in me as well. So I started an MBA when I was there with him. And ⁓ that was really good. And then when we moved into referrals, ⁓ I moved across the referral side of the business. And then. speaker-0: would have been up in their Glasgow referral site. speaker-1: Yeah, I was in Kent, so they bought ⁓ a practice in Kent called North Kent Referrals, which unfortunately wasn't quite all it was cracked up to be when we finally got it over the line. exist? ⁓ Yeah, I killed it. I killed it with a paper where ⁓ I was saying that what we needed to do was the site was not fit for purpose. We couldn't attract specialists with it. And I said, what we need to do is close this site and open up a brand new shiny one, which will cost X amount of money. But I think referrals is going to be huge as we go forward. But unfortunately, the board looked at it and thought, we agree with the first part, let's close it. But we don't agree with the second part. And so, yeah, so I killed that one. speaker-0: however you were right they should have listened to you. speaker-1: I often think that, but then I tend to ignore the times that I'm wrong. I went to work for them in Swindon for a bit, but I had a bit of a thinker seven year itch to try some other things. ⁓ I then worked for a few different companies, ⁓ Southern counties, veterinary specialists, as a business manager, vet partners where I was a regional person. Then I had half the country for a short period of time ⁓ until they had a ⁓ restructure. And then COVID hit. So I was struggling at that point. And that's when I began mongrel. And also, again, just started doing anything that could happen. I was... ⁓ speaker-0: job affected by COVID because you weren't in practice. speaker-1: No, but what it meant is I couldn't get another job. at that point, I'd been laid off actually, annoyingly. I'd left in the February of that year, was it 2020? February 2020. You all know what happened in March 2020, COVID. And I was on final interviews for going to work for a company in Canada or Australia ⁓ when COVID hit ⁓ and the barriers went up. ⁓ And then I had to scrabble around. did NHS tests and trace calling, went over to Ireland briefly to help open some COVID centres and then Vets for Pets under the lovely Jane Balmain, who was absolutely wonderful, ⁓ offered me a way out. And I came back into the veterinary world to work for them, doing some project work for them, which I'm very proud of what we achieved in that period. And I worked briefly for an independent practice, VMG part-time and meantime tried to build up my mongrel business. That's it. I hope I wasn't too long with my career bit there, speaker-0: No, I mean, it's fascinating for me. ⁓ Very different to how my career has gone. So it's nice to speak to and hear from people that are in veterinary, but not veterinary nurses or vets themselves and see that there's other things that you can do within veterinary and other important tasks and career paths. I think it's really interesting, especially since you mentioned you wanted to be a vet at one point and then obviously anatomy. destroyed that for you, biology. But you still found a way into it. ⁓ And what's fascinating for me is it's, ⁓ I feel like, and I don't know, because actually I've been a vet forever and for always, you know, except those little waitressing jobs and things that did when I was younger. I've just been a vet and to me that it's a very specific industry. And I think it's difficult to work in it if you're not from it. Is that true? Did you struggle to get into it? speaker-1: I think that's a really interesting point because ⁓ it is very unique and I think that is a mistake that's made by a lot of people when they come into sort of top leadership roles ⁓ within the industry that they just think it's a retail business. And in a way, in a way it is but it's more than that. It's something different to that. The purpose element is enormous in it and you're dealing with very professional driven high achievers and who basically could have gone on to make a shedload of money if they'd worked in human medicine. But they chose because of this weird quirk that they have, I'm careful what I say now, because of their love of animals, ⁓ or because they grew up on a farm or with horses, whatever it is because of this, then they chose to take a job that pays them less and gives them much more abuse. So the real quirky element and when I first came. speaker-0: I'm considering other options. speaker-1: Yeah, please, My intention is to try and retain people with the industry, not to lose them. yeah, because of that, you know, actually, when I first came to Vets Now, I ⁓ met ⁓ a person from I think was Blue Pearl in the States who said to me, first thing you need to do is get to understand vets and nurses. says, yes, that's what you have to focus on. And for me, people has always been the thing that's driven me and that I've enjoyed the most. So getting to know the people involved and understanding that was critical to then being able to lead them. And also having, you know, I went to work in a referral hospital, lots of specialists, and that brings its own challenges in terms of leadership and management. But if you can gain their respect, if they know that you know what you're talking about, particularly if you've got it backed up by accredited qualifications, then that helps as well. But if you understand them ⁓ and can empathize with them, ⁓ you can help ⁓ them navigate the other bits that they're not so interested in and why they didn't become vets and specialists, which is why people like me were originally drafted into the veterinary industry ⁓ because there was a belief that vets didn't make very good managers and leaders. Yes. And I would dispute that. I would say it depends. ⁓ I think there's a different mindset. So being a clinician is a very different mindset to being a leader. When you go back in about 2004, there was a study done on the health service, the NHS, by Mintzberg and various people. And they asked the question, who is best to run a hospital? Is it a surgeon? Is it a nurse? Or is it a non-clinical professional manager? And they asked that question. speaker-0: Isn't it? speaker-1: No, it wasn't me. And what they said was the surgeon, the natural instinct is to cut and run essentially. You go and you cut, leave everybody else to clear everything up. nurse... Sorry if this is getting a bit awkward now. The nurse, they're all about the all round care, which makes them excellent leaders. However, they don't command the respect of the surgeons, which makes it difficult for them ⁓ to command. speaker-0: Yeah. speaker-1: ⁓ leadership of the hospital, with the professional managers. Yes, they know what they're doing with management and leadership, but they can easily have the wool pulled over their eyes clinically. And in the end, of course, it concluded as all these things always conclude, which is it depends. You need a mix of leadership across these roles. They all bring something to the party and it's not about one leader. It's about having leadership across and recognising each other's strengths and weaknesses and what you bring to the party. speaker-0: This is very similar to what ⁓ I've just done one with Ben Jacqueline, who's the Medivet UK CEO. And he says the same thing. So he's a vet. ⁓ And we were actually in university together. ⁓ Mostly I remember me and him drinking and partying, but it turns out he's really good at his job. And he agrees that it's a mixture of veterinary professionals and non veterinary professionals that makes it work. ⁓ but it's interesting what you said about our vets leaders or not, because I don't think I've ever had any professional leadership training. Potentially when Linnaeus bought the clinic that I was working at, we had a couple of hourly sessions here and there. We did a bit of personality training, but other than that, not really. What I have had is a sporting career and captain teams and coached players and things like that, which I truly believe helped me in two ways, surgical skills, I think if you could do the hands, you could do the hands, but also teamwork and leadership. ⁓ So that's what I believe helped me. But I can see that some people that maybe don't have that or have never had team environments or leadership roles elsewhere, how are they going to lead teams? speaker-1: Yes, so there's there's two ways in which they can do that. So I'm sure, as I say, a lot of people was wrestled should be able to get in charge of a nursing charge and so on. But I think forget forget about that. So how do you lead? Well, first of all, do you want to do it? OK, because if the career pathway is purely become a vet and either then you have to become a manager of people or you stay where you are, then you end up with people going into leadership roles. It's not really their thing. Whereas if you can actually allow them to progress along a clinical route and still be earning the same, if not more than a manager or a leader of a practice, then you're allowing them to follow the pathway that naturally suits them. However, if they do have some kind of desire to manage or lead, ⁓ then that's when they need to develop themselves as leaders, which it's you know, Primarily, it's first of all, understanding your yourself. ⁓ Self awareness bit is really, really important before you can do anything else, because we get in the way of ourselves all the time about how we are. understanding yourself and then ⁓ turning that into self development. you know, who, who is it I want to be as a leader? ⁓ What am I right now? And how do I get from there to there? Yeah. How do I then make that stick with everything that comes at you? when you're working in a practice, how do I make that stick and who can help me? These are really important questions to ask as you go along. And ⁓ there are ways and means of doing it, but I would recommend, especially being in the VMG, that you follow an accredited program like we have. It's degree level certificates and diplomas in leadership and management that are accredited by the Institute of Leadership and Management. they're properly assured and accredited like clinical work is. So should leadership and management be in our view in VMG. So you can do that, but there are also alternative pathways, of course, of ⁓ developing yourself through internal ⁓ courses and bits and bobs like that. But if you're going to do the role, it's such an important role. would argue equally as important to have good leadership in a clinic as it is to have good clinicians in a clinic. You need to do it to the best of your ability and create the right culture. and the right leadership skills to be able to do all of the things that you need to do. speaker-0: Well, we have this huge leaky bucket now, don't we? Let's talk about the leaky bucket. So we've got, I did have the stats, let's, I might be slightly wrong, but it's something like 40 % of vets are leaving by the time that they're four years qualified, if not more. And why is that first of all? And is it the environment that we're creating? There was something about the type of people that were recruiting into it. ⁓ I want to choose not to believe that that's the case because I believe that ⁓ if they get through vet school, they are the right person for the job ⁓ and that they should be staying in it. But why are we losing so many vets? So one thing I thought was, it because we're turning them into leaders and taking them off of clinics? Are we creating the wrong kind of leaders? Are we not creating a good enough environment for they stay in? Are we not protecting them? ⁓ I think within my clinic, I'm very strong on getting my new graduates to come in and we get their GDP done and then I get them on a pathway. So something that interests them, go and study a certificate, let's get you interested, let's get you motivated and let's make sure you're okay. Just really simple. Let's make sure you're okay, that you're happy to come to work. ⁓ And I say to them, If you call me one day and you're a bad day and you say, Nath, I need to stay off, I'm going to come in the car and I'm going to cover for you you're going to take your day off and you're to look after you and do what you want. I'd like to believe that kind of culture is everywhere. But that was a lot. I just yapped a lot. What's your opinion, Where should we start? The leaky bucket. speaker-1: There's a lot to unpack there. I've got a slight tangent initially, because I really liked your idea of if you need to take a bit of time off, I'll cover for you. when we talk a little bit about generations later on, that's one of the things that would really appeal to a Generation Z person, well-being days. ⁓ And there are some organizations that ⁓ not just have sick days, but also well-being days where you can you can phone in and say, you don't even have to tell what it is. You say, I don't feel like coming in. that gets covered. No, it's really difficult, though, if you're in a small practice with a small team when that happens. But as a a principle, I think it's quite it's quite interesting because ⁓ it does tailor to to generation Z expectations. But in terms of why are we losing so many speaker-0: You don't know what's wrong with you. speaker-1: people, which is a massive question. Leadership is a big part. Well, first of all, as you say, are they the right people coming in? Yes, because they've been through vet school. Are they coming into the right place? No, most of the time not, because we are still operating our clinics as the way we did probably back in the 1980s and 1990s and so on. So they're potentially not always coming into the right culture. And coming back this vet as leader a bit again, because I do want to kind of emphasize there are some incredible vet leaders around as well. And it's it's not a matter of ⁓ get a practice manager that will do everything. There's some brilliant vet led practices that are terrific at creating that culture. So that's really important. It's the person, not the role. So if they're coming into the right place where as human beings, OK, we are there all to varying degrees, we want the same thing. OK, one, we want to earn enough money and have some routine and something that the kind of whole kind of survival bread and buttery things. Right. We all need that to a degree. Secondly, we want to love. want relationships. want to feel that we're valued, that our boss likes us and all these kind of things. We want to learn. So you giving your people the opportunity to to go and study. That's really important. ⁓ And we want some kind of purpose, some kind of reason for doing what we want. So in the veterinary world, the purpose is there. It's there. And all we can do is sometimes get in the way of that purpose with sometimes how we manage and lead. But the purpose is there. Just tap into it, because that's why people became vets and nurses and so on in the first place. So the right kind of leadership will will demonstrably improve your attention. demonstratively ⁓ improve your well-being and demonstrably, I'm struggling with that word but we will get it out. speaker-0: ⁓ I'm not saying that one. speaker-1: Increase your performance across all the areas by driving employee engagement which has been shown to correlate very highly with all sorts of performance metrics from patient safety through to profitability and so on. So the right kind of leadership is... speaker-0: Client retention as well. They don't want to see someone else when they come in. They want to see their vets and nurses. And it doesn't have to be the same one. What I say to people when they come into my clinic is we don't have locums. You might not see me next time, but you'll see my team and we all talk about all of the cases together. So we know you and we know your pet. speaker-1: Yeah, and that that's ideal. And that's creating the right culture. There's a really interesting graph. I use it on virtually every single ⁓ every single workshop I do. I pull up this slide from 2019 ⁓ that was ⁓ essentially a bar chart from ⁓ the RVC Beaver and ⁓ BVA. I think it was. And it was reasons why vets remain in their position and reasons why they leave their position. So they had Tell me. Yeah. From the central line, had the chart going up for the reasons, all the reasons listed along the bottom. And then the higher the graph went, the more people had said, that's the reason why I'm staying. And then conversely, below the line, the zero line, were the reasons why they were leaving. And within that chart, one of the biggest reasons why people were leaving was management. And more so than why they were staying. speaker-0: I don't the answer to this. speaker-1: So I think we need to shift that up. And a lot of the other bits and pieces, particularly the ones that were quite strong ⁓ reasons like work-life balance and investment in education, these kind of things, are things that leadership can control. There are things in there that you can't control. if somebody's family moves away and they've got to go, they're going to leave your practice. But there's a lot within managers control. But first of all, become a good leader and manager. Otherwise, you're losing people anyway. Yeah. Yeah. speaker-0: worth investing. So achievements, are they measured by your EBDAR? speaker-1: That's a measure. Yeah, is a measure but ⁓ speaker-0: You've spoken about that in a couple of your articles that you've written. And it's a dirty word for vets or clients when you, the thing is that it is a business and it does have to make money and it does have to pay people and they should be paid well. They do an amazing job. It seems like it's a dirty word. speaker-1: Yes. I have this idea, which I think everybody has in the veterinary world. When I was doing my MBA back in 2010-12, there was a guy that talked about professional service industries who talked about the three S's of success, satisfaction and something else. But basically, it's looking after your customers, making money and looking after your people. ⁓ speaker-0: Sun and Sand. See Sun and Sand. speaker-1: We'll keep it at that. ⁓ So you hit the three S's and I came up with the four C's for the veterinary world, which essentially I changed to the pet, the client, the team and the business. Essentially, those are four equally important areas of the whole. ⁓ And so what you need to do is have measures for how well are you doing for your patients, which are partly your ⁓ clinical measures, but also how well are you looking after them as well when they're in? How do you measure cuddles? I don't know. But certainly some kind of ⁓ measurement of how well you're doing for patients within your care. Clients, there's all sorts of metrics you can get for clients and all sorts of clinical metrics you can get. Team, so you can get a simple thing like employee NPS that you can regularly measure. ⁓ Those sorts of things. And then your business side of things, which is your profitability and ⁓ your KPIs and so on. But I believe in looking at those in the round ⁓ as a complete picture. So a balanced scorecard type approach. much like Ben was talking about when he was on your podcast, the profit should come. If you do good medicine, you look after your people, you look after your clients. The profit should follow, particularly if you engage your your people so they understand the financial side. A number of practices don't share financial information with their people, and they really should, because there's nothing to be embarrassed about. In fact, If you should be embarrassed about in any way, it's the fact you don't make enough. You know, if you go back and look at some of the surveys done, the EBITDA to use the phrase is pretty low in most places. A lot of practices struggle to make profit. So, you know, you should share it so people understand because they can see money coming in and they make this assumption that it's being kept by the owners. But the reality is when they have an understanding of, you know, the classic ⁓ image of the pound coin and how you divide it up. Yeah, what's left for profit. They understand that and they understand how to value themselves and the service that they're providing to people. ⁓ speaker-0: think most of, if I think about most of my clients, I'm very up for open conversations with them about how much something costs, why it costs that. And yes, we do make some profit because, you know, got to eat. ⁓ Most people are quite open for that conversation. And I just like it to like not be a dirty word anymore and to be able to explain it and for them to be okay with it. But the ones that are not happy with it, I think they're just the loudest. I don't think they're the majority. I they're the loudest. speaker-1: think you're right there. also I think the unfortunate comes from the loudest sometimes having come from above where all that they've been told about is they need to improve their EBITDA, their ATB and so on. ⁓ Whereas if you take Ben's approach to things that he discussed with you on your podcast previously, then that's what people want to hear. And when I was at Vet Partners, I encouraged the business development directors to go in and take that kind of balanced scorecard approach. And it wasn't just about going and getting out the PNL and KPIs and going, look and look how you compare. speaker-0: That's the reason that I left the Linnaeus practices. I didn't have any clinical appraisals or anything like that. It was just ⁓ Hibidah, KPI, ATVs, hiring freezes, that kind of thing, ⁓ which is fine for me because the vet station was born of that and I love it and I wouldn't change a thing, but ⁓ they lost me and I was the only orthopedic surgeon in that group. So I can't imagine that didn't hit speaker-1: help their ATV. speaker-0: severely affected the A.T.V. speaker-1: Is that round about 2018 ish? speaker-0: Yeah, it was, I think they were, they bought the practice as I was at probably 2017, 2018. And I was gone end of 2019. speaker-1: I think there's a point, the event we were was hitting a really difficult point where costs were going up. Sales had really plateaued, plus the bottom had fallen out of the acquisition market. So a lot of the bigger organizations were really struggling at that point, which is I think what happens every time any human being is under stress, you default to this version of yourselves. You're trying to be a sort of bigger person, but you default to it. And I think at that point, probably a lot of the corporates were feeling a lot of pressure. And so you immediately start to go, we need to get the EBITDA, we need to get it possibly that's how the conversations then focus too much on that. Yeah, I do wonder that because we suffered in vet partners with that as well. At that point, it was like all of a sudden, I think we'd just been had a new private equity firm come in just at the point that everything plateaued. speaker-0: Yeah, that absolutely time. speaker-1: sales wise and costs were going up and all of a sudden we had to get a bit more serious about how we were how we were running practices. Yeah. But I think then the conversations did swing much more in that direction. ⁓ And I guess the secret is one, don't get yourself to that place if you can help it. But two, if you do try and maintain your perspective, try and step back, just like if you're having a really bad day as a leader and you know We all have our particular weaknesses based on our personality and your default. ⁓ absolutely. to step back. Yeah. ⁓ speaker-0: I've times asked for ⁓ forgiveness for something I've said when I've been stressed or tired or under pressure. It's actually the worst when you can see that you've upset somebody or made them feel very badly and you're like, crap, should have kept a lid on that. speaker-1: Yeah, we've all had to apologize and the important thing is to apologize and and acknowledge your weaknesses. And I'm now long enough in the tooth that I don't really have anything to prove to anybody. I'm quite upfront and comfortable with my weaknesses, but it doesn't mean I don't try to improve. But I'm happy to say, you know, sorry, I'm not, I messed that up because that's not really my strong suit. speaker-0: On that, it's a slight subject change, but it's reminded me of something. So you wrote an article about working with Gen Z. speaker-1: Generation Z. Generation We're in UK. We're in UK with Generation Z. speaker-0: Generation Z. ⁓ And I actually asked my staff the other day, I am a little blunt with them, but I've tried to explain to them that I'm a direct speaker and that they're okay to tell me to use fluffy words if they need. So I am a little blunt, but I basically said to them, who told you, you had to be perfect? Who told you, you can't make mistakes? Because every time ⁓ I see this she- panic on their faces if something, if they believe something hasn't gone perfectly or if they believe they've made a mistake and I'm out there dropping instruments during surgery, putting pins in the wrong place and like, ⁓ it'd be fine. Don't worry about it. It'd be fine. And yes, part of that is experience and you know what can go wrong and you can get away with that kind of thing. But honestly, I see their little brains like, ⁓ hit the panic button. What's going on? Who told Gen Z they have to be perfect? speaker-1: Yeah, yeah, well, unfortunately, yes, your generation why? speaker-0: Lenny was so much cooler. I didn't even know that was a thing, Jen. Why? But it makes sense. speaker-1: Yeah, if you prefer, I'll call you a millennial, but it's the same thing. speaker-0: I just think it's cooler. I'll be a millennial. speaker-1: You're a millennial. for you, trial and error is an important part of how you grow. But for Gen Z, there's a few factors that come into play. just sort of stepping back a little bit and looking at the whole idea of generations, So we're human beings. We're the same thing, OK, pretty much. There's not any difference over the last. 60, 70 years between us biologically, it's all about ⁓ the environment that you grew up in. various ⁓ factors have influenced ⁓ generations, generation Y, X, and baby boomers before that. ⁓ And ⁓ one of the main factors, so if we take, for example, ⁓ family. So technology is the obvious thing. ⁓ Let's have it. if you look at that, you were there sort of you know, Facebook came along, you started to do that and the dawn of the internet happened during your formative years. ⁓ speaker-0: And I saw. dial up noise. Yeah. Yep. ⁓ speaker-1: So you had that so started to use technologies, you've got a little bit of a feel for it. Gen Z were born into it. So they're very agile, adaptable to that. And so on. Gen X, I, you know, had sort of really rubbish video games, like that tennis game that you had to turn the thing and move these wobbly things on the screen. And I could type 8008135 on my calculator, turn it up. speaker-0: I did that too! We kept that one along! speaker-1: The crew out! And baby boomers probably have an abacus or something that they would play with. I don't know. there are various things like technology, family. So again, if you're a baby booner, you would probably brought up again, this is all generalizations and it all merges. So there's more difference within generations than there are between them. But you can talk about these factors in general ways. And I'm not labeling everybody the same. just to be clear. so baby boomers more likely to grow up with, you know, father going to work, mother staying at home kind of thing. Right. Generation X. latch key parents, both parents out working, we would come home, stick some baked beans on and watch Blue Peter and wait for them to come home. Generation Y were then getting ⁓ more parenting ⁓ coming in. So they were a bit more watched as a generation. There's a bit more stranger danger, that sort of fear which affected them. But Gen Z, absolutely has gone, you know, what you have is this very overprotective helicopter parenting that we've been doing. as Gen X, ⁓ again, in general terms, where we've been very overprotective in the real world. Something goes wrong in school. When I was a kid, I'd have to sort it out myself. Nowadays, something goes wrong in school. I mean, I want to see the head teacher. What's going on with my... So as parents, we've taken away this kind of accountability aspect from our children. ⁓ And so ⁓ there's a couple of factors come into play. So one is, you know, they haven't really sort of... developed accountability ⁓ very early. the other aspect to it is, I think, you most vets are quite perfectionist, anyone quite high achieving and so on. And they're coming into this is probably possibly their first job. So don't really know the rules. speaker-0: I read in your article and I was so shocked. This is their first job. speaker-1: 20 % less than 20 % of generations that have had a job in their teenage years. my generation is because financially the parents haven't had to as much. think there's a number of factors. mean, the whole kind of financial bit is interesting in itself because generations that are much more financially motivated because although they've had a more comfortable upbringing, my baby boomers, was scarcity. hardly speaker-0: Now is that why speaker-1: and any material objects, then generations that have also seen their parents get laid off during the financial crisis during Covid. ⁓ speaker-0: ⁓ I remember, and I was actually really young, I must have been three or something, but the minor strike. My dad was a minor. So I remember all of that. speaker-1: Yeah, 1984. Yeah. But but that's you know, that whole kind of situation has got worse and worse and worse. Yeah. Staying with a company these days is sometimes quite hard. Plus, their jobs are being threatened by AI. Yes. There's all sorts of factors that have influenced them. But coming back onto the why do they need to be perfect? That's where I have a bit of a tendency. This is going to be a long podcast. speaker-0: Three hour podcast, first one up. speaker-1: But they are afraid to make mistakes because because of a bit a bit about how they've been parented ⁓ and how they're coming out of school. So and learning. Yeah. But you have to say you have to let them know it's fine to make mistakes. ⁓ speaker-0: I've only got myself to blame. I honestly am at a loss as how to do it because I, I demonstrate mistakes to them daily because I make a lot of mistakes. ⁓ so I'm like, that's okay. We've done that. We'll just, you know, move along or whatever. Absolutely. Like she should really be more careful. She should pay attention to what she's doing. speaker-1: think you're an idiot. reporter to the RCBS. That's terrible. What's going on? speaker-0: Yeah. And I try to be okay with their mistakes. I mean, now and again, when they drop something that's worth 10,000 pounds, I'm a little bit upset, but you know, that's rare. So in general, I try to be okay with them making mistakes and support their mistakes, but I don't know. I actually don't know what to do. speaker-1: It takes a while for them to try. a couple of things. First of all, it takes a while to trust because, you know, generation Y, as soon as somebody gave you like a mission statement and a set of values, you're like, ⁓ brilliant, better money because I've got a purpose and I got some values. I'm happy. generations, having seen they've grown up through this kind of post-truth world that we're living at the moment, having seen lots of politicians behave extremely badly and not lose their jobs and so on. They're a little bit and seen their parents laid off by companies where they've been loyal servants for ages and ages and ages. They're a little bit more. Yeah, OK. He's telling me you've got these values and this mission and stuff, but I'll believe it when I see it. So they will take a long time to kind of figure, can I actually trust that they're saying what they're what they mean, what they say? Yeah. But also it is about the new into work there. It's scary being a vet. probably remember your first. time coming into practice. It's a lot of responsibility. I heard you talk about it on one of your podcasts before. You know, that's a lot on their shoulders. speaker-0: weren't handheld in our first days either. So it was really in the deep end. speaker-1: But yeah, and it will just take longer and there just needs to be more patience. ⁓ It will just take more time because they're new to work. There are all these other factors that are influencing them. And yes, they'll kind of believe what you say eventually. But as you know, it only takes ⁓ it takes a long time to build trust. Yeah. And and can quite easily be destroyed quickly. So ⁓ just be patient is what I say. and get to know people individually ⁓ and don't just label them as this is just your generation because actually you're not valuing them when you do that are you? So it's get to know the person individually ⁓ and together you can learn because you'll learn stuff from them as well I'm sure you do. speaker-0: Yeah, I've learned the word mental health. ⁓ No, I actually think they like they bring a lot as well. Whereas we ⁓ probably me and Callum and Kate, so we're all a bit older and we will just work the entire day. We won't eat until all of the work is done. And then we'll be the first ones. We'll all stay till midnight, 1am or whatever. speaker-1: Yeah, yeah. speaker-0: actually that is not healthy, it turns out. Who knew? My nervous system is on overdrive. And they will just say things like, you know, you should just step outside and take a walk or why don't you eat first and then come back to it? And they'll protect their own time, which I think is amazing where they're looking at them like, what are you doing? But actually it's amazing. And they look after their own, like I said, mental health. actually do, which I thought we, I've never done that. I don't think we've ever done that. In fact, sometimes when my brain is too busy, what do I do? I do more work so I don't have to think about it. speaker-1: And you drop lots of stuff all over the floor and they're sitting thinking, ⁓ look at this, what's going on? Yeah, it is. You look at attitude towards mental health. Now, there's there's awareness of mental health and there's there's actual incidents of mental health as well. So a lot of ⁓ older generational people might go, ⁓ it's all just a load of nonsense, isn't it? know, when my day we just go on with it kind of stuff. And so back then, there would have been, you know, speaker-0: Absolutely. Yeah. speaker-1: If you look at what was going on, there was a lot of mental health issues that just weren't, you know. speaker-0: like horrendous ones that impacted the lives of other people and people around them. speaker-1: Yeah, so the awareness is better. It's not that, you know, these things just suddenly started to happen recently. They've always been around. speaker-0: And think we've got words for them now as well. We didn't have words for them before. speaker-1: We do. And people are more aware of them, can then, know, sometimes then perhaps where some people might just kind of get on with it, others might go, ⁓ I don't think I can. You know, that's the nature of being aware. But also, I think there's a lot of evidence to show that ⁓ social media and technology use and so on has had massive impact because a lot of there's a book called The Anxious Generation by Jonathan Haidt that is well worth a read. where he points out a lot of these ⁓ of anxiety and so on started to happen at the advent of when Facebook put in a like button and suddenly you could and the putting of a camera on the back of a phone. Yeah. Yeah. speaker-0: I mean that. Thank God. Thank God there was not a camera around when I was in my 20s. That's all I can say now. speaker-1: Me too. I had to use the word me too. But yeah, was just yeah. If you think about the way I behaved back then, I'm so glad that not there was anything me too ish, just to be clear. speaker-0: Yeah, we're not that kind of speaker-1: I'm glad that doesn't come back to haunt me. And I do feel sorry for some politicians when this stuff comes back from, you know, 20 years ago, because, you know, you were different. speaker-0: Yeah. And it was okay to be like a bit stupid and crazy and make bad choices. And, know, obviously we learned from them because we don't still do those things. Well, I mean, occasionally, but, you know, generally we learn from them. Whereas if, if you do that now, there's a photo, there's a video, it's in the group chat at the very least. And if not, it is on someone's Instagram feed or it's in a podcast. Yeah. Or a reality show. Yeah. speaker-1: or it's in a podcast. speaker-0: Who knows? ⁓ Yeah. So you have to be a lot more careful. speaker-1: Yeah, and they're doing the right things because again, you come down to the evidence and what I think is important with all this is everybody can have their opinion and most of our opinions are based on our ignorance and our biases and so on and so forth. But we can have our opinion. But what's important is evidence, you know, and the evidence is if you're not taking breaks and so on, you don't perform as well as you should. So there's a lot of evidence that backs this up. So we should follow that because we're evidence based people. So let's use that when it comes to our people stuff as well. But ultimately, you're going to have differences in expectations. So a Gen Z is more likely to come into a job expecting that job always to be really interesting and that they'll be able to just fit it around what they do in their social time and so on. They can just drop the job and move on. Whereas you go back to the sort of baby boomers, it's like, you know, I live to work. It's now like, well, yeah, it works there and I need to do it because I've got to earn money because I can't afford a mortgage and an AI is going to take my job. So I've got to do all that kind of stuff. But actually, ⁓ it's it's it's I've got to look after myself as well. So, yeah, I think it's really it's really important to to think of when you've got all these differences that will happen. And people actually go, ⁓ they don't want to go on the out of hours rate or they're leaving at five o'clock and all this kind of stuff is to one, ask yourself, first of all, is this me? speaker-0: Yes, I've through this recently. I couldn't understand it. No, I couldn't understand why they weren't the first ones volunteering to stay and do this exciting surgery. I just thought, what, what, what, what do mean you're going home for dinner? That's what I thought. And then literally I was like, is this me or is this them? And I still don't know the answer. speaker-1: No, sometimes a bit, but when you figure that out, the next thing is right, well, who needs to change? Yes. Because that's the point. It's like, what does the practice actually need? And that's just sort of North Star is right. This is my practice. This is what my practice believes in. This is what we're here for. This is how we, this is what we promise to our clients, to our patients, to our people and what we need to do as a business. So that is my North Star. So if you're a, if to you, for example, running your own out of hours is one of your core strategies, then you need to be clear when you have anybody coming in for an interview, that's there, that's not going to change, you'll come into the rotor. And that way, no, eyes open, I'll either take that or I won't. ⁓ And when you ever have a sort of disagreement about what should be or shouldn't be happening, you should ask what's best for the practice. But within that, you also need to be thinking not what was best for the practice 10 years ago, but what's best for the practice in the future. So when I did a project for Excel that's a while back and I interviewed a hundred different managers in different positions from people that owned the practice, all sorts of roles across the practice, a hundred interviews, 64 job titles. that's lots of cups of tea. I'm a cup of tea kind of guy. But what was very clear was that the practice owner director role has to change because you'll never get any generations ed wanting to take on their look at that. And most of the practice owners and directors I know want to carry on being 90 % clinical and seeing their lovely clients on top of doing the leadership and management roles. And so they're doing all of that in their weekends, their evenings and so on. speaker-0: two full time jobs. Yeah. This is what I found as a clinical director. My stepped off actually consults, just did the surgeries, orthopedics, and then the rest was management stuff. Yeah. I don't, I actually wasn't that good at, if I'm honest. speaker-1: No, it's to get somebody to do that for you. And and also, yeah, and a lot of practice owners and directors, you know, they're trying to all the HR and the marketing and the people stuff. So speaker-0: people, admin any task that involves an Excel sheet. It's not for me. speaker-1: No, I'm not a massive fan of them. I like to make them look pretty, but yeah. speaker-0: husband actually does that for me. Thank God he's an analyst. So let him know the data I need and you may lend him out. ⁓ Yeah. And then just on the VMPG stuff, because I'm not sure that I knew much about it before. Actually, you sent me a nice message, I think, after the Panorama show. And then I looked into it I was like, ⁓ this is amazing. I should have done this before I opened a practice. speaker-1: ⁓ well, that's really handy. Can I borrow him sometimes? speaker-0: ⁓ but I think there was a tagline happy, healthy vet world, which I loved. where any, everyone benefits from excellent leadership and management, which is the dream. How are you going to make that happen? How are we? We we're all in it together. speaker-1: We are, so what we are at the VMG is we're a community of veterinary leaders and managers. Anybody, doesn't matter what your clinical or non-clinical role is. So first of all, let's provide a community. So we run a thing called ShareSpace where once every six weeks ⁓ people come in, they say, what do we want to talk about? And we'll split people off into groups and they'll share their experiences, their challenges, their tips and so on with each other. and build community across the country that way. So community is one way of doing that. Another way that we do it is through CPD and also through our qualifications, which, as I said before, they're level five degree level, their certificates and diplomas are accredited. so providing people with the qualifications to lead. And we have tutors, fantastic tutors that are quite well known in the industry like Helen Silver McMahon and so on. So we have some really good tutors ⁓ as well that will help you do your assignments and tailor them to your practice. So your leadership and management skills become accredited. You get those qualifications that also give you that little bit of kudos when you're dealing with other people have qualifications, but also give you the knowledge ⁓ applied to your work to be able to do it. So so community education. We have our congress of course in April as well, which I hope you come along to this. speaker-0: this year. I remember where I was. I feel like I was out of the country, so that's not my fault. Yeah, you did. And I was up for it until I realized I was not in the UK. speaker-1: I you were. I I tried to persuade you. So it's really providing that community and the education, the CPD to recognise and not just because I'm a vet or I'm a nurse, I'm a leader, I'm a manager. And those perspectives are important, just like they are in practice. If you just had a community of vet leaders and a community of nurse leaders and a community of reception leaders and so on, you're missing out on that cross pollination and that team working in different... speaker-0: Perspectives that you speaker-1: Yeah, from from that. yeah, it's slow, but our vision, yeah, it's to is to make sure that leadership and management standards are raised, because it makes such a difference to well-being, engagement ⁓ and retention. speaker-0: Yeah, that's amazing. Anything else that you wanted to throw out for us? We've covered a lot to be fair. I'm not sure. I'm not looking at the clock. speaker-1: How many hours have we been here? We could probably make it an all nighter but I suspect we probably reached a reasonable point. But you're reaching for a cushion. speaker-0: Yeah, I'm trying not to fall off my chair while I get this, but look, you now get some under the firmer. You can proudly take around everywhere with you. speaker-1: ⁓ right. Excellent. I can't look at that. I will. speaker-0: I to look at my face and every day look. ⁓ speaker-1: Excellent. know just the place to put this. speaker-0: ⁓ Thank you very much for joining me and also just thank you for what you're doing. I think it's amazing and very needed. speaker-1: Thank you Vanessa and thanks for your voice as well in the industry. It's really important to have somebody natural like yourself that just gets out there and engages with people and doesn't hide and isn't afraid to say something because somebody's always going to criticize you. speaker-0: Yes, yeah, that's and parcel, isn't it? speaker-1: And I love the way you're also spending some of these podcasts having clients on. So you're giving us in the industry a real chance to listen in some depth to what clients are saying on areas that we're quite uncomfortable with. Absolutely. And and vice versa, you're giving clients the opportunity to listen to our perspective. I think that's a really, really good thing to be doing. ⁓ speaker-0: Thank very much. Not often people come in and thank me. speaker-1: Thank you. speaker-0: Excellent.