Latest / My Veterinary Life / Discovering dentistry, mentorship, and leadership with Dr. Rachel Stading

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Discovering dentistry, mentorship, and leadership with Dr. Rachel Stading · My Veterinary Life

0:09
Speaker 1: Welcome to this week's episode of the My Veterinary Life podcast.
0:13
Speaker 1: I'm your host, doctor Annie Schavant, and my pronouns are
0:16
Speaker 1: she her, and our guest today is doctor Rachel Stating.
0:19
Speaker 1: Doctor Stating is a small animal associate veterinarian with special
0:22
Speaker 1: interests in dentistry and leadership development. I am so excited
0:26
Speaker 1: to share her story today, but before we do, I
0:29
Speaker 1: want to give a thank you to our podcast partner,
0:31
Speaker 1: NBA General Practice. NBA helps great vets become even greater
0:35
Speaker 1: with multiple paths to build a career that's uniquely yours.
0:38
Speaker 1: Lead a team, explore a specialty, own a practice, or
0:43
Speaker 1: shape care across our network of over nine hundred neighborhood clinics.
0:46
Speaker 1: Wherever you want to go next, NBA has a path
0:49
Speaker 1: to help you get there. Visit careers dot NBA dot
0:53
Speaker 1: com to find your next role. And with that, welcome
0:56
Speaker 1: to the show, doctor Stating.
0:58
Speaker 2: Yeah, Yannie, thanks for having me.
1:00
Speaker 1: Yes, thanks so much for being here. I am so
1:02
Speaker 1: excited to chat with you and learn all about your
1:05
Speaker 1: career story and the twists and turns and things that
1:08
Speaker 1: get you excited. So let's start at the very beginning
1:12
Speaker 1: and talk about how do you first become interested in
1:14
Speaker 1: veterinary medicine.
1:16
Speaker 3: That one was actually a little bit more unconventional. You
1:19
Speaker 3: know when I was when I was a kid, I
1:22
Speaker 3: was into nature, wildlife and pretty much it. You know,
1:26
Speaker 3: my my parents had a lot of allergies and my
1:29
Speaker 3: dad has bad asthma, so you know, we didn't really
1:32
Speaker 3: have pets growing up, you know, and if we did,
1:34
Speaker 3: it was for a short while, and you know, maybe
1:36
Speaker 3: I over compensated now, but that's a different Sorry. Yeah,
1:40
Speaker 3: I even know when I was like getting close to
1:42
Speaker 3: graduation trying to figure out a career path, you know,
1:45
Speaker 3: it was more trying to kind of get an idea
1:48
Speaker 3: about what would stable job would be that would kind
1:51
Speaker 3: of combine everything, and I had interested in medicine, so
1:54
Speaker 3: I was like, oh, better medicine.
1:56
Speaker 2: That sounds like a good like mitchpog of everything. So
1:59
Speaker 2: pretty much.
2:00
Speaker 1: I love that. Yes, I do feel like that sort
2:04
Speaker 1: of reflection point of how is my career going to
2:08
Speaker 1: align with my interests is so key. I'm looking for
2:12
Speaker 1: something to incorporate all of my passions together. So I'm
2:15
Speaker 1: so glad that you found veterinary medicine to be that
2:18
Speaker 1: fit for you. So I am curious. You went to
2:22
Speaker 1: that school, you graduated, what were your plans for after graduation,
2:27
Speaker 1: and how do they compare it to what actually happened.
2:31
Speaker 3: Yeah, I think you A lot of things tracked on
2:33
Speaker 3: a total different direction.
2:35
Speaker 2: Most of the time for lots of people.
2:37
Speaker 3: But for me, when I went into venter medicine, I
2:41
Speaker 3: still had a strong affinity for wildlife. I loved a
2:45
Speaker 3: quatic animal medicine. That's what I really wanted to do.
2:49
Speaker 3: But life have always different path.
2:51
Speaker 2: To show you.
2:53
Speaker 3: And when I was done graduated and all you know,
2:57
Speaker 3: I was in a relationship.
2:58
Speaker 2: We're trying to figure out where.
2:59
Speaker 3: We want to live, where you know, would be doable
3:03
Speaker 3: for us to have both stable jobs and allso.
3:07
Speaker 2: In small animal medicine I went still in. Yeah.
3:13
Speaker 1: I think that's so important to highlight though, because there
3:17
Speaker 1: are so many factors that go into what we end
3:22
Speaker 1: up doing and what causes us to pivot during our careers.
3:26
Speaker 1: And some of those are the species we want to
3:29
Speaker 1: work on, some of them are geographic factors, some of
3:32
Speaker 1: them are personal or relational factors. I do think that
3:35
Speaker 1: talking about some of those factors that maybe aren't the
3:39
Speaker 1: first ones that immediately come to mind when we're thinking
3:41
Speaker 1: about career choice is really really helpful because it does
3:44
Speaker 1: impact your job satisfaction. So into Small Animal you went
3:49
Speaker 1: in your words, how would you describe those early career
3:52
Speaker 1: years for you?
3:54
Speaker 2: If I had one word, it would be messy.
3:58
Speaker 3: I was a little ill paired because you know, I
4:02
Speaker 3: had such a strong affinity for more like wildlife rehab,
4:06
Speaker 3: aquatic animal medicine and all. So when I first started,
4:09
Speaker 3: I was is a rude awakening because you know, I
4:12
Speaker 3: had a lot of experience in the vet school setting.
4:16
Speaker 3: How you're like as a vet student when you do
4:19
Speaker 3: your rotations. You know, it's not the exact same thing
4:21
Speaker 3: as when you're you're the doctor in a sense in
4:25
Speaker 3: a private clinic. And when I started, I was just
4:29
Speaker 3: trying to figure out, you know, my pathway. And then
4:32
Speaker 3: I ended up not going into aquatics. Well, I had
4:35
Speaker 3: applied to some internship in aquatics and then one internship
4:39
Speaker 3: in er that was close to my significant other, and
4:45
Speaker 3: I was like, okay, well we ended up you know,
4:48
Speaker 3: matching for that one, and so that was in Small
4:51
Speaker 3: Animal R.
4:52
Speaker 1: I appreciate you being candid about your experience. We know
4:57
Speaker 1: that that transition from that student to veterinarian is a
5:01
Speaker 1: significant one in all of our lives, and it looks
5:04
Speaker 1: different for everybody, so especially making that transition from that
5:08
Speaker 1: student learning mode that you mentioned to being the doctor,
5:11
Speaker 1: the primary decision maker. And then in your case, you're
5:14
Speaker 1: adding on that extra layer of perhaps practicing on species
5:18
Speaker 1: that you weren't exactly planning on while you were selecting
5:22
Speaker 1: all of your courses during veterinary school. So I would
5:25
Speaker 1: be curious about some of the strategies or resources you
5:29
Speaker 1: used to help you cope or navigate through that time.
5:35
Speaker 1: What works during those early career years.
5:38
Speaker 3: I would say, you know, something that provide now that
5:42
Speaker 3: I'm more of a well seasoned venerian that I didn't have.
5:47
Speaker 2: Was mentorship.
5:48
Speaker 3: So in my early career I was not blessed with
5:51
Speaker 3: having any sort of mentorship. After four months of interning
5:56
Speaker 3: inn er, I decided that was not for me and
5:59
Speaker 3: move and you know, I had to rely a lot
6:03
Speaker 3: on some of my friends and then some of my
6:07
Speaker 3: family members. You know, just you have such an imposter
6:10
Speaker 3: syndrome going on when you're like very young in your career,
6:14
Speaker 3: and you know, lots of people were telling me if
6:17
Speaker 3: you're quitting an internship four months and it will be
6:22
Speaker 3: very not ideal. You know, it doesn't look good on
6:25
Speaker 3: re resume essentially. And you know, my significant others a
6:30
Speaker 3: veterinarian too, and he was in vet school still at
6:33
Speaker 3: that time when I was starting my early career career,
6:36
Speaker 3: and I think that was key for.
6:38
Speaker 2: Being my grounding.
6:40
Speaker 3: Moment, like resetting the expectation and say it's like, yeah,
6:45
Speaker 3: you were very unhappy. Look at you now, you know
6:48
Speaker 3: it's been two months. Now you work at a private practice.
6:51
Speaker 3: I was able to find a job within two weeks
6:54
Speaker 3: after quitting, so it went all right. And then but
6:57
Speaker 3: you know, he had to remind me a few times
7:00
Speaker 3: so I didn't forget about that that it is not
7:02
Speaker 3: a failure, it is actually a success because that was not.
7:07
Speaker 2: The right fit for me at all.
7:09
Speaker 3: So moving to a better environment was causing less stress
7:13
Speaker 3: and I was able to learn a lot better that way.
7:16
Speaker 1: Yeah. Wow, that is quite the journey for those those
7:20
Speaker 1: early years, and such a difficult decision to make to
7:24
Speaker 1: leave an internship, because you're right, you highlighted a lot
7:27
Speaker 1: of those barriers that we think about, right, what is
7:30
Speaker 1: it going to look like on my resume? What are
7:32
Speaker 1: my job prospects going to look like and the fact
7:36
Speaker 1: that you know you had committed to the internship, you
7:39
Speaker 1: thought that it was going to be something that would
7:42
Speaker 1: work well for your career. So there's that sort of
7:44
Speaker 1: imposter syndrome of like, this decision wasn't the fit that
7:47
Speaker 1: I anticipated there. But kudos to you for recognizing that
7:53
Speaker 1: and being able to make the shift with the support
7:57
Speaker 1: of the folks that you had in your life at
7:59
Speaker 1: that time to be there and remind you of your
8:02
Speaker 1: why and remind you of what was important to you
8:05
Speaker 1: and why you're doing this. Because there will be difficult
8:09
Speaker 1: decisions that we have to make during our journeys. It
8:12
Speaker 1: may be in the first four months, it may be later,
8:15
Speaker 1: but there will be those inflection points. And so I
8:19
Speaker 1: think your strategy of taking that assessment, asking for advice,
8:25
Speaker 1: and then finding a different option is a really great
8:28
Speaker 1: framework for us to keep in mind. So you transitioned
8:32
Speaker 1: from some animal emergency internship to a small animal private practice,
8:37
Speaker 1: and then you had the opportunity to practice in multiple
8:41
Speaker 1: areas of the country in the next kind of phase
8:44
Speaker 1: of your career and even in the Caribbean. So I'm
8:47
Speaker 1: kind of curious in getting that perspective from different environments.
8:52
Speaker 1: What are some things that you learned about along the way.
8:55
Speaker 2: Yeah, I have. I've learned so much.
8:58
Speaker 3: Everything was quite situational in regards to moves, but at
9:03
Speaker 3: the same time, being able to experience different work settings,
9:08
Speaker 3: different work opportunities was It was eye opening in a
9:13
Speaker 3: sense that I was able to experience varied work culture
9:20
Speaker 3: and see what works and what doesn't work, and see
9:22
Speaker 3: what i like and don't like, and see what I'm
9:26
Speaker 3: successful at and when I'm not successful at.
9:30
Speaker 2: And learned that you know, we can't be we can't
9:33
Speaker 2: be perfect.
9:35
Speaker 3: There's always something that's going to have to give at
9:38
Speaker 3: some point, depending on lots of circumstances. But one thing
9:42
Speaker 3: that I've noticed is essentially a leadership style, and even
9:47
Speaker 3: more so than work culture, because I would go, you know,
9:52
Speaker 3: work at some work environments that I felt we're quite
9:57
Speaker 3: successful at having a close knitted team, and then sometimes
10:02
Speaker 3: I would see it totally fall apart after a while,
10:05
Speaker 3: and then you know, you have like a whole change
10:08
Speaker 3: in team, and then trying to see that team getting
10:11
Speaker 3: rebuilt and try to also contribute to that team rebuilt.
10:16
Speaker 3: I've learned a lot about myself during that time too,
10:20
Speaker 3: with trying different clinics as well, in different work environment,
10:24
Speaker 3: different countries, and I've learned about what causes my energy
10:29
Speaker 3: to drain and what causes my energy to be replenished.
10:33
Speaker 3: And that was huge for me to be able to
10:36
Speaker 3: have those different experience and figure that out to myself,
10:40
Speaker 3: because if I would have not moved to from one
10:42
Speaker 3: place to the next, if I would have not gone
10:45
Speaker 3: to the Caribbean, I would have never learned that. Because
10:48
Speaker 3: when I moved to the Caribbean for a while and anything,
10:51
Speaker 3: this is not their world country by all means. You know,
10:53
Speaker 3: it's still high level bentary practice. We have all the
10:57
Speaker 3: bells and whistles, medications you need and all. So. But
11:02
Speaker 3: you know, what I've learned primarily is like I was
11:05
Speaker 3: always very scared. It was like, oh my gosh, I'm
11:07
Speaker 3: going to have to do on call. This is going
11:09
Speaker 3: to cause me to have burnout.
11:11
Speaker 2: And you know, I'm working full time and doing on call.
11:16
Speaker 2: It was actually.
11:18
Speaker 3: An energy fueling moment for me to be on call
11:22
Speaker 3: because you have so much appreciation from those clients, and
11:28
Speaker 3: it is, you know, most of the time, even if
11:31
Speaker 3: it ends up badly, it is such a humbling moment
11:35
Speaker 3: and the clients are so appreciative either way that you know,
11:39
Speaker 3: you always go home with your heart fuller. So yeah,
11:42
Speaker 3: that was that was like a big, a big take
11:46
Speaker 3: home moment for me.
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Speaker 1: I love that and especially highlighting that on call experience
11:53
Speaker 1: because I do feel like there's a little bit of
11:55
Speaker 1: stigma around on call hooks are looking to men those hours.
12:01
Speaker 1: To your point, the concern about burnout, which is a
12:03
Speaker 1: legitimate concern, but you held that concern in one hand
12:08
Speaker 1: and we're still willing to give it a try on
12:10
Speaker 1: the other and we're able to discover that there are
12:14
Speaker 1: some really great benefits of on call getting those client interactions.
12:18
Speaker 1: They are they're just different in that sense of accomplishment
12:21
Speaker 1: and gratitude. So I think that take home even applied
12:26
Speaker 1: more broadly, of being open to different opportunities and benefits
12:32
Speaker 1: that you might not have even anticipated, is such a
12:35
Speaker 1: great posture and attitude to have with new experiences.
12:39
Speaker 3: M Yeah, and I've learned a lot about what I
12:43
Speaker 3: can do because in my early career I've noticed more
12:47
Speaker 3: about I actually spend more attention on what I could
12:51
Speaker 3: not do, which is not a good mindset, and eventually
12:59
Speaker 3: figured it out that is.
13:01
Speaker 1: A great addition. So shifting that mindset from scarcity can't
13:05
Speaker 1: to abundance can. I love to hear about that. And
13:09
Speaker 1: I think that that might tie in a little bit
13:13
Speaker 1: to your enthusiasm passion for dentistry because yes, very okay, perfect,
13:21
Speaker 1: because that's traced throughout those different career transitions. And as
13:25
Speaker 1: you were talking about building teams, you were also building
13:29
Speaker 1: dentistry services at some of the practices that you were in.
13:32
Speaker 1: So how did this interest in dentistry evolve in the
13:36
Speaker 1: different practice settings?
13:38
Speaker 3: No one wanted to show interest in dentistry. Therefore I
13:44
Speaker 3: was like, Okay, I will do it. And it was
13:50
Speaker 3: you know, it started primarily at a clinic where I
13:54
Speaker 3: was working with a few doctors and most of the
13:57
Speaker 3: doctors were really.
14:00
Speaker 2: Not passionate about dentistry at all.
14:03
Speaker 3: So that was my change to step in, is like
14:05
Speaker 3: I will fill up that niche and I had absolutely
14:10
Speaker 3: zero dentistry training, zero, So I had to learn how
14:15
Speaker 3: to scale, how to extract. What is a drill bit,
14:21
Speaker 3: what instrument is, what is that a scaler?
14:25
Speaker 2: What is a curate? I have no clue.
14:27
Speaker 3: So I started from absolutely zero and I've learned a
14:33
Speaker 3: lot from technicians, which is actually super important to say,
14:40
Speaker 3: because you know, some of those venery technicians that are
14:45
Speaker 3: experienced are quite willing to share their knowledge and they
14:50
Speaker 3: know stuff that new grads will not know, and it's
14:55
Speaker 3: so humbling and heartwarming to develop through an equal relationship
15:02
Speaker 3: with your team and learned and she was great at
15:05
Speaker 3: some point after a lot of frustrations and after a
15:08
Speaker 3: lot of failures, but a lot of support from my
15:11
Speaker 3: technicians and a few successes that were quite addictive, and
15:17
Speaker 3: then went to the point where I was learning mostly
15:20
Speaker 3: everything from my technician to I was coming back to
15:24
Speaker 3: after some training and saying to my technicians, I've learned
15:28
Speaker 3: this thing, let me show you, and like, wow, that
15:31
Speaker 3: is so cool, you know, And from that moment forward,
15:34
Speaker 3: I was like totally.
15:36
Speaker 2: I was totally addicted to Benter dentistry is you're.
15:39
Speaker 3: Almost looking for that adrenaline and dorphin rush after like
15:44
Speaker 3: you try something and it actually works, and then you
15:48
Speaker 3: don't want practicing get better at There was also no
15:52
Speaker 3: performance pressure, which I think for me was the way
15:56
Speaker 3: to go and probably one of the main reasons why
15:59
Speaker 3: I love dentistry so much because it fits my so
16:05
Speaker 3: to speak. B type personality, and I didn't feel like
16:09
Speaker 3: I was judged for doing something a certain way. There
16:13
Speaker 3: is so many different ways to achieve an extraction or
16:17
Speaker 3: achieve a certain treatment that I like that quite a bit.
16:22
Speaker 1: Yeah, very cool. What a story. Starting with identifying the tools,
16:28
Speaker 1: like that is the knowledge level that you were starting from,
16:31
Speaker 1: to developing the interest learning from your colleagues and your teammates.
16:36
Speaker 1: I love that you highlighted that. I think that is
16:38
Speaker 1: so important and can be so rewarding, as you mentioned
16:41
Speaker 1: as well, to then looking to level up and going
16:44
Speaker 1: to continuing education, bringing back new treatments, new techniques to
16:50
Speaker 1: even further elevate that service in the areas that you worked.
16:55
Speaker 1: And I can only imagine the things that you learned
16:57
Speaker 1: about yourself along the way, and how you embrace challenges
17:01
Speaker 1: and teach and communicate. And what a great experience that
17:06
Speaker 1: was born really out of a need more so than
17:10
Speaker 1: innate desire to pursue a dentistry. And I think that
17:14
Speaker 1: we should all acknowledge that is a way to discover
17:17
Speaker 1: a passion and something that you end up really really enjoying.
17:20
Speaker 1: So thank you for being open to that experience and
17:24
Speaker 1: leaning in and watching it developed throughout your career.
17:28
Speaker 3: Yeah. Yeah, the way you're describing is very interesting because
17:31
Speaker 3: I never realized that about my dentistry passion because it
17:36
Speaker 3: was Yeah, you're right, it didn't blossom from just an
17:39
Speaker 3: interest on my part. It was blossomed practically because there
17:43
Speaker 3: was a niche that wanted to be filled and I
17:47
Speaker 3: opened myself to it. I use my curiosity and say
17:51
Speaker 3: maybe maybe I can do it if I don't think
17:56
Speaker 3: too hard on what I could fail on and the
18:00
Speaker 3: stakes are not high, then yeah.
18:04
Speaker 1: Yeah, I appreciate you adding that word of curiosity too,
18:08
Speaker 1: because I think that's a trait we can all think
18:10
Speaker 1: about that can apply to many different areas. And so
18:15
Speaker 1: I love that that was what led you to dentistry.
18:20
Speaker 1: And I want to move us into another theme of
18:23
Speaker 1: your career that I've noticed, being open to new experiences,
18:27
Speaker 1: working through challenges. And you mentioned earlier that the importance
18:32
Speaker 1: of mentorship and how you had hoped for more ideal
18:36
Speaker 1: mentorship experience personally in your early career and now want
18:40
Speaker 1: to be able to provide a better experience for other folks.
18:43
Speaker 1: So focusing now on your interest in leadership development, mentorship coaching,
18:50
Speaker 1: Why does this matter so much? To you and what
18:53
Speaker 1: does that look like in your practice?
18:55
Speaker 2: Now?
18:56
Speaker 3: Yeah, I think that when we finished fit school and
19:00
Speaker 3: go out into the real world and then maybe that
19:03
Speaker 3: that's my personal experience.
19:05
Speaker 2: I felt very ill prepared to be a leader.
19:09
Speaker 3: I was, you know, a vet student for most of
19:12
Speaker 3: my career in clinics, and then going into practice it
19:16
Speaker 3: was like, oh, I don't feel good about this.
19:19
Speaker 2: I don't feel good about leading.
19:22
Speaker 3: And I had a long personal journey ahead to kind
19:26
Speaker 3: of figure this out. And by my big moment was Wow,
19:31
Speaker 3: that doctor who just spoke to me right now for
19:33
Speaker 3: five minutes just told me I messed up on something.
19:38
Speaker 3: And instead of being frustrated defeated, I feel empowered, I motivated,
19:46
Speaker 3: I feel good about myself.
19:48
Speaker 2: What was the difference?
19:50
Speaker 3: And I want to know, you know, and I had
19:52
Speaker 3: to go dig in there and that was that was
19:56
Speaker 3: the big moment. Actually that made me into that brings
20:00
Speaker 3: the curiosity factor in there again. I brought a lot
20:04
Speaker 3: of curiosities like, oh, I want to know more about
20:08
Speaker 3: this style of communication and he's like, you know, this
20:11
Speaker 3: is what she did and then this is how she
20:13
Speaker 3: approached me and in a very positive way and non
20:19
Speaker 3: judgmental and supportive. So I want to be that person too.
20:25
Speaker 3: And you know, and at some extent, when you dive
20:28
Speaker 3: so deep into your own routine every day, you forget
20:32
Speaker 3: about that aspect that you need to learn as well.
20:35
Speaker 3: You know, you need to develop those skills. So noticing
20:39
Speaker 3: that and trying to expand on that as well was
20:43
Speaker 3: great because my relationship with my peers improved. I was
20:48
Speaker 3: able to have a better workflow because I was you know,
20:53
Speaker 3: so then I was noticing my needs, expressing my needs
20:58
Speaker 3: in a better way, and I felt more successful and
21:04
Speaker 3: wanted to make sure that I could provide this idea
21:09
Speaker 3: of developing those skills to other people as well. At
21:15
Speaker 3: that time, I was working corporate and had opportunity as
21:19
Speaker 3: well from that doctor that provided me that curiosity, opportunity
21:25
Speaker 3: to further develop my skills and start mentoring as well.
21:30
Speaker 3: We had hired a new grad and she thought I
21:34
Speaker 3: would be a good fit to be a mentor, to
21:38
Speaker 3: be a coach, and I had support from her as well,
21:42
Speaker 3: which would be my first mentor about almost ten years
21:46
Speaker 3: in and that was a great moment. Things went well,
21:51
Speaker 3: and I've realized how much you can fuel your energy
21:56
Speaker 3: just by seeing other people succeed through your help and
22:01
Speaker 3: how they can develop their independency. And you know, you
22:07
Speaker 3: you lived through their success, you lived through their failures too,
22:10
Speaker 3: And yeah, I was also hooked. After my experience in
22:17
Speaker 3: that corporate clinic. I eventually moved to another state and
22:22
Speaker 3: then and then in the Caribbean, and I had accumulated
22:27
Speaker 3: a significant amount of mentoring experience by then, and had
22:32
Speaker 3: also the experience to build dentistry practice, which built my
22:36
Speaker 3: confidence too, and then ended up in some work settings
22:41
Speaker 3: that I had noticed did not align with my leadership style.
22:48
Speaker 3: And when I moved back to the US, I was
22:51
Speaker 3: looking specifically to find something that had what I would
22:58
Speaker 3: consider the right culture and also a leadership skill which
23:03
Speaker 3: is more of a servant style leadership collaborative. And once
23:09
Speaker 3: I found that clinic, the leadership changed for something I
23:14
Speaker 3: was not quite happy with, and I was desperately trying
23:19
Speaker 3: ways to fix this because I'm a fixer. Let me
23:23
Speaker 3: try to fix this. And I'm like, Okay, I don't
23:26
Speaker 3: have the skill to fix this. So I had talked
23:29
Speaker 3: to one of the BI rep at the time who
23:33
Speaker 3: was in the Caribbean, and he was very firm about
23:37
Speaker 3: saying that, oh, I did a venery A Leadership Experience
23:41
Speaker 3: and a few years back it was life changing.
23:44
Speaker 2: You would love it.
23:46
Speaker 3: I was like, okay, so I remember that from two
23:50
Speaker 3: years ago and decided, you know what, I'm going to
23:52
Speaker 3: go for it. And I looked up ventery A Leadership
23:55
Speaker 3: Institute and ended up signing up for TRACK, which.
23:59
Speaker 2: Was lifetia changing, so to speak.
24:02
Speaker 3: So I was able to learn a whole lot more
24:04
Speaker 3: about myself too, because it is so important to know
24:08
Speaker 3: and understand yourself well before you can serve others and
24:13
Speaker 3: communicate efficiently and just be.
24:16
Speaker 2: A good person in general.
24:19
Speaker 3: And I was able to bring a lot of things
24:22
Speaker 3: back to my clinic and develop really good coping skills
24:27
Speaker 3: and ways to be nurturing in adversity so to speak.
24:36
Speaker 2: Yeah, which was really good.
24:37
Speaker 3: And loved my experience so much, and I had to
24:42
Speaker 3: give back in a way and ended up also facilitating
24:46
Speaker 3: at the Venerian Leadership Experience. It made full circle then,
24:51
Speaker 3: so I was able to go back to my roots
24:54
Speaker 3: as a newbie and then now mentoring future Venerians and.
25:00
Speaker 2: It is so heartwarming. Yeah.
25:02
Speaker 3: I left when my heart very very overfull. And you know,
25:06
Speaker 3: you develop so many good skills that are anti burnout.
25:09
Speaker 2: It's amazing.
25:12
Speaker 1: Wow, that is quite the leadership journey. So again, similar
25:18
Speaker 1: to your practice interests, if starting from the very beginning
25:22
Speaker 1: with somebody believing in you and assigning you essentially your
25:26
Speaker 1: first mentee, to developing those skills through direct experience at
25:32
Speaker 1: multiple different practices, then to seeking out additional professional development
25:38
Speaker 1: training first trek, and then giving back and facilitating at
25:42
Speaker 1: the veterinary leadership experience. So I love hearing how your
25:48
Speaker 1: path has evolved along the way in terms of leadership,
25:52
Speaker 1: and just hearing that sense of satisfaction and pride in
25:55
Speaker 1: your voice as you explain it really says it all.
26:00
Speaker 1: As we wrap our time today here doctor stating, Rachel,
26:05
Speaker 1: if you can distill one piece of advice that you've
26:09
Speaker 1: received throughout the many twists and turns that's really stuck
26:13
Speaker 1: with you since you first heard it.
26:16
Speaker 3: That one is a very unusual one and it came
26:20
Speaker 3: from a hairstylist.
26:24
Speaker 2: It's don't think about it, just do it. And it
26:28
Speaker 2: stuck with me because at.
26:30
Speaker 3: The time I was ready to move move apartments and
26:34
Speaker 3: was very stressed and could not start packing, and then
26:39
Speaker 3: she just simply said, I understand you, and I usually
26:42
Speaker 3: tell myself this, just don't think about it, just do it.
26:45
Speaker 3: So it translates to me that don't be over analyzing
26:50
Speaker 3: before you start something. And there's a big difference in
26:55
Speaker 3: regards to starting something and doing something, and it's okay
27:00
Speaker 3: to take that first step and start and go from there,
27:05
Speaker 3: reassess and see if you want to continue. It really
27:09
Speaker 3: did follow me all my life and it's just it's
27:12
Speaker 3: such a silly quote, but it translates to all aspects
27:16
Speaker 3: of my life.
27:16
Speaker 1: Yes, that's fantastic. You never know when those knowledge gyms
27:22
Speaker 1: are going to arrive, so being open to advice wherever
27:25
Speaker 1: you can find it and you never know what impact
27:29
Speaker 1: it's going to have. I think that's such an important
27:31
Speaker 1: distinction between starting something and doing something that can help
27:34
Speaker 1: us get over some of that apprehension. Just start. You
27:38
Speaker 1: can always reassess, but start with the starting and just
27:42
Speaker 1: do it. So I think those are some great words
27:45
Speaker 1: to leave our listeners with today to think about in
27:48
Speaker 1: their own lives and where that can apply to them
27:51
Speaker 1: or translate to them as you said. So thank you
27:54
Speaker 1: so much Rachel for coming on sharing your story, being
27:57
Speaker 1: honest about the challenges and opportunity and moments of curiosity
28:02
Speaker 1: on the way. I really enjoyed our conversation and I
28:05
Speaker 1: hope you have as well.
28:06
Speaker 2: Thank you, Annie, I really enjoyed conversation too.
28:09
Speaker 1: Wonderful and thank you to each of you for joining
28:11
Speaker 1: us on this episode of My Veterinary Life podcast. We
28:14
Speaker 1: love sharing this journey with you, and remember, we want
28:16
Speaker 1: to hear from you, so please be sure to leave
28:18
Speaker 1: us a rating and review on Apple Podcasts or whatever
28:21
Speaker 1: platform you listen to, and you can also email me
28:23
Speaker 1: at mvlpodcast at ABMA dot org. Take care and we'll
28:27
Speaker 1: see you next time.