Practice Management

Practice owners, you dont need to be best friends with your veterinary associate, or share the same hobbies, or practice the exact same style of medicine. You just have to treat others as you want to be treated by being fair, honest and appreciative.

A roomier, better equipped space for dental procedures in your veterinary hospital can inspire team members to do more of them, according to speakers at HospitalDesign360 conference.

Look for the disconnect between your veterinary colleagues words and their nonverbal communication to find out when its time to ask for more information.

Have you ever set up, adequately explained and regularly monitored a bonus program that ties much closer to practice goals that benefit patients, practice owner and employees?

When it comes to defusing potential arguments, this veterinary practice owner trusts the words of self-made millionaire and motivational speaker Jim Rohn: Focus on the solution, not on the problem.

Whether its National Veterinary Technician Week or any other week of the year, your technicians are amazing. Here are three ways you can show how them much you care.

Its well known that veterinary professionals undervalue their time and services, but your clients might notif you play your cards right.

This path to new hires for my veterinary hospital guarantees effort on the part of an applicant, a chance to ask tough questions, and a path to feedback from the team members wholl be working, day in and day out, with the new hire.

After your hospitals veterinarian has explained the need for a product or pharmaceutical, dont hand off your clients to websites, pet store employees and big-box aisles and aisles of competing products. If this is the right product for this pet, carry it. The sales will follow.

When a veterinary team member messes up left and right, but is still looked upon through rose-colored glasses by doctors and managers, what can be done?

As a veterinary professional, you've probably witnessed poor training here, there, everywhere. Which is why you know that an experienced, qualified dog training professional is hugely valuable to dog owners and can make a world of difference for your canine patients. Use this tool to help lead veterinary clients in the right direction.

Whether your veterinary practice is equine, mixed or small animal-only, you have a responsibility to recruit and retain an associate that meshes well with your clients, your team and, most importantly, your patients.

Practices are fighting to hire veterinary associates today. Could that lead to unsustainable salaries as we compete for hires?

You, dear veterinary professional, dont go out looking to be bitten or scratched, yet you probably have some sort of battle scar from a bad encounter. Heres how to prevent any more from happening in the future.

When this veterinary practice owner decides to extend his clinics hours to include Sundays, its met with doubt and concern.

Want to dig into your own personality or gather a fun (and perhaps useful) profile of your veterinary team? Here are some of the most popular personality tests floating around.

If youre struggling in small-animal or equine practice to find associates, check out the results of my unscientific survey that reveal new and future veterinarians wants and needs for their workplace.

Think about who you are and who youre looking for, then write a veterinary practice job ad for that. Job ads are sniper rifles, not shotguns, says the recruitment-minded Dr. Dave Nicol.

Brush up on your feline facts, veterinary team members, while you disabuse your well-meaning but ill-informed cat clients of some feline fallacies. Dont miss the client handout at the end!

What do I do with a veterinary technician undermining her coworkers?

This empathy map helps you navigate the tension in your job (and your life!) that youve been avoiding. Key elements: Plan ahead, think about others feelings, and imagine how they might react.

You may not want to hear it, but clients interest in unconventional diets isnt going away anytime soon. This veterinary nutritionist says its time to listen to their reasons and work with themnot shut them down.

Veterinary practice owners and managers: Can you name your teams strengths off the top of your head? Use these meeting activities to showcase team members superpowers, and reinforce the importance of the entire team to the success of the practice as a whole.

There are lessons to be learned from the many companies that have disappeared in recent years.

While its true that Disney reigns supreme when it comes to delivering superb customer service, that fact is that not all customer service models can be equal. Heres how the Disney model hurts our professionand what we can do about it.

When it comes to advice for veterinary clients, I discourage feeding pets table scraps and human food. The pet obesity epidemic and the danger of toxicities mean I lean away from encouraging sharing of food to maintain the human-animal bond.

While the veterinary profession mulls over how telemedicine will change practice, some doctors are going ahead and changing. Instead of looking at what the future holds for veterinary telehealth, were diving into whats happening now in this new arena of client satisfaction, relationship-building and innovative pet care.

In light of the dearth of quality veterinarian and technician job candidates today, its the wise practice that makes a new hire feel like part of the team from the get-go.