Why winning a manager award meant so much to me

Take pride in what you do and look at how you have developed as a leader and can continue to grow. (Zakharov Evgeniy/stock.adobe.com)

Being awarded dvm360/VHMA Practice Manager of the Year in 2018 genuinely made me feel like I could finally take off my “training wheels” mentality. Because my background wasn't veterinary medicine, I always had this looming impostor syndrome that maybe I didn't know what I was doing. Yes, I'd worked at Lowe's for years in different levels of management and could run the departments with my eyes closed and hit all the sales goals. But being nominated by other veterinary practice leaders and then being selected by a group of peers and industry professionals gave me the boost of confidence to feel more secure to make decisions out of my comfort zone and jump into risks confidently. I feel like I'm leading my team with a different level of fearlessness and a level of calm that I didn't have before.

I think earning the designation also gave confidence to my supervisors at National Veterinary Associates, who relocated me to another hospital in the network to see if I can provide the leadership support and structure they've needed recently.

Just the activity of answering the contest questions allowed me to switch my brain from obsessing over what I still need to get done and let all of the things I've already done sink in.

I hope this year's finalists find the extra “push” and encouragement I felt to keep doing the good work, to feel empowered to make their leadership roles more visible in the industry and to recognize that even small things they do every day impact their team members in the most monumental ways possible.

Angelina Morgan, CVPM, is hospital administrator at Animal Specialty Center in Yonkers, New York, and the 2018 dvm360/VHMA Practice Manager of the Year.