Much greater job satisfaction results if you are engaged in doing something worthwhile.
It is almost time to go to work. You have been in school for almost eight years and this year, you likely will receive your veterinary degree and become a licensed veterinarian. Naturally you will be eager to find a job. After all, you have devoted most of your time and effort toward reaching this goal. Just as you have spent a lot of time studying the various subjects in the veterinary curriculum, you will be well served by spending additional time in seeking your first job as a veterinarian.
Each of you will have invested well more than $250,000 in opportunity costs—tuition and missed salaries—for your education, so it is important that you find a position that you can begin to recover your investment. Equally important, it is critical that you find a position that will be rewarding and satisfying to you. There are many factors that you should consider when seeking your first veterinary position. These factors include quality of practice, growth opportunities, type of practice, geographic location, and community benefits and services. These factors are reviewed in this article.
A desire that frequently is expressed on the resumes of new graduates is that they want to work in a clinic or hospital where high-quality medicine and surgery is practiced. This is a laudable objective. It might be the most important factor in selecting your first job.
"I recommend that you carefully pick your first jobs based on your perception of the quality of medicine practiced there and the positive tone of the owners, associate veterinarians and other staff members," notes Dr. Ross Clark, author and veterinary entrepreneur. "Your level of financial success, as well as the quality of medicine you practice, is very likely to be a mirror image of the first practice."
Adding to Clark's advice, there is empirical evidence that one of the major reasons that new graduates leave their first position is due to dissatisfaction with the quality of medicine practiced. If you truly want to practice quality veterinary medicine, then it behooves you to investigate each of your job opportunities carefully. Unless you are unusually astute, it is unlikely you can do this in a short interview.
From this list of questions, it should be clear that there are many factors that can affect the quality of medicine practiced. If you want to practice high-quality medicine and surgery, you can improve your chances of job satisfaction and success by obtaining appropriate answers to the questions presented above.
Many individuals enter veterinary medicine because they want to make a difference. They want to enhance the quality of life of the animals they work with and provide peace of mind to the owners. Many veterinarians not only make a difference in the lives of their clients and animals, they also make major contributions to colleagues, staff, their community and organized veterinary medicine. If you want to make a difference, then it is important to explore the opportunities for personal growth when seeking a new job.
One of the first questions to explore in this area is whether the position you are applying for is a new one or whether you are replacing someone who left the position. (Why did the person leave?) If you are entering a newly created position, you need to perform a financial feasibility analysis. That is, is there enough potential revenue to support your position? If the prospective employer does not have specific information to answer your question, then you can obtain some estimates on your own. A crude estimate can be obtained by determining the gross community income (GCI) within a certain radius of the practice. The GCI is calculated by multiplying the number of households by the median family income within the practice radius selected. This information can be obtained from the latest U.S. census data and from state or county economic data. You then divide the GCI by the number of practicing veterinarians present within the same geographic area. Generally there should be $70 million to $80 million GCI per veterinarian in order for the veterinarian to have a reasonable income. If the GCI exceeds this range, then there might be good potential for financial growth. If the GCI is considerably below this range for the number of veterinarians present, then one would have to think long and hard before accepting a new position in the community. There are other formulas that can be applied to approximate the potential revenue in a practice. These frequently depend on market survey data. Although the cost of doing these surveys can be expensive, you might be able to find out local human and animal demographic information by contacting the chamber of commerce, the regional small business development center or the economic development commission. Frequently, representatives of pet food companies will have similar information that can aid you in assessing revenue potential of an area.
You must know precisely how much you will need to support yourself and your family. This means that you must have a budget prepared in which you outline your potential income against all of your known and estimated expenses. If you don't have a budget, then you might be surprised and very disappointed when you discover that you are not earning enough to cover your expenses. This can be devastating if you enter your first job with considerable debt. It is imperative that you be prepared to negotiate your salary and benefits in order to protect yourself. This may mean sharing personal financial information with your prospective employer. Once they see your situation, they may be willing to work with you in improving your financial situation.
It is important to consider and involve your family when answering questions about where you want to work and what you want available in the community. There are a number of factors to consider. Do you want to work in a metropolitan, suburban or rural area? Do you want to work in a stand-alone hospital or in a shopping center clinic? Are housing and living expenses reasonable and within your budget? A visit to the chamber of commerce, extension office, or a realtor's office can provide you with good information on housing and living expenses. What are the opportunities for spousal employment? Your prospective employer might be able to assist with this information. It can also be helpful to see of the town or community has a Web page. Finally, how important is it to be reasonably close to your parents or other important family members?
As you become involved in the job search, take some time to imagine yourself as the prospective employer. What is it that you would want in a new veterinary associate? What skills would you expect them to have? What traits and characteristics would you want them to have? How much would you want them to work? What would you provide for your new employee? What type of working environment would you provide? By taking time to examine the situation from the other employer's perspective, you can clarify the things that are important to you.
Dr. Draper is associate dean for academic and student affairs in Iowa State University's College of Veterinary Medicine. He is a professor of biomedical sciences and has been interim associate dean since January 2003.
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