Vets In Business: Making it Better

By Joe Hill

A veterinary degree is long and difficult but, above all, scientific. The world of a practicing vet is far from white coats, test tubes and theory, it is complex, full of human interactions and financial decisions.

Understanding these concepts and how they can be managed is key to career longevity, a good work-life balance, and a sustainable profession. There is no wonder cure or magic pill, but this book will help to make things better.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Austin Macauley Publishers
• Release date: Aug 18, 2023
• ISBN: 9781398484801

Joe Hill

Joe Hill is the #1 New York Times bestselling author of the novels The Fireman, NOS4A2, Horns, and Heart-Shaped Box; Strange Weather, a collection of novellas; and the acclaimed story collections Full Throttle and 20th Century Ghosts. He is also the Eisner Award–winning writer of a seven-volume comic book series, Locke & Key. Much of his work has been adapted for film and TV, including NOS4A2 (AMC), Locke & Key (Netflix), In the Tall Grass (Netflix), and The Black Phone (Blumhouse).

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About the Authors

Joe Hill has been a practicing vet for over 20 years and has helped manage and improve many practices in different countries. He has an MBA (University of Bath), holds visiting positions at several UK universities where he teaches on a range of programmes and undertakes research in related fields.

Terry Hill is an Emeritus Fellow of the University of Oxford (UK) and previously a Professor at the London Business School (UK) and the University of Bath (UK). He is joint author of a range of textbooks in operations management and operations strategy.

Dedication

To my co-author and family for the continued enthusiasm and support they have shown.

To PM, SA, AJ, LV, OJ, DT, FJ and AV.

Copyright Information ©

Joseph Hill and Terence Hill 2023

The right of Joseph Hill and Terence Hill to be identified as authors of this work has been asserted by the authors in accordance with sections 77 and 78 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without the prior permission of the publishers.

Any person who commits any unauthorised act in relation to this publication may be liable to criminal prosecution and civil claims for damages.

A CIP catalogue record for this title is available from the British Library.

ISBN 9781398484795 (Paperback)

ISBN 9781398484801 (ePub e-book)

www.austinmacauley.com

First Published 2023

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The Structure of the Book

The purpose of this book is to introduce some of the key elements involved in running a veterinary practice covering both day-to-day management and developing strategies to meet longer-term goals. While the veterinary sector has unique aspects, its purpose, as with other businesses, is to sell its skills and capabilities to its customers.

The chapters use examples and information from veterinary practices to explain the use of various business and management concepts as well as looking at other sectors to further illustrate these ideas and approaches. Any veterinary-related data used throughout are taken from actual veterinary practices and in that way reflect the problems and dilemmas that managers will encounter in their work.

Chapter 1

A Vet Practice – Merging and Managing the

Technical and Business Aspects of the Job

The activities, responsibilities, decisions, and procedures that make up the work of a veterinary practice transform tangible (such as materials and medicines) and intangible inputs (such as knowledge and skill) into outputs (such as advice, diagnoses, and surgical procedures). In essence a veterinary practice sells a range of services from over-the-counter products to technical and surgical capabilities but all within a business setting. Veterinary surgeons fall into that small subset of occupations known as professional services which are characterised, in part, by their autonomous self-regulation. This governance is invariably exercised through professional bodies rather than being subject to external, governmental regulation. All these professions, including medicine and law, combine specific and exclusive technical skills which are linked to training and regulation and portray a unique status and element of trust within society (Wilensky 1964, Von Nordenflycht 2010). As the majority of professional services exist within a commercial environment, success requires a mix and blend of technical know-how, business acumen and management skills.

The technical and medical knowledge required to practice in the veterinary sector occurs through an intensive and lengthy undergraduate degree course. These skills and capabilities are then further developed through ‘on-the-job’ learning and mandatory, annual continued professional development (CPD) in a vet’s chosen field(s).

Historically, there has been little focus on the non-scientific/non-technical aspects of the job which are a crucial part of effectively communicating with clients and successfully developing a vet business. There is a growing recognition that these ‘soft skills’ are critical for individual vets working in a business environment and yet basic, business-related teaching typically accounts for less than two weeks of a degree course spanning at least half a decade.

The core component of a veterinary business is to deliver a range of services and products to customers through a mixture of employee skills and the equipment and products available. The way in which these elements are combined to meet the needs of current or potential customers is known as a service delivery system.

In addition, a business needs to develop systems and procedures to help manage a range of other activities – for example, negotiating the purchase and supply of services and products from suppliers and scheduling customers through its various service delivery systems.

The Management Task

Irrespective of business size, professional service firms revolve around people in the form of customers and staff (Hill & Hill, 2018). Managing this dynamic within the business involves two distinct but complementary parts – content and style.

Content

This comprises the actual tasks and responsibilities that professional staff undertake. Broadly speaking this can be separated into three areas:

The technical role – concerns the provision of technical knowledge and expertise through a range of services. Not all veterinary practices provide the same level or breadth of technical services due to a number of factors, including:

Expertise and equipment. There are many disciplines inherent in veterinary sciences as with other professional service firms. Undergraduate training exposes students to numerous fields of medicine (e.g. surgery, internal medicine, and neurology) to a limited degree. After graduation, vets choose a more specialised route or decide to remain a generalist. Ultimately, more specialised services (e.g. complex fracture repair) require both appropriate technical know-how and equipment in order to be undertaken. As procedures and diagnostic capabilities become more complex and resources become more expensive, fewer veterinary practices can offer these services with many of these complex services consequently being provided by ‘referral centres.’

Business structure. Firms vary in size from small vet practices employing one or two professionals to large multi-site veterinary hospitals. While the actual structure of these organisations differs one common approach to managing a multi-sited business is through the development of a ‘hub and spoke’ system (see Figure 1.1) where smaller practices are located around a larger central hub in which technical expertise and/or equipment is centralised. Although all business units may be able to undertake a full range of professional services, the volume of work in smaller units makes this both uneconomical and impractical. Without sufficient volume of work neither can the necessary equipment be justified, nor the technical skills be adequately developed. Consequently, a small single business unit would invariably outsource this work (e.g. complex surgical/medical cases) to another firm. The development of a ‘hub’ enables this work to be kept within a business as it consolidates a viable amount of work in various disciplines from its multiple branches.

Figure 1.1 A ‘hub and spoke’ design in a multisite veterinary business

The provision of professional services requires a range of support staff. The exact number varies between businesses but in the veterinary sector the ratio of support

to professional staff increases with the clinical complexity of the work being performed (see Figure 1.2).

The principal management role in smaller businesses is performed by a senior member of staff (typically a professional), but as business units increase in size it is frequently necessary to create separate management teams.

Figure 1.2: Staff numbers in different sized veterinary practices

B. Regardless of both size and type, all businesses require the day-to-day management of tasks and responsibilities inherent in the daily running of the business. These include meeting schedules, controlling costs, managing staff, handling suppliers and fulfilling both the ethical and commercial standards within the firm.

C. Competitive markets are never static and success requires a business to change and adapt the services and products which it offers. Management, therefore, includes a strategic role which contributes to the development and delivery of those elements that make a firm competitive within its markets so enabling it to meet its business objectives.

Style

Management style relates to the way in which individuals manage people across the whole business.

The internal role relates to the management of people within the firm including peers, other clinical/technical staff, receptionists, and administrators. The successful running of a veterinary practice requires the effective coordination of multiple people with varying levels of clinical and non-clinical skills (see Figure 1.2). Within a hospital all vets are part of a team providing services for clients that involves working closely with other clinical and non-clinical staff. In addition, part of their role is to provide clinical advice to vets located at branches and to seek advice from other ‘specialist’ vets from outside the organisation where necessary. Branches comprise smaller numbers of staff (see Figure 1.2) that typically creates an environment that is more conducive to good team working but equally, such working environments may feel somewhat claustrophobic at times such as when there are disputes between colleagues. Smaller numbers also result in less scope to cover sickness or holidays creating the need for close working relationships to facilitate staff planning on such occasions. Throughout a business, telephonists and receptionists are the first (and often the last) point of contact with customers. Therefore, it is important that vets regularly touch base and build good relationships with these key staff to help promote and reinforce good working practices and ensure that the desired business values are maintained.

The external role encompasses the interactions and subsequent management of relationships outside the business including customers, suppliers, and people from other organisations (e.g. regulatory bodies and the media). Providing appropriate technical advice and managing customers is central to all professional service firms. However, the core component of a veterinary business remains the clinical assessment and ethical treatment of animals (normally people’s pets).

While the ‘hub and spoke’ system (see Figure 1.1) is not common to all veterinary businesses, the ‘hospital’ role remains a key component of most veterinary practices even when performed by an independent company. Complex cases typically require expertise, specialised diagnostic equipment, and extensive periods of 24-hour care which many veterinary practices are unable to provide. Where these are externally provided, then managing these relationships is important to both parties as it enables ‘branches’ or small independent practices to ensure continued care for its clients and allows ‘hospitals’ to financially benefit from the expensive resources and equipment they provide.

The range of tasks and breadth of capabilities and skills required makes management roles both demanding and most interesting. It links strategy to action and requires coordination across various activities. This mix of technical competence and business awareness comprises the essence of a firm. A successful outcome needs the effective management of both people and other resources in order to deliver the services and products sold to customers.

While day-to-day tasks are where most staff understandably allocate their time and effort, they also need to recognise the strategic challenges facing the firm. These forces are not static and require time to analyse and formulate to enable a business to grow both its sales revenues and profits.

The tasks involved will, of course, vary depending on the size and type of business and the nature of the services and products involved. Figure 1.3 illustrates this diversity by