Aug. 23, 2021

043 - part 2 of 2 - how Dr Jocelyn Birch Baker attracts and embraces part timers to run a profitable smooth operating vet clinic

043 - part 2 of 2 - how Dr Jocelyn Birch Baker attracts and embraces part timers to run a profitable smooth operating vet clinic

Send us a text Julie South interviews Jocelyn Birch Baker of Smooth Operating Vets + High Street Veterinary Clinic in Rockhampton, Queensland, Australia Jocelyn’s vision at Smooth Operating Vets is to ensure all veterinary women have the opportunity to work in a team where everyone knows their talents and calmly does their very best in an encouraging and supporting place…. That women can return to veterinary practice after the birth of their babies with the skills, knowledge and confidence t...

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Season 1 Interviews Workplace Culture

Send us a text

Julie South interviews Jocelyn Birch Baker of Smooth Operating Vets + High Street Veterinary Clinic in Rockhampton, Queensland, Australia

Jocelyn’s vision at Smooth Operating Vets is to ensure all veterinary women have the opportunity to work in a team where everyone knows their talents and calmly does their very best in an encouraging and supporting place…. That women can return to veterinary practice after the birth of their babies with the skills, knowledge and confidence they need, to work in clinics that are supportive and flexible … where everyone works together - like a community - to achieve everyone’s goals. 

Over the course of her career, Jocelyn’s experienced many areas of the veterinary profession – from the cattle industry through to mixed and small animal clinics.  

She’s held positions on Australian national and state boards and committees and has taken time out of her career to raise her children.

Today, as the owner of High Street Veterinary Surgery in Rockhampton, Queensland, she’s had hands-on, day-to-day experience of what it’s like to be a practice owner in today’s veterinary marketplace.   

Jocelyn understands the complexities of running a profitable practice, while having an excellent lifestyle for herself and enabling everyone on her team to have excellent lifestyles too.

As the founder of Smooth Operating Vets, Jocelyn is working to create mother-friendly veterinary practices.   She believes that creating mother-friendly vet clinics is essential to help reduce the number of highly skilled veterinarians who leave the profession because they can’t find positions that support, nurture and respect them as veterinarians and mothers.

In this episode Jocelyn talks about the:

  • 5 "rules" at her clinic.
  • 3 underlying tenets that enable her to attract and keep high performing veterinary professionals.
  • 6 actions she took to help build a strong team of trust, respect and belonging.
  • 7 different ways Jocelyn manages part-timers for maximum efficiency and profitability as well as fun.
  • 11 things that Jocelyn implemented with her 30 minute consults that's meant she's never looked back

The way Jocelyn now recruits, together with the systems and procedures she’s put in place, is non-traditional but it works.   This is what Smooth Operating Vets is all about.

Struggling to get results from your job advertisements?
If so, then shining online as a good employer is essential to attracting the types of veterinary professionals who're a perfect cultural fit for your clinic.

The VetClinicJobs job board is the place to post your next job vacancy - to find out more get in touch with Lizzie at VetClinicJobs


WEBVTT

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welcome to episode 43 of paws claws, and wetnoses, the veterinary sector podcast, celebrating all creatures great and small.

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And the fantabulous professionals who look after them all.

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I'm your show host Julie south.

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If you're listening to this and God's own,Aotearoa New Zealand, while we're in alert level four a lockdown, doing our best to contain the enemy called COVID 19 Delta, I pray that you and everyone who's precious to you, a safe well, and.

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Free of infection.

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I'm hearing that there are some clinics around the country where the bubbles have been upset, a Ted where people have been at bits and Fitness's staff have been at places.

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Interest locations of interest.

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So yeah, he is thinking of you, if you haven't yet been vaccinated.

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I hope that the wait times for you too long, either I've been fully vaccinated for a while.

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Now, as I mentioned last week, my husband's a pilot, which meant that as an airport worker, he was one of the first cohorts to get called up.

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And by default, I was.

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I'm a bit of a wuss when it comes to needles.

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So I had to ask him to hold my hand while I got the shot.

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And wow.

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I swear that the first, the first Jeb I got the first nurse was aiming to make it, to, to get into qualification for the New Zealand Olympic dance team, because boy did it hurt.

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Whereas the second one, I never felt a thing.

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And I'm proud to doing my little bit here in God's zones, fight against the enemy that we're calling Dell.

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Anyway, back to Dr.

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Jocelyn Birch baker of smooth operating vets.

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This is episode two of two, where Dr.

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Jocelyn, who's a veterinarian, a clinic owner of high street, or the clinic owner of high street, veterinary surgery in Rockhampton, Queensland and mother, and the founder of smooth operating.

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Continues sharing how veterinary clinics can embrace working moms into their practices to create a smooth operating veterinary clinic.

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If you haven't yet listened to episode 42, I recommend that you go back and listen to that one because it gives you a bit more context and background for today's show.

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And this episode we're picking up from last week where Justin starts talking about her eight week smooth operating bits business model for embracing and retaining pat timers and veterinary clinic.

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And as you'll be able to guess from some of the background noise, we recorded this during Jocelyn's clinic hours and Rockhampton different time zone there too.

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Where I was, it was getting a bit dark here.

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Hopefully you won't find it too distracting.

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An old vet told my father when he was a student in Glasgow.

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He said, if you want to be a success in veterinary practice, just keep the bowels open and just arrested.

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God.

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Nutrition is not an opinion.

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It's a science.

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They called me that weird herbal needle.

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That, and I, I just remember thinking.

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Well, I'm still gonna do it cause I know it works and I've got the research to back it.

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Um, reminiscences of the real James Harriet son to Pitt nutrition, to acupuncture the vet podcast, discusses current animal health issues from around the world on veterinarian, Brian greeter from New Zealand, just search for the vet podcast, wherever you get your podcasts,

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paws, claws and wet noses is sponsored by Vetstar.

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If you've never heard of it, staff it's new, Zealand's only full service recruitment agency.

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100% dedicated to the veterinary sector and Fitz staff has been around since 2015 and works nationwide from Kate, rehang it to the bluff and everywhere in between as well as helping Kiwis fit staff.

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Also helps overseas, qualified veterinarians find work Aotearoa New Zealand.

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Vetstaff.co.nz again today, Jocelyn shares lots about what she does.

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Some of the lessons that she's learned along the way, what works and what doesn't work.

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And like last week, I'll put all links about how you can get hold of Jocelyn at paws claws with noses dot F M.

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And this is episode 43.

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Because Jocelyn does cover a lot.

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Like this is chock full of information.

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I'll also run a quick summary for you.

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So stay tuned to the end.

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And here we are.

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We're stepping into the conversation where I ask Jocelyn about smooth operating vets business model.

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So Jocelyn you have a, a model, is that a business model for helping clinics supporting clinics too, to be able to have part-timers that work, whether it works for the clinic and it works for the part-timer.

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Yep.

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Yep.

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So there's.

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Feel programmed.

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And during that, we look at what you've got now, what you want to achieve and then how to achieve that goal with, um, with graduates.

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I'm really interested in upskilling the money.

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Um, getting their confidence back, um, upscaling them, getting back into practice, having a really good onboarding practice so that they can hit the ground, hit the floor running within two or three weeks because these are experienced.

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They know what they're doing.

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They know how to manage a client life skills.

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That you wouldn't believe looking after a little one, like they know how to negotiate the head to control what's going on in a chaotic environment.

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If they need to and just settle everything down and move on.

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They, yeah, they have really skilled people.

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And how long has smooth operating vets been?

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I've been probably mostly this year.

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I'd been able to get out of the clinic more now that it's running smoothly and I've got the more vets coming in and I've got Jamie as a practice manager doing so much more of that review, work, the paperwork, all that sort of stuff.

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So mostly this year, I haven't really got any clients yet.

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Right.

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So this that's what principals and.

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Practice managers and owners listening to this.

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We'll put the contact details on how you can get a hold of Jocelyn on the website for this episode.

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But Jocelyn, how does somebody get hold of you?

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They can email me directly director@smoothoperatingvets.com.

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Oh yeah.

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Pop onto the webpage.

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Pop onto Facebook.

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Yeah, message me.

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And let me have a chat with you and we can talk about.

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What you're looking for so that we can do something together to get those pathways in place and get these moms back.

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Okay.

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Right.

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So, and I'll put the links as well into the show notes for this episode.

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I just want to, I'm going to throw you a question that you might not be able to answer straight away.

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I've noticed you have reframed a couple of times you, one was when.

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Somebody comes to you and says, a woman comes to you and says, I'm pregnant and you get excited about it.

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Or somebody says, you know, all they want to do is, is run out the door because they've got childcare, but you have you've, you've changed your language and you actually embrace the, everything that is wonderful about being a working mum.

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So those are a couple I've heard already.

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Is, do you have a dictionary that you use at your clinic to make sure that, that your whole team supports and word's everything in the positive?

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I think we do.

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I think we do.

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We have our five and their rules set up by me.

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Our first rule would be the intent is.

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So that everybody knows that everybody else is really trying to do the right thing.

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They're not, they haven't done something odd because they want to be mean or anything that just doesn't happen.

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They really wanted to make this thing work really well.

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This thing happened really well.

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We care about the animals, the clients, the clinic, each other.

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The second one is there's no blame policy.

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So if something goes wrong, we look at the systems.

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Have I not taught you properly?

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Have I not shown you how to do this?

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Where you.

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Was the phone ringing, whatever, what do we need to do to change this?

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So this doesn't happen again.

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If it's a problem, we have a no swearing policy and I know people might think that's a bit prudish, but it's not, it reduces the, the tone, the nasty, any nastiness sneaking in.

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Yeah.

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Yeah.

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Well, that's what I feel anyway.

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And the last one is every animal deserves to come in.

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And be looked at by one of our veterinarians and that's money for reception so that they know that we welcome animals and people in all the time.

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But that, that sort of sets up the tone of the clinic.

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Oh no disrespectful behavior.

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That's that's the other one.

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It's just not to happen.

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And you can call it out.

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If someone, if you say something to someone and they roll their eyes at you, you can say, oh, you just rolled your eyes up.

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Why, if something's happening, they can come to Jamie or I, if they're not comfortable speaking to this person, and often I say to them, sometimes you don't actually speak to them right then and there because you might snap right back at them.

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Whereas you might not want to do that.

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You might want to talk to them an hour later at lunchtime and say, oh, remember when that dog nearly beat me and you rolled her eyes.

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I felt really uncomfortable about that.

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Can we talk about it?

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So that is hard to develop that level of trust and communication, but you got to keep at it.

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You got everything you do like menace, pleases, and thank yous all the time.

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It's not that hard.

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Could you please do these?

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Can you do that for me?

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It's um, yeah, we do use a lot of really positive language.

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And my theory probably behind that, that I figured out now is your thoughts become your words, become your actions.

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And I think that's very true.

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What is it?

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About high street vet surgery that enables you to be staffed.

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I really think it's our culture, our positiveness, and our acceptance, that, and our value.

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We value people so much and want them to be a part.

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If they want to be a part of us, there's certain things that they need to be and do so that we can keep functioning as a really good team.

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That's where we find people who.

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Sued us and want to work with that friendship and that openness and that professionalism, five talking about it.

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Word of mouth is huge here in, in these regional areas.

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People hear about you.

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They look on your website, they look at your Facebook and go, oh yeah, that's a nice positive place to work.

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Let's put that into context here and give it some, some comparison are some other clinics in Rockhampton.

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Or maybe the environs struggling to find staff.

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Yes, they are.

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I don't know if they're struggling, but I know their ads have been.

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Yeah, right.

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Yeah.

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Because it's not just because it's a nice place to live.

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Oh, Rockie is a nice place.

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You do find families or people move away to do their uni.

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And then they come back home to their family.

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People do gravitate back towards their family, especially once they start having their own family.

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And that happens.

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We find also people come to Rocky because their partner's job is in Rocky and women.

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Again, it's a cultural thing.

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Women follow the males career very often.

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That's just the way it happens, but it benefits us so much.

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It's just wonderful because these women just turn up and say, yeah, my kids are in school now.

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Can I come and do a couple of days?

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And how did you build up trust?

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And team respect and belonging.

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Was it there when you took over and I'm presuming that maybe it wasn't, if you had a bit of an Exodus when you first started, but what did you do?

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I learned, it was very hard to start with.

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I thought everybody thought like I did and wanted to do it like I did.

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And apparently they don't, but that's okay.

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I've realized that now.

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So I listen a lot.

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I talk, I am, I try and understand.

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I do tell stories.

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I think I use that a bit about my past and my history and this happened to me and then they'll share a story.

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Oh, that happened to me and the effects that it had on them.

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So it's this actual communicating and when we have social or social occasions, we invite the whole thing.

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So that we get to meet the partners and, and, you know, they'd been talking about this person and yeah, there he is in real life and it's just grand and they meet you.

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Parents of many of our, our team will come in and make the clinic just so welcoming.

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Welcome everybody in and just talk about stuff and sit there.

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And the real bonding thing is when you are with someone else and you do a tough job, you do a tough surgery or you're there.

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Doing everything you can to save an animal.

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And, and that's, that's a gift that after hours we'll bring that people don't talk about it.

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You just really push yourself.

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You work hard.

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You, you, you.

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Trust yourself, you trust the person you're working with and you pull that animals for, and that bonds people they know that they can work with and trust that other person through all sorts of things now, because that one's through that together.

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So I think that's really precious and that happens every day in the clinic, but also after hours.

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How do you manage the team of pat timers?

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You, you talked about your, your cloud software system.

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So what, what CMS do you use?

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We use easy bed and never looked back since the dose started with easy bed.

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It's just been wonderful.

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It's a really good program.

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There's plenty of places to write the things we use.

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A lot of templates So that saves time you can just pop the template in.

00:15:09.914 --> 00:15:10.065
Yep.

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Yep, yep.

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Nope.

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And also there's a communication section so that you can communicate.

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If someone phones you, you can put it on there.

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Yep.

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Spoke to Sally-Ann and she said, blah, blah, blah.

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And then the next bit goes, oh yeah, they'd been phoned everything's sorted everything's okay.

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Any pathology comes back through the system, so, you know, it's arrived and you can, um, talk to the owners.

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Or memos.

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I'm not sure you can talk, you can set them up so you can talk to everybody.

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You can talk to management, you can talk to the beds, you talk to anyone.

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And there's also, we use WhatsApp to talk to everybody, but that's more of a social side of things.

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The practice management software, um, easy bit looks after the, the within clinic clinical work, the post on your Facebook page.

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Do you have somebody dedicated to do Facebook updates or does everybody do a bit of it?

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Um, we do have someone do that for us now.

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I wasn't a Facebook fan and I struggled with it.

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I just didn't want to go there.

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It was all too hard to me, but then Jamie, our practice manager said, we need to do this to us and we need to connect with people.

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We need to do this.

00:16:17.985 --> 00:16:20.384
So she took it on board, did a brilliant job.

00:16:20.414 --> 00:16:22.485
She brought us up to wherever a thousand people.

00:16:22.485 --> 00:16:23.264
And that was great.

00:16:23.595 --> 00:16:25.575
And she was always asking the girls, just take a photo.

00:16:26.105 --> 00:16:27.514
I mean, technology's wonderful.

00:16:27.514 --> 00:16:27.965
Isn't it?

00:16:28.325 --> 00:16:30.065
You take the photo and Jamie's go to it.

00:16:30.125 --> 00:16:31.804
And then she sends it on to the other lady.

00:16:32.220 --> 00:16:32.850
That's dumb.

00:16:32.850 --> 00:16:35.399
So yeah, we use a company, I think they're Australian way.

00:16:35.460 --> 00:16:47.700
He does, and she's been doing a wonderful job, but, and she ran times our tone and our culture and our at quite specific ways that this, if there's something that we think are prefer not to have that we just let her know and she doesn't.

00:16:47.789 --> 00:16:48.029
Yeah.

00:16:48.120 --> 00:16:49.080
She just works with it.

00:16:49.080 --> 00:16:49.590
She's great.

00:16:49.830 --> 00:16:50.970
It's just been wonderful.

00:16:51.100 --> 00:16:51.399
Yeah.

00:16:51.600 --> 00:16:54.269
And the clients give us feedback that they're just lovely.

00:16:54.409 --> 00:16:57.440
Cause, cause the voice and the tone is really important.

00:16:57.860 --> 00:16:59.929
So let's talk about, and we have.

00:17:00.595 --> 00:17:01.315
Talk a little bit.

00:17:01.315 --> 00:17:09.355
You talked about 10, I think you said 10 visits, 10 touch points, maternity leave, and returning to work.

00:17:09.684 --> 00:17:13.555
The different stages that mothers are.

00:17:13.555 --> 00:17:17.065
I guess women go through with their family care.

00:17:17.065 --> 00:17:18.174
How do you manage them?

00:17:20.474 --> 00:17:24.345
As they have their babies and go through maternity leave.

00:17:25.035 --> 00:17:28.005
So we manage that and the 10 touch points.

00:17:28.005 --> 00:17:32.984
They're just keeping in touch days that it's on WhatsApp when they just get by.

00:17:33.750 --> 00:17:35.700
We're doing training, we're doing something.

00:17:35.700 --> 00:17:36.329
Please come on.

00:17:36.690 --> 00:17:43.470
We also do have a dedicated person for each lady who has gone on to medic onto maternity leave.

00:17:44.240 --> 00:17:45.950
And so like a buddy system.

00:17:46.190 --> 00:17:46.430
Yes.

00:17:46.519 --> 00:17:52.130
They stay in touch with them much more like each week they know what's going on, touch base with them.

00:17:52.519 --> 00:17:56.450
I also do this thing with people like clean houses.

00:17:56.450 --> 00:18:00.380
So when you have a baby, apparently it's really hard to keep your house clean.

00:18:01.680 --> 00:18:06.390
I don't worry too much about things like that, but apparently people do, which is really good.

00:18:06.690 --> 00:18:17.009
And so I give the ladies 10 hours of house cleaning after they've had the baby so that they don't have to stress over that because I think something like that really weighs in a lot of people's minds.

00:18:17.279 --> 00:18:19.170
So yeah, someone comes and cleans the house.

00:18:19.170 --> 00:18:21.329
They'll cook a meal or whatever needs to be done.

00:18:22.065 --> 00:18:22.664
For the girls.

00:18:22.664 --> 00:18:33.644
So that, that's that small little thing too, to just take that pressure off them when they're little, because they often don't have family close by to, to be with them for that early part of the baby.

00:18:34.174 --> 00:18:40.295
How about when do you ever have babies or children in the clinic?

00:18:40.775 --> 00:18:44.734
Because the mother can't find care or something goes, yeah.

00:18:46.440 --> 00:18:46.890
Phi.

00:18:46.950 --> 00:18:47.730
Yes, absolutely.

00:18:47.759 --> 00:18:48.599
Absolutely.

00:18:48.630 --> 00:18:49.079
Yes.

00:18:49.109 --> 00:18:49.440
Yes.

00:18:49.500 --> 00:18:50.759
We're a bit of a backup.

00:18:51.150 --> 00:18:52.890
Sometimes the partner can be backup.

00:18:52.890 --> 00:18:53.940
Sometimes they can't.

00:18:54.450 --> 00:18:56.609
The issue we find is with daycare.

00:18:56.609 --> 00:18:59.519
If the child gets sick, daycare don't want it.

00:19:00.660 --> 00:19:02.670
We can't have her the clinic because it's sick.

00:19:02.700 --> 00:19:06.029
So mom has to take it home and she's still paying daycare.

00:19:06.960 --> 00:19:08.009
Which gets a bit tough.

00:19:08.490 --> 00:19:09.690
So backup plans.

00:19:09.839 --> 00:19:10.109
Yeah.

00:19:10.140 --> 00:19:11.279
Babies in the clinic yet.

00:19:11.460 --> 00:19:14.490
Totally welcome to come to the meetings.

00:19:15.119 --> 00:19:20.039
Training sometimes could be a bit hard to have a baby yet, but pens of what, what is doing it for sleep?

00:19:20.069 --> 00:19:20.759
It's fine.

00:19:21.329 --> 00:19:28.430
Jamie, actually I heard her say we did a review with one of our nurses and Jamie said, I'm really sorry that our training is ending.

00:19:29.369 --> 00:19:31.019
Late for you to leave.

00:19:31.049 --> 00:19:35.849
I will bring it back so that you can finish the training and then go home.

00:19:36.329 --> 00:19:39.809
So, you know, we do do an effort to make sure they get that training.

00:19:39.900 --> 00:19:41.880
Little, little baby grain.

00:19:41.910 --> 00:19:44.400
He's he's still fed.

00:19:44.730 --> 00:19:48.089
Say he and his dad will pop in during the day.

00:19:48.299 --> 00:19:51.390
He'll go and have a feed, have a laugh with the girls.

00:19:52.815 --> 00:19:56.984
Just lifts your whole day to have a little baby just pop in the clinic and have a giggle.

00:19:56.984 --> 00:19:59.924
And off I go again, it is really something special.

00:19:59.924 --> 00:20:01.095
I think we should appreciate.

00:20:01.125 --> 00:20:01.875
Yeah, it's lovely.

00:20:01.934 --> 00:20:02.204
Yeah.

00:20:02.265 --> 00:20:08.565
Otherwise Casteel express and um, so you'd need a private space to be doing that as well.

00:20:08.625 --> 00:20:08.924
Yeah.

00:20:08.924 --> 00:20:10.605
Those little things are important.

00:20:11.134 --> 00:20:16.744
Hey, have you got a dedicated, have you created like, like a family, a family room perhaps?

00:20:17.625 --> 00:20:19.244
Is anything dedicated?

00:20:19.365 --> 00:20:30.075
No, no, we haven't really, because we haven't got the room, but being in all the cleaning, the girls are pretty relaxed about it and she's quite happy just to be in the kitchen by herself.

00:20:30.224 --> 00:20:39.404
We do, we have set up one of the consult rooms so she can be in there if she chooses to, but she rather hang out with us than be stuck in a room by herself.

00:20:39.555 --> 00:20:39.855
Yeah.

00:20:39.865 --> 00:20:43.595
So yeah, it works quite well, but I would like to do that.

00:20:44.835 --> 00:20:57.884
How about, and let's talk about the fact that over 80% of graduates in Australia are women and we're losing people from clinical practice.

00:20:58.424 --> 00:20:59.894
What would you like to say about that?

00:21:00.464 --> 00:21:07.625
I really, I think that's why we need flexibility in our practices so that these women can come back and work part time.

00:21:07.865 --> 00:21:16.214
So if you've got eight out of 10, That are women and then 50% of those eight.

00:21:16.424 --> 00:21:19.184
So five out of those age have family.

00:21:19.875 --> 00:21:30.404
That's five out of 10 women or people, vets that you're not reaching when you just continue to advertise a full-time job because children, you have children.

00:21:30.404 --> 00:21:38.744
When you say 30 and they're with you for a very long time, you need to have different needs, different ways of managing a workforce.

00:21:39.194 --> 00:21:39.585
And.

00:21:41.400 --> 00:21:42.809
The increase in productivity.

00:21:42.809 --> 00:21:46.769
I mean, they'd talk about it all the time with just getting women back into the workforce.

00:21:46.769 --> 00:22:01.170
The increase in GDP is tremendous if they get women back into the workforce, but they do need to support it by looking after the children in a really, really good way, because you're not going to just leave your child and feel unhappy about it and go to work.

00:22:01.170 --> 00:22:04.289
So, yeah, this is the demographics of it.

00:22:04.440 --> 00:22:05.460
80% of women.

00:22:06.434 --> 00:22:10.365
The more vets you put out, you're still going to have 80% being women.

00:22:10.365 --> 00:22:13.845
I would say it's, it's a terrific career for a woman.

00:22:13.875 --> 00:22:16.724
It just it's ticks all the boxes for us.

00:22:16.724 --> 00:22:18.075
We care, we love animals.

00:22:18.075 --> 00:22:18.765
We love children.

00:22:18.765 --> 00:22:22.875
We love looking after the nurturing, all those sort of things as great.

00:22:23.865 --> 00:22:26.684
I think there's a bit of an issue when women come back to practice at there.

00:22:26.704 --> 00:22:32.865
So I'm glad to be back at practice that they do not negotiate.

00:22:33.404 --> 00:22:33.525
Right.

00:22:34.335 --> 00:22:42.855
Uh, renumeration for what they're worth are bringing so much to that practice, but they feel it's, it's the guilt thing I should be at home.

00:22:42.855 --> 00:22:43.934
I should be at work.

00:22:43.994 --> 00:22:47.984
I'm really lucky to be here that they will let me come and work here.

00:22:48.734 --> 00:22:50.805
And I think they, they walk in that door.

00:22:50.805 --> 00:22:54.134
They become a professional, they should be treated as such.

00:22:56.355 --> 00:23:06.134
Maybe because I, I only have the experience that I have and that is, I negotiate for all of my vets and my nurses.

00:23:06.825 --> 00:23:09.704
And I mean, the majority of them are women, but.

00:23:11.250 --> 00:23:12.059
I negotiate.

00:23:12.059 --> 00:23:20.519
So anybody coming through vet staff, they get a, a rem package, a remuneration package they're honors and respect.

00:23:21.619 --> 00:23:22.099
Yes.

00:23:22.190 --> 00:23:35.450
And I, and I like to think that the clinics that I'm negotiating with, even though they don't like putting their hands in their pockets, sometimes at the end of it, they are happy.

00:23:35.569 --> 00:23:37.670
They, they, they, they want.

00:23:38.414 --> 00:23:47.505
Managed to convince them that it's important to them, that they love the team and that their teams feel loved.

00:23:47.894 --> 00:24:00.194
And one way we can do that as to give them as much as, as possible to give them, you know, without, without affecting the commercial viability or getting everything.

00:24:00.194 --> 00:24:03.845
So out of whack with everybody else, I only know.

00:24:04.964 --> 00:24:05.894
Good deals.

00:24:06.164 --> 00:24:18.795
However, in saying that I do have vets and nurses coming to me, not on good deals that are being uh, it's just, yeah.

00:24:18.894 --> 00:24:20.345
It's yeah.

00:24:20.974 --> 00:24:21.115
Yeah.

00:24:21.154 --> 00:24:23.045
They ask you to negotiate for them.

00:24:23.255 --> 00:24:24.724
How this stuff works.

00:24:24.934 --> 00:24:25.954
Is that right?

00:24:26.775 --> 00:24:28.755
The, the clinics pay us.

00:24:29.355 --> 00:24:35.474
So the, if a clinic can get away without using vet staff services, then they will.

00:24:35.775 --> 00:24:45.914
But the moment a, a job seeker, an applicant comes to us and says, I want you to find me a job, or I'm applying for that job that you were advertising then straightaway.

00:24:45.974 --> 00:24:51.855
We are that person's agent, we're the bridge between the clinic and.

00:24:52.529 --> 00:25:00.440
The, the job seeker, we do it because like you've said, people, we don't realize their worth and it's edgy.

00:25:00.470 --> 00:25:03.920
I don't know whether I would be able to negotiate on behalf of me.

00:25:04.220 --> 00:25:19.400
You know, if I was applying for a job, even though I do this, not every day, but I do this every week and I'm a good, I like to think I'm a good negotiator, but would I be able to, to back myself the way I bet.

00:25:20.204 --> 00:25:21.224
Somebody else.

00:25:21.644 --> 00:25:34.365
I don't know because it's, it comes down to self-esteem and you know, not that I'm my self esteem is low, but I think we could all do with lifting our own.

00:25:34.454 --> 00:25:38.765
Self-esteem so many times we're so ready to bat for someone else that way.

00:25:38.884 --> 00:25:43.494
And the thing is, you know, that they would bet for you as well, which may.

00:25:44.250 --> 00:25:48.359
Just that for yourself too, but it's it's, I dunno, it's how we are.

00:25:48.750 --> 00:25:57.210
Another thing about paying well is if you pay really well, you show you that's that you really value them and they transfer that onto the owners.

00:25:57.750 --> 00:26:06.720
And then the owners start learning to value them as well and pay their bills and understand that they are getting something very special here to look after them.

00:26:07.369 --> 00:26:09.650
Can we talk about that place?

00:26:10.019 --> 00:26:11.140
How, how.

00:26:12.255 --> 00:26:30.045
Does it just magically happen or is it, you know, you pay a vet really well and somehow that happens or have you trained in, do you have a culture that, that somehow brings that about it?

00:26:30.045 --> 00:26:30.615
Doesn't just happen.

00:26:31.529 --> 00:26:32.140
One of them.

00:26:32.190 --> 00:26:35.069
That's brought it very strongly to me.

00:26:35.400 --> 00:26:38.670
The lady that I bought the clinic from, she was a very good business woman.

00:26:38.849 --> 00:26:41.430
She kind of pushed off all the accounts.

00:26:42.240 --> 00:26:43.710
She only had a very few accounts.

00:26:43.710 --> 00:26:46.200
So I kept with that system, which was really great.

00:26:46.710 --> 00:26:53.549
And then, um, when I got the two dates, one of them was very adamant that people should pay well, because she's doing a really good job.

00:26:53.579 --> 00:26:56.009
She works very hard and she does a really good job.

00:26:56.369 --> 00:26:57.930
The other vet picked that up as well.

00:26:57.930 --> 00:26:59.009
And I picked up on as well.

00:26:59.009 --> 00:27:00.150
So I'm totally grateful.

00:27:00.674 --> 00:27:04.904
For her to step out there and say, no, no, we're a good clinic.

00:27:05.835 --> 00:27:07.154
We do a really great job.

00:27:07.184 --> 00:27:08.134
We say that animals.

00:27:08.134 --> 00:27:10.505
And so it's been a learning for all of us.

00:27:10.505 --> 00:27:12.634
And now all the rest of the staff are right there too.

00:27:12.875 --> 00:27:14.375
We pride ourselves on our work.

00:27:14.375 --> 00:27:15.365
We work hard.

00:27:15.664 --> 00:27:17.194
We communicate with owners.

00:27:17.615 --> 00:27:21.664
I did do some marketing, some work with a company in Sydney.

00:27:21.845 --> 00:27:21.904
Yeah.

00:27:21.964 --> 00:27:25.144
And they taught me about your ideal client.

00:27:26.085 --> 00:27:38.775
And I really define my ideal client so that the red bags and the nasty ones that don't tend to come to our clinic because word of mouth and whatever, we charge, whatever reasons they don't tend to come to our clinic.

00:27:39.255 --> 00:27:42.345
So your ideal clinic and your point of difference.

00:27:42.795 --> 00:27:46.694
And we really work on our point of difference in that we've got personalized pet care.

00:27:46.904 --> 00:27:50.055
So it's not a one size fits all.

00:27:50.384 --> 00:27:51.674
There's no wellness plans.

00:27:51.674 --> 00:27:54.134
If you want a wellness plan, we'll work at one for your dog.

00:27:54.164 --> 00:27:54.914
But yeah.

00:27:56.460 --> 00:28:03.960
Uh, girls will do everything they can to look after your animal and make it well again, and there is a price for that.

00:28:04.470 --> 00:28:09.150
And if you can't do that, let's have another look and negotiate and see what we can do.

00:28:09.529 --> 00:28:14.269
Do you charge for your, your nurse's time?

00:28:15.380 --> 00:28:16.279
Not during the week?

00:28:16.279 --> 00:28:16.789
No, I don't.

00:28:16.789 --> 00:28:17.150
I have.

00:28:17.210 --> 00:28:17.599
Okay.

00:28:17.900 --> 00:28:23.569
Right, because, um, yeah, there, there are some clinics here in New Zealand as a way to.

00:28:24.404 --> 00:28:27.494
To help show the nurses that they are respected.

00:28:27.855 --> 00:28:35.355
They are including what the nurse, the nurses contribution as part of the, the invoice as well.

00:28:35.625 --> 00:28:43.785
So anesthetic monitoring or whatever it is that they're doing, that it just helps boost the nurses as well.

00:28:44.734 --> 00:28:53.015
And I think we just had an upgraded version of easy bed and there will be bigger packages in there so that we can fill all those in properly and let people know exactly.

00:28:53.940 --> 00:29:01.500
Our input and what's going on and help them understand the process because I've had a doctor asked me how much does snake ND Beneen cost?

00:29:01.500 --> 00:29:04.289
Cause she had a dog that is Nightbot.

00:29:04.619 --> 00:29:07.230
And when I told her she was modified, she said that much.

00:29:07.349 --> 00:29:07.769
Yeah.

00:29:07.769 --> 00:29:08.940
That's the way it is.

00:29:08.940 --> 00:29:09.299
Yeah.

00:29:10.009 --> 00:29:14.549
Another thing that we do, Jolie that we've talked about before is the 30 minute consultation.

00:29:14.579 --> 00:29:16.740
30 minute consultations are wonderful.

00:29:16.740 --> 00:29:19.619
Again, we did them during COVID and they worked really well.

00:29:20.355 --> 00:29:26.265
And then after, well COVID, as we had it in Rocky, once things settled down, everyone came back in the clinic.

00:29:26.265 --> 00:29:29.805
It was all very much back to normal, 15 minute appointments.

00:29:30.345 --> 00:29:36.164
And one of the moms said to me, is there any chance that we could go back to that 30 minute appointment?

00:29:36.164 --> 00:29:37.394
She said, I really liked that.

00:29:37.394 --> 00:29:40.994
It gives me time to sort out my mind to get all my information.

00:29:40.994 --> 00:29:44.654
You need to get everything sorted out to talk to the owner and no one.

00:29:45.345 --> 00:29:47.444
What's going to happen for everything.

00:29:47.444 --> 00:29:49.904
And I said, well, let's talk to the bed.

00:29:49.904 --> 00:29:51.914
So we talked to the vets, they all thought it was a great idea.

00:29:51.914 --> 00:29:52.755
So we've done it.

00:29:53.174 --> 00:29:54.015
It's just great.

00:29:54.585 --> 00:29:55.424
It's just great.

00:29:55.605 --> 00:29:58.005
Everyone's calmly doing job to job.

00:29:58.295 --> 00:30:03.884
All our admissions are done by the vets so that they know exactly what's going on with that little dog.

00:30:03.884 --> 00:30:07.845
The owner meets the vet knows who's going to be looking after that dog for the day.

00:30:09.299 --> 00:30:10.410
Some are 15 minutes.

00:30:10.410 --> 00:30:15.059
If they're just to revisit checks, ditches or something like that, that's fallen, but most of them have 30 minutes.

00:30:15.089 --> 00:30:21.329
And then you can get to talk to them about their teeth, about their bloods, about whatever needs to be done about their arthritis.

00:30:21.329 --> 00:30:27.210
You can have a full conversation with people and then do really good workups so that the animals are much better off.

00:30:27.299 --> 00:30:29.640
I can imagine some.

00:30:30.980 --> 00:30:32.000
Owner's going.

00:30:32.269 --> 00:30:36.380
What, because what you've done is I'm playing devil's advocate here.

00:30:36.799 --> 00:30:45.230
What you've done is you've reduced your opportunity for concerts from four an hour down to two an hour.

00:30:45.920 --> 00:30:50.150
So you've effectively halved your, your face.

00:30:51.259 --> 00:30:57.259
What happened in the real world when you, when you stayed with your 30 minute concert.

00:30:59.099 --> 00:31:03.420
We actually, I did the numbers and we actually made a bit more money.

00:31:03.690 --> 00:31:05.009
Nobody wants to be processed.

00:31:06.355 --> 00:31:08.184
And they don't want their animal to be processed.

00:31:08.214 --> 00:31:13.345
They want the vet to spend time to show they care to go through everything.

00:31:13.345 --> 00:31:25.994
So I just think the development of trust conversations, you're not spending time on the phone settling in on a dam because they didn't understand or confused or, you know, why would you do that?

00:31:26.025 --> 00:31:28.154
Why don't you just make sure everything's going well?

00:31:28.904 --> 00:31:32.144
First time, rather than trying to fix things up later.

00:31:32.204 --> 00:31:33.855
I really don't like doing that.

00:31:33.855 --> 00:31:37.335
So yeah, honestly, we haven't lost any money.

00:31:37.394 --> 00:31:38.714
The vets are happy about it.

00:31:38.984 --> 00:31:41.535
They are talking about bringing some back to 20 minutes.

00:31:42.015 --> 00:31:45.015
We'll see again, it's a conversation for them to have.

00:31:45.045 --> 00:31:46.365
They're the ones that are doing it.

00:31:46.365 --> 00:31:46.424
Yeah.

00:31:47.190 --> 00:31:49.529
I know that they always build properly.

00:31:49.529 --> 00:31:50.400
They do the right thing.

00:31:50.400 --> 00:31:52.319
They look after that little dog and the client.

00:31:52.529 --> 00:31:58.950
If I can make my staff happy, therefore make my clients happy and then I will be happy and they will be happy too.

00:31:59.329 --> 00:32:06.920
So when you know you, you were on 15 minute concerts, pre COVID pre lockdown, you went to 30 minute concerts.

00:32:07.430 --> 00:32:13.130
Then they said, we want a new, went back to 15, and then they said, we want to go to 30.

00:32:13.279 --> 00:32:15.529
What sort of thoughts were going through your mind?

00:32:16.799 --> 00:32:19.799
And how did you reconcile those?

00:32:21.420 --> 00:32:25.859
Because there'll be people listening, thinking, oh, sounds really good.

00:32:25.859 --> 00:32:27.390
How do I do this myself?

00:32:27.890 --> 00:32:31.970
I have never said to the girls, because I know you've read it now.

00:32:31.970 --> 00:32:35.299
And then you need to make X amount out of each consultation.

00:32:35.359 --> 00:32:36.890
That's not how we work.

00:32:37.279 --> 00:32:42.289
How we work is we look at that animal and what can we do to help this animal?

00:32:42.740 --> 00:32:43.000
And.

00:32:43.755 --> 00:32:47.474
During any vaccination at animal examined from head to toe.

00:32:47.505 --> 00:32:50.234
If they're an older dog, we talk about running bloods.

00:32:50.474 --> 00:32:52.095
We talk about you had the conversation.

00:32:52.125 --> 00:32:53.835
Are they drinking more, weighing more?

00:32:54.704 --> 00:32:58.545
And if that conversation develops up, I think we might need to do bloods.

00:32:58.545 --> 00:33:04.335
And when we can catch diseases before that badly affecting the dog, it's so much better.

00:33:04.815 --> 00:33:06.434
So you can have those conversations.

00:33:06.434 --> 00:33:08.684
You can say the teeth are okay.

00:33:09.660 --> 00:33:13.589
But I think next year we need to seriously think about having a scale and Polish.

00:33:13.890 --> 00:33:20.849
And that starts a conversation you're not in there 15 minutes and you're done, it needs to scale and Polish and they are, what's a scout and Polish.

00:33:21.329 --> 00:33:24.839
Whereas now we've told them the year before, what does scaling polishes?

00:33:24.869 --> 00:33:27.539
What it involves that there will be a general anesthetic.

00:33:27.539 --> 00:33:27.779
So.

00:33:28.599 --> 00:33:37.210
It's a conversation that goes on and on and on year after year it's it's just so not processing people and they're getting confused and frightened.

00:33:37.480 --> 00:33:39.279
And as I said, the money is just being brilliant.

00:33:39.279 --> 00:33:39.910
It's fine.

00:33:40.339 --> 00:33:45.720
So you're not having the bill shock conversations when they come to pay them.

00:33:47.025 --> 00:33:50.565
No, no, because that's all talked about as well during the conversation.

00:33:50.815 --> 00:33:55.125
Some people say, oh, you just haven't got time to go through the estimates with them.

00:33:55.125 --> 00:33:56.025
Just email it.

00:33:56.105 --> 00:33:56.835
I'm sorry.

00:33:56.835 --> 00:34:02.375
If I just emailed, if I just got an estimate email to me, I probably wouldn't go back.

00:34:02.404 --> 00:34:04.115
I need to know why.

00:34:05.325 --> 00:34:08.775
Paying this and what, what is this, what is this medication?

00:34:08.775 --> 00:34:12.135
You know, what, what is this about that you're going to do to my little dog?

00:34:12.135 --> 00:34:14.355
So the conversation is just fine.

00:34:14.465 --> 00:34:14.855
Yeah.

00:34:15.175 --> 00:34:15.385
Yeah.

00:34:15.394 --> 00:34:16.744
You're educating people.

00:34:17.255 --> 00:34:17.554
Yeah.

00:34:17.554 --> 00:34:17.974
Yeah, yeah.

00:34:18.184 --> 00:34:20.494
And again, we've got that ideal client.

00:34:21.155 --> 00:34:26.224
So we are finding the people who want that sort of care, that conversation.

00:34:26.224 --> 00:34:27.275
They want to know us.

00:34:27.275 --> 00:34:29.405
They trust us as to look after their own.

00:34:30.179 --> 00:34:32.579
Oh, the ones that just want you to hold it and stitch it up.

00:34:33.090 --> 00:34:34.650
No, it's not going to happen.

00:34:35.090 --> 00:34:35.360
Okay.

00:34:35.389 --> 00:34:38.030
Have you fired clients?

00:34:38.690 --> 00:34:39.139
Yes.

00:34:39.800 --> 00:34:41.690
How does that feel?

00:34:42.110 --> 00:34:42.949
Was it a bit scary?

00:34:43.309 --> 00:34:44.780
Was it scary?

00:34:44.869 --> 00:34:45.199
Yes.

00:34:45.230 --> 00:34:46.460
I get the shakes and.

00:34:48.284 --> 00:34:49.875
It's it's yeah, very scary.

00:34:49.875 --> 00:34:53.894
But sometimes it needs to be done and I will back for my girls any day.

00:34:53.954 --> 00:34:55.394
I will always back them up.

00:34:55.394 --> 00:35:00.344
If a client complains about something, I will be talking to my vet and I will back my bed up.

00:35:00.585 --> 00:35:02.054
I don't see any other way.

00:35:02.574 --> 00:35:03.465
The clients.

00:35:05.070 --> 00:35:09.269
Get confused, whatever, but I know what my vets are saying to the clients.

00:35:09.269 --> 00:35:12.780
I know what's behind their conversations and again, they document it.

00:35:13.289 --> 00:35:14.400
It's written down there.

00:35:14.659 --> 00:35:19.039
Are you still a practicing vet or are you an management mode?

00:35:20.460 --> 00:35:26.130
More management and with the smooth operating bets, but, um, our full-time bed is taking two weeks holiday.

00:35:26.130 --> 00:35:33.840
So I'm going to have to work for two days, which I'm quite excited about actually being back in there on the floor with the girls.

00:35:33.840 --> 00:35:35.219
Yeah, I do love it.

00:35:35.340 --> 00:35:35.849
I do love it.

00:35:35.969 --> 00:35:36.269
Yeah.

00:35:36.380 --> 00:35:38.570
I remember the first chat we had.

00:35:38.780 --> 00:35:48.800
You, you said that you pinch yourself for doing the, having the privilege of being able to.

00:35:49.889 --> 00:35:52.260
To work with animals the way you do.

00:35:53.449 --> 00:35:54.170
Oh yes.

00:35:54.230 --> 00:35:54.469
Yes.

00:35:54.469 --> 00:36:06.380
Some days when, you know, you're doing an anesthetic and, and you're squeezing the stuff into this dog and the dog just lies down and goes to sleep and you go, oh, okay.

00:36:06.380 --> 00:36:08.510
That worked how cool.

00:36:08.570 --> 00:36:10.159
And now I'm going to do surgery.

00:36:11.505 --> 00:36:14.144
And who am I to be able to do this to a dog?

00:36:14.204 --> 00:36:24.635
I am so lucky to have this, the skills and the ability and the training and the backup and the ability to do surgery.

00:36:24.695 --> 00:36:33.815
To me, that's phenomenal too, to use a scalpel and have a look inside a dog and fix it or stop it, having too many puppies or whatever it is you're going to do.

00:36:33.815 --> 00:36:39.394
I do, I do feel very humble and I do feel like it is a privilege that we are able to do that.

00:36:40.364 --> 00:36:41.025
I really do.

00:36:41.054 --> 00:36:41.474
Yeah.

00:36:43.394 --> 00:36:44.744
That's a good place to finish.

00:36:45.485 --> 00:36:52.574
I just want more bits to love doing it, just to get that happiness and that satisfaction, that joy.

00:36:52.635 --> 00:36:53.085
Yeah.

00:36:53.114 --> 00:36:56.594
Just, we worked so hard and we so believe it.

00:36:56.644 --> 00:36:59.114
It is wonderful and it is, yeah.

00:36:59.445 --> 00:37:02.625
We need to keep doing it in a happy place.

00:37:04.155 --> 00:37:05.264
Thanks so much, Julie.

00:37:05.985 --> 00:37:06.795
Thank you.

00:37:07.175 --> 00:37:13.534
I hope you picked up a few things that you can look at implementing into your clinic.

00:37:13.894 --> 00:37:29.690
If you want to get in touch with Jocelyn, you can email her at director@smoothoperatingvets.com and that's vets I promised you a summary of what Jocelyn said.

00:37:30.159 --> 00:37:33.489
And here are my takeaways from that.

00:37:33.969 --> 00:37:43.230
Jocelyn has five roles in her clinic that everyone lives and breathes and they, um, Number one, the intent is good.

00:37:43.469 --> 00:37:50.309
She believes that all people mean well, there's a no blame policy, a no swearing policy.

00:37:50.849 --> 00:37:55.829
Every animal deserves to come in and be looked at by one of her veterinarians.

00:37:56.099 --> 00:37:58.679
And there's no disrespectful behavior.

00:38:00.045 --> 00:38:07.934
The three underlying tenants that enabled Jocelyn to attract and keep top talent is her culture.

00:38:08.324 --> 00:38:16.875
Everyone has everyone's back and wants everyone to be the best, the positivity, and that they value people.

00:38:18.014 --> 00:38:22.934
What does Jocelyn do to build up trust in team and respect and belonging?

00:38:22.934 --> 00:38:24.195
I picked up six things.

00:38:25.079 --> 00:38:25.829
She listened.

00:38:26.519 --> 00:38:27.869
She then got people talking.

00:38:28.409 --> 00:38:30.829
She always endeavors to understand.

00:38:32.070 --> 00:38:36.570
Jocelyn sheers and shared her personal stories when they're appropriate.

00:38:37.260 --> 00:38:45.900
She makes sure that everyone's families are invited to clinic social occasions because they're part of her extended team.

00:38:46.530 --> 00:38:58.199
And number six, that it's by going through hard or difficult cases together and procedures together with shared hard experiences that everyone works together as a team.

00:38:59.280 --> 00:39:07.619
At that point, the team discovers that they've all got each other's backs when it comes to managing a team of part timers.

00:39:07.630 --> 00:39:10.920
I picked up seven different things that Jocelyn mentioned.

00:39:11.400 --> 00:39:19.380
She uses the easy VIPs, C R M software, software service, WhatsApp for team chat.

00:39:20.684 --> 00:39:21.525
Where she can.

00:39:21.525 --> 00:39:22.945
She uses technology.

00:39:22.965 --> 00:39:26.594
If it's designed to make life easier than she likes to use it.

00:39:27.045 --> 00:39:42.224
She likes to let people play to their strengths, which includes outsourcing, for example, her social media, that when people are on parental leave, she makes sure that there's at least 10 touch points while they're away on leave.

00:39:42.735 --> 00:39:48.375
There's a buddy system for everyone on parental leave, which includes weekly chicken.

00:39:49.650 --> 00:39:54.449
And then there's the 10 hours of housekeeping that she gifts.

00:39:54.780 --> 00:40:01.409
As soon as someone goes onto parental leave had coolers that and training is organized.

00:40:01.800 --> 00:40:04.440
So it suits as many people as possible.

00:40:05.175 --> 00:40:07.635
Around childcare requirements.

00:40:08.085 --> 00:40:21.224
And now a quick top level overview of what we talked about as that clinics need to have different ways of managing the workforce to ensure that the moms continue to practice as veterinarians.

00:40:21.434 --> 00:40:22.994
You can't do what you've always done.

00:40:23.579 --> 00:40:26.550
And expect a different result returning to work.

00:40:26.579 --> 00:40:34.829
Vic mums need to learn how to negotiate better rates for themselves because they do add value to the client.

00:40:35.804 --> 00:40:42.164
And most employees, most people, most employees don't realize their own worth.

00:40:42.465 --> 00:40:53.864
So you need to lend some negotiation prowess, or if not come to us and we can help you@fitstaff.co dot, indeed, some other incidentals.

00:40:54.164 --> 00:41:02.114
When you show VIPs that you really value them, then pet owners start to value them as professionals and the.

00:41:02.875 --> 00:41:05.005
Happier to pay their bills.

00:41:05.244 --> 00:41:11.125
Jocelyn said that she noticed this and she has very few on account clients.

00:41:11.364 --> 00:41:13.014
Most of them pay on the day.

00:41:13.585 --> 00:41:21.775
And this was brought about, because one of the VIPs working with Jocelyn believed in herself, and this was how she did it.

00:41:21.855 --> 00:41:25.454
So Jocelyn learned from her and then followed.

00:41:25.485 --> 00:41:25.755
So.

00:41:26.760 --> 00:41:30.690
She's absolutely clear on who her ideal client is.

00:41:30.929 --> 00:41:45.090
We've actually talked about this a couple of times, or I've heard this a couple of times when I've had fits, who are clinic principals and owners as guests on the show that they also know.

00:41:45.855 --> 00:41:58.784
Uh, the successful clinics know who their ideal client is and have worked with a marketing consultant and they know, or in this case, Jocelyn knows what her point of difference is.

00:41:59.175 --> 00:42:03.704
And one of those is that they offer personalized pet care.

00:42:04.215 --> 00:42:07.215
It's not a one size fits all at her clinic.

00:42:08.385 --> 00:42:11.414
And she also talked about 30 minute consults.

00:42:11.684 --> 00:42:15.974
Here are 11 things that I picked up from there that she hasn't looked back.

00:42:16.005 --> 00:42:24.735
Justin hasn't looked back since implementing this post COVID last year and it has turned out to be a better income generator.

00:42:26.385 --> 00:42:33.614
It's do the admissions and her clinic because it means that they get to chat with the owner and thus get more information.

00:42:34.965 --> 00:42:41.684
Full conversations mean really good workups, which means better care for the patients.

00:42:42.644 --> 00:42:45.014
Number four, no one wants to be proceed.

00:42:46.050 --> 00:43:09.989
People want to know that they're special and Jocelyn's team goes out of their way so that they actually feel that less time is spent and following up calls because all the information or as much information as, as absolutely possible to get as done during the consult, they have no sales targets or billable income to achieve.

00:43:10.679 --> 00:43:14.599
Top of mind for everyone is how can we best help this?

00:43:16.184 --> 00:43:40.065
Full head to toe examinations are done, even if it's only, and only as an air quotes here, even if it's only a vaccination appointment, there's no bill shock conversations on the presentation of the bill again, because it comes back to this communication that's taken place in the last half hour with the class.

00:43:40.934 --> 00:43:51.525
They do not email estimates for conversation takes place at the time because Jocelyn and her team are strong on educating their clients.

00:43:52.125 --> 00:43:59.925
And when you have the last one, when you have the ideal client, when you know who your ideal client.

00:44:00.485 --> 00:44:06.034
Is all of the previous 10 points become so much easier.

00:44:06.335 --> 00:44:07.385
So there we have it.

00:44:07.655 --> 00:44:19.445
How to have a smooth operating veterinary practice you can get in touch with Jocelyn by email director@smoothoperatingvets.com.

00:44:19.744 --> 00:44:28.114
You can check out her website, smooth operating fits.com and Facebook, same name, smooth operating fee.

00:44:29.045 --> 00:44:35.795
Now, if you haven't already, please click that follow button wherever you listen to your podcasts.

00:44:36.094 --> 00:44:44.434
That way you'll never miss out on an episode because your podcast app will deliver them straight into your podcast feed.

00:44:45.094 --> 00:44:47.554
This is Julie south signing off.

00:44:47.855 --> 00:44:51.574
Thank you for spending the last little bit of your life.

00:44:53.070 --> 00:44:54.869
I really appreciate it.

00:44:54.929 --> 00:45:01.889
And I know that Jocelyn has too so behalf on behalf of pores, closing wet noses, khaki, Deanna, peace.

00:45:01.889 --> 00:45:02.610
Be with you.

00:45:02.820 --> 00:45:10.050
Take care and God bless paws, claws and wet noses as sponsored by vet staff.

00:45:10.630 --> 00:45:16.570
If you've never heard of it, staff it's new, Zealand's only full service recruitment agency.

00:45:16.840 --> 00:45:30.519
100% dedicated to the veterinary sector and Fitz staff has been around since 2015 and works nationwide from Kate, rehang it to the bluff and everywhere in between as well as helping Kiwis fits.

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