Training

This week on the Uncharted Podcast, Dr. Andy Roark and practice management geek Stephanie Goss are talking through an interesting challenge that a veterinary technician wrote in to the mailbag with. This tech works in a practice with 15 other team members. They have no practice manager. Who solves the problems that the team can't solve? How come it feels like anarchy over there? This team member is asking for help. Let's get into this…

You can also listen to the episode on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Google Podcasts, Amazon Music or wherever you get your podcasts.

Do you have something that you would love Andy and Stephanie to role play on the podcast – a situation where you would love some examples of what someone else would say and how they would say it? If so, send us a message through the mailbag! We want to hear your challenges and would love to feature your scenario on the podcast.

Submit your questions here: unchartedvet.com/mailbag

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October 25: Team Meetings That Build A Financially-Informed Culture with Ron Sosa

Are you struggling to create a balance between a money-focused environment and a culture that values more than just profits? Do you feel judged for how your practice manages its finances? Get ready to tackle the challenges surrounding financial transparency and foster a culture that goes beyond mere numbers.

Uncover ways to create a stronger, more financially savvy practice that thrives on teamwork and a shared vision. In this live virtual workshop you will:

1️⃣ Foster a Financially-Informed Culture:

Learn how to engage your team in understanding and appreciating the financial aspects of your practice. By involving them in setting metrics, you’ll create a united front in driving financial success while maintaining a strong cultural identity.

2️⃣ Promote Transparency and Trust:

Break down the barriers between team members and financial matters. Openly share enough financial information to ensure transparency, building trust and eliminating judgment within your practice.

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Discover strategies to keep your cultural feel intact while introducing necessary financial metrics. By involving your team in the process, you’ll create a sense of ownership and engagement in achieving both financial success and a positive work environment.

Gain the knowledge and skills needed to navigate financial matters effectively, align your team with strategic goals, and foster a culture of financial awareness and accountability within your practice. Don’t miss this opportunity to transform your financial meetings and drive your practice toward greater success.

When: October 25, 2023, 12-2 PM ET/9-11 AM PT

$99 to register, FREE for Uncharted Members

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Episode Transcript

Stephanie Goss:
Hey everybody, I am Stephanie Goss and this is another episode of the Uncharted podcast. This week on the podcast, Andy and I are diving into the mailbag to take an email from a technician who is struggling because their practice brought 15 team members and their practice owner doesn't seem to want to hire a practice manager. This technician feels like the team's size is too big for them to work everything out amongst themselves and it feels like they need some leadership in the practice every day. The practice owner doesn't want to budge. This is going to be a wild one. Well, let's get into it.

Speaker 2:
And now, the Uncharted podcast.

Dr Andy Roark:
And we're back. It's me, Dr. Andy Roark and the one and only Stephanie, you-and-me-and-the-devil-makes-three Goss.

Stephanie Goss:
I was not disappointed. That was a good one.

Dr Andy Roark:
Oh, yeah. I heard that song recently. I was like, “I'm using that one.” That was a good song.

Stephanie Goss:
I love it.

Dr Andy Roark:
Oh, yeah. How are you?

Stephanie Goss:
How's it going?

Dr Andy Roark:
Oh, it's good. I just got back from a big vacation with my family. We went camping and hiking in Maine and Nova Scotia and Prince Edward Island. It was absolutely glorious. I learned something about my wife on this trip that you'll appreciate. So we go. It's not that we unplugged. It's that there's no cell service. First of all, there's no American Cell Service. But there's like… A lot of Nova Scotia is real remote and also we have American cell-

Stephanie Goss:
It's forced unplugging.

Dr Andy Roark:
Yeah, it's forced unplugging. So we are there and we're doing this beautiful hikes and camps. We got a rental car, a minivan. We're driving from one place to another and we're doing these things. Alison and I are just talking about how awesome this sort of go with the flow, making our way across the country. Trip is going. We're just talking about it's really awesome to be unplugged and absolutely just going with the tides and it's beautiful.
And so we're out there. We're like seven days into this trip and this is the vibe. We're hiking along these rocks next to the ocean and overlooking it. We come off of this hike. Our plan is to make our way into this nearby town and go to this little whale museum, museum about whales. We're coming out of the woods and we're just walking. I'm holding Alison's hand and I hear her whisper under her breath, “We're 16 minutes ahead of schedule.” And I realize that this whole trip she had planned to the minute. While I thought we were just blissfully rolling across the countryside, she was 100% running the schedule. It was like we were a weekend and she said, “We're 16 minutes ahead of schedule.” And I realized it was all a lie. The whole thing was absolutely planned. It's like the facade of relaxation was like, “Oh, there's a schedule. There's a schedule and I am being managed on that schedule.” And I had no idea.

Stephanie Goss:
That's pretty fantastic.

Dr Andy Roark:
I thought you would like that. When I tell a story about my life with Alison, I'll remember her holding my hand and we're coming off this-

Stephanie Goss:
You're 16 minutes ahead of schedule.

Dr Andy Roark:
… beautiful hike. And I was like, “That was one of the most beautiful places I've ever been.” And she was like, “We're 16 minutes ahead of the schedule.” “Okay. Okay.”

Stephanie Goss:
That's fantastic. That's fantastic. So you had… I have so many questions. We're going to have to have a conversation because we haven't talked about it. That means you had a little bit of a forced unplugging because you didn't have service. So I'm like, I can't wait to hear about how that piece went for you. Because when we did our unplugging episode last year with our friend Eric Garcia and Tyler Grogan, I remember Eric issuing you a challenge trying some unplugged time.

Dr Andy Roark:
It was great. It was particularly great because my two daughters were with us. They're 12 and 15 and their cell phones are-

Stephanie Goss:
Didn't work either.

Dr Andy Roark:
Yeah, exactly. Are important to them. They're not on social media, either one of them, but they text their friends and they watch YouTube videos and listen to their music and stuff like that. It really was this great. It was going to be one of those all-time favorite vacations just because it was a lot of family time in the minivan and hiking together and things like that. But it really was great. It was great in this way too, so they didn't have any access to cell stuff because they don't have a Canadian plan. But we could go places and get on wifi and they could send texts and download things and get episodes to watch or whatever they wanted to do. They could do that too. I really think that was beautiful. My position… So we talked with Eric Garcia a while ago and Eric does these things where he goes away and he unplugs and I get that. But I think everybody has to find what works for them.
My position on unplugging is this. I thought a lot about it on the walk. I knew you'd ask me about it. But I thought a lot about it on my hike and stuff like this. I really liken unplugging to eating healthy. Yeah, to eating healthy and like meditating. To eating healthy and meditating. Meaning unplugging and being disconnected is good for you. It is good for you. Eric going away for a month and being unplugged the whole time is comparable to a juice cleanse for 30 days in my mind. It's so healthy. I have no interest in it. I got into meditation a couple of years ago and I was like, as I do, I get big into things at the beginning. I find the thing-

Stephanie Goss:
You go all in…

Dr Andy Roark:
… and I get really excited about it. I was meditating a couple of times a day for like 10, 20 minutes at a time, 10 or 15 minutes. But I would do it a couple of times. I was really into it. One of my friends was like, “You got to come to this meditation retreat.” I was like, “Yes I do.” I was like, “How long is it?” And they were like, “10 days silent.” I was like, “What do you mean 10 days silent?” And they're like, “You go there and you don't talk for 10 days.” I was like, “What do you do?” And they were like, “You sit and you meditate and you eat soup.” I was like, “Why do you eat soup?” And they're like, “Because you're not doing anything with your body so you don't want a lot of calories. So you just eat soup.”
I was like, “I bet that's probably a spiritual thing that speaks to people. I'm happy doing the Headspace app for 10 minutes. That's where I am. I don't need a 10-day silent meditation retreat. I don't need to do a whole 30. I can do a whole five and then eat pizza on the weekend. That's where I want to live.” The same thing is true with unplugging. I don't want to unplug for 30 days. I like to unplug for 16 hours and then check and then have a little snack.

Stephanie Goss:
But I think that's the whole point. That there is no one-size-fits-all approach. You're finding what works for you. What works for you is different from what works for me, different from what works for Tyler and what works for Eric. Each one of us has made up our own rules and is finding that place. It sounds to me like you did the things behind the idea of unplugging, which is you spent time present with your family and with your girls. I will say it doesn't surprise me that you would rank this as one of your top favorite vacations. Because I have to say, I feel like we've entered a whole new stage as parents that our kids… For those who don't know our kids are right about the same ages. It is so fun. I love hanging out with them and I love spending time with them. I loved going and doing things and going on vacation with them when they were little. It held different joy than it holds for me as a parent now.
They're real little half grown humans at this point and I get to experience the world through their eyes in a radically different way than experiencing the world through their three and four year old little eyes. I love this. I love this stage. It scares the hell out of me that they're starting high school and that they're growing up. This summer has really hit home for me that I only have a few short years left with them at home before they start to make their way in the world. But I really am digging this stage as a parent, so it doesn't surprise me that you found that with them this summer.

Dr Andy Roark:
No, I completely agree. I tried unplugging for 90 minutes right before this podcast episode. Do you remember what happened? I unplugged for 90 minutes. What's wrong? About what time we were podcasting, I got three text messages and six phone calls from people saying, “Are you okay? Where are you?” And I was like-

Stephanie Goss:
But in my defense-

Dr Andy Roark:
… unplugging in the middle of a workday is not best.

Stephanie Goss:
But in my defense and in your defense, I was worried about you because although you generally run on Andy time, you always communicate. You broke rule number one about unplugging, which is that you have to let everybody know ahead of time that you're going to unplug.

Dr Andy Roark:
All right, that's fair.

Stephanie Goss:
Okay, we're off the rails already. Let's get into this episode because-

Dr Andy Roark:
Just kidding-

Stephanie Goss:
We have-

Dr Andy Roark:
We got a lot to cover here.

Stephanie Goss:
Yeah, we do. We have a good one. We got a mailbag letter from a technician who is working at a small-ish practice. It is private practice. They have about 15 team members in total and they do not have a manager of any sort. They don't have any leads. They don't have a office manager, a practice manager or anything. It's the practice owner and the team. What has started to happen as they have grown is that problems come up and the practice owner expects the team to figure it out and solve problems for themselves, which is wonderful and has benefits that I think we're going to talk about. There are also cons to it. This letter comes from the place of looking at some of the cons because they are struggling with feeling like there is animosity, there is a front versus back mentality because there is no one doing the, quote, unquote, “managing” from this team member's perspective.
What they're looking for here in the management sense is someone to help problem-solve and to deal with the challenges in a leadership capacity. Someone to be the decision-maker and help them all sort it out. They were just asking, “What is our option here?” Because they have asked the practice owner about hiring a manager and they have flat out said no. So this team is wondering, “What do we do? We're not all happy. We feel like there's strife. We feel like there's no one to help us solve the problems. We're really struggling. What is our best option for going forward from here?”

Dr Andy Roark:
I have some thoughts. This is always really challenging because the devil is definitely in the details here about what's our best option. I don't know what tools do we have to work with and what exactly is happening. But I think we can talk in general terms about this idea of we've got a team of say 15 or so. We don't have a manager and we're having strife and the owner has pushed back against that. I want to go ahead and start… Let's start with headspace as we do. I want to call out a trend, a thought pattern that I see a lot in not just in veterinary business management but in business management in general. There is this belief with a fairly large segment of the population, I think, that if you have problems in your organization, the obvious path forward is you should add managers, you should add administrators, you should add systems.
That's it. Like, “We're not getting along. We need a manager. We need some administrative person. We need more rules for sure. More rules are going to help us solve this front versus back problem.” It's funny because people are like there's a problem, we add more managers and more rules. If you keep following that then the idea is the path to utopia is more rules and more management. I don't think anybody wants to work at a place that has tons of management, tons of administration, tons of rules. No one wants that outcome, but everybody seems to think that moving in that direction is the obvious path to make their job better. I think that's funny. I think if you look at human healthcare, you will see the manifestation of this. Human healthcare in America, one of the reasons it is so ridiculously expensive is the layers and layers of management, administration and bureaucracy. It's completely out of control.
You've got these healthcare providers at the bottom supporting all of this management and administrative infrastructure and the whole system is broken. It's the same in universities. Anyway, it happens in our government, don't even get me started. But it's that sort of thing of you add these things that add things that add things. Now that's not always. I'm not, absolutely not saying that managers aren't important and there's no benefits to having manager or anything of that. But I want to call this out because I do think people quickly jump right to, “We are not getting along. If we had a manager involved or more management or more systems or protocols or rules, we could get out of this interpersonal problem.” And I would say I want you to really analyze that assumption and think about it. Okay, cool. Just full stop. I'm doing the thing that I do where I'm not saying they're wrong, but I want to punch holes into that bedrock belief of we need to add a manager. That's what we need.
It's funny, this letter ended a little differently than I thought it was going to. We often get these emails, and I started reading this one, and it felt this way, where people will be like, “Hey Andy and Stephanie, here's the problem. Here is the obvious solution that I have. Question, how do I get everyone to recognize that I am right and do what I want to do?”

Stephanie Goss:
It's true.

Dr Andy Roark:
You know. We get those letters all time.

Stephanie Goss:
We do.

Dr Andy Roark:
And yes, I laugh. I chuckle every time I read them, “Here's the problem. Here's the obvious solution that I have that is clearly correct. Question, how do I get other people to recognize my correctness in this matter and do what I think we should do?” And I'm like, “That is not an interesting question for me.” Well-

Stephanie Goss:
And to be clear-

Dr Andy Roark:
… of course, I did not say that.

Stephanie Goss:
… sometimes we do agree with them. But sometimes it's like, “That would make a boring conversation.” Yes, we agree with you, end of podcast.

Dr Andy Roark:
A lot of times they're not entirely right. A lot of times they have made some… Generally when I say, “There is one correct solution and here's what it is.” If your team has not bought into it, if other people don't feel any ownership of this solution, it's probably not the correct solution even if you can make a stronger case for it than anything else. Anyway, that's not what they did here. They did not end with, “How do I get the practice owner to hire a manager?” They ended with, “What's our best option?” I was like, “Okay, I'll pivot here. I do appreciate that.”
But anyway, I have those thoughts a lot and we see a lot of those. Anyway, when it came down to, “We don't have a manager, what do we do?” I needed to call out the idea of like, okay, I would just want to punch some holes in the assumption that a manager is the right answer to this problem. It might be, definitely might be. But there should be at least enough uncertainty that we can discuss other options. If there's not that level of uncertainty, I think it's going to be hard to move forward towards a resolution everybody feels good about.

Stephanie Goss:
I would agree with that and I think you presented a good headspace challenge. I think the answer… For me a lot of the time in veterinary medicine, I used to drive my team nuts because my answer was it depends. Because so much of veterinary medicine and life in general exists in the middle gray zone. And so this was one when I read through it that I was like, “Oh, okay. The answer probably is somewhere in the middle.” It wasn't a clear, this is the only right answer, because there's no one-size-fits-all approach to this. Every practice is different. Every business owner has different needs and every team has different needs. But from a headspace perspective, I think you presented a great challenge, which is I would say action step-wise, sit yourself down and think about one end of the extreme, like you presented, and think about the levels of bureaucracy that get layered in the bigger you get.
Human healthcare is a great example. Is that what you want or need for your practice? Let yourself go there from a headspace perspective. Then on the opposite end, it sounds from their email like it might be a little bit closer to the end that they feel like they're at, where it's a free-for-all and everybody can do whatever they want. There's no rules. There's no structure. There's no systems. It is a total free-for-all. Because once you wrap your head around what those two extremes look like, it is a lot easier in my experience to try and find multiple different paths that start in the middle and take the pros out of both ends and find the path that works for you and your team that feels individual.

Dr Andy Roark:
I want to touch on both of those two extremes real quick and again, I haven't yet revealed my position here and I want to be clear about that. I'm just shaking the construct that has been laid down to let everybody see that it's not as rock solid as people like to think it is. It's funny. There are a lot of… There's a tendency to think that managers are the answer to interpersonal problems. I've not found that to be true in a lot of cases. Meaning, people will say to me, “We have this person who is an absolute toxic person.” And they don't have a strong manager. And I'm like, “Let me give you a little piece of bad news. If they're an absolute toxic person, it doesn't matter if they have a strong manager. They're going to be a toxic person.”
There's a lot of people who have this. They tell themselves that if this person who I despise was managed, I wouldn't despise them. They're like, “I hate Carol and what I need is a manager that will make Carol not act like Carol, but like the ideal version of Carol I have in my mind.” And I'm like, there is no manager that-

Stephanie Goss:
That's not how-

Dr Andy Roark:
… is going to-

Stephanie Goss:
… that works.

Dr Andy Roark:
… make that happen. That's a magician, not a manager.

Stephanie Goss:
Yeah, you're so spot on. That's not how that works guys.

Dr Andy Roark:
Anyway, I just want to say that and put that in the con manager camp. So I have beaten my anti-manager drum here. Now let me beat my pro manager drum for a second. You and I talked about our vacation and going to Maine. We took tents and we went camping. There was four of us and we flew to Maine and then rented a minivan. Then we tent camped and we did all these different things to everything. Do you know how we packed? We did not have four people run around and pack everything that they thought we needed for this trip. That is not at all how we packed.

Stephanie Goss:
Let me guess. I would guess that Alison Roark was the general and said, “This is what we're going to pack and how we're going to do it.”

Dr Andy Roark:
Exactly. Alison had the list.

Stephanie Goss:
The list.

Dr Andy Roark:
I don't want people to think that Alison did this by herself. Absolutely did not. I was involved in planning and all of those sorts of things. Do not think she was abandoned and that's why. I was very involved in this, still, when it came down to packing, given that I was very involved in this and very excited about it and we went through everything together and I made sure that we had what we needed off of her list and things like that. It's important to say I was very invested in this and I put a lot of time and effort into it. When it came time to pack, Alison Roark with her checklist pointing where things went and asking for this and telling what she needed. This goes here and this goes in the car first and this goes and those things are going to be packed together and that's in a check bag and we're going to carry these things on. That was the way to get this done.
It was having a manager, an organizer, a general, a conductor. And we were exponentially more efficient and effective for having one person whose job was to organize the three of us, me and my two daughters, running around, packing the things, bringing things, loading things into the car. It made so much more sense for her to stand back and coordinate us as opposed to throwing in herself into the chaos and running around and doing things. That's how we packed. There's absolutely a point, a tipping point, where you say, “We are not organized and having someone step back and get us organized, that makes a ton of sense for efficiency and effectiveness.”

Stephanie Goss:
Yes, I agree with all of that. I love it.

Dr Andy Roark:
Okay. So we talked about the pros and the cons. There is a way to avoid bureaucracy and to own the difficulties of interpersonal relationships. Also, to say, we are not organized and we have to get organized, that do not necessarily involve hiring a full-time manager for a staff of 15. It's definitely possible. It's really hard because now you're really starting to get into how would you do this and it really depends on the talent that you have on the floor as far as what your options are. And so anyway, I just want to start to lay that out. The last part of headspace before we start to get into how I would try to start, what your options are or how I should line this up, the last part I want to lay out is I am a big believer in flat organizations or flat-ish organizations. I am not 100% bought into the idea that a hierarchy is required to get things done and create a good place to work.
I think you can do it that way and you and I have both seen it done that way where everybody has a clear manager. The manager manages the people right underneath them and everybody moves in that clear lockstep, direct boss looking over your shoulder, maybe micromanaging, maybe not. But everything has a clear direct hierarchy of if you don't like what this person did, you can go directly to their boss and blah blah, blah, blah, blah. I think that there's a lot of benefit in hiring good people and supporting them as communicators and giving them autonomy to say, “Hey, these are our values and this is the general system in which we work.” I want you to look around and assess what's going on and make it the best decision in the moment rather than following some cookbook protocol that was laid out with no thought to this specific situation.
I think it is not too much to ask that grownup people do some actual relationship building and a little bit of conflict management. I think that there is a problem with conflict management skills, a lack of conflict management skills in our profession and I'm not convinced that if you have people who are not good at conflict management, the obvious answer is a babysitter to wade in and fix their problems. I think that you can make a strong case for facilitating conversations and giving responsibility back to people to fix their own issues. I do think that there is a tendency sometimes to say, “These people are not getting along. Bring to me, the manager, your problems and let me sort out your interpersonal issues.”
And we both know where that goes because we've seen managers who do nothing except deal with interpersonal issues all day long. They should have pushed those issues back onto the people who were having them a long time ago and said, “I want you both to go. Here's a $25 gift card to Starbucks. I want you guys to go to Starbucks. I don't want you to come back until you're able to work together.” That may sound archaic, but I promise you it absolutely can work. Sometimes it doesn't. We have to escalate. But I see a lot of people who are way too quick to take interpersonal issues and take them up the chain as opposed to empowering people and expecting people to handle their own issues. Then it just becomes management time is completely saturated dealing with interpersonal issues.

Stephanie Goss:
Well, let me shout out a big positive here because this team member called out their practice owner wanting and expecting the team to be empowered to solve their problems on their own. From a headspace/action step perspective, I agree with you. I think a lot of practices would look at this situation and say, “We're going to put a manager in place.” And go about it the way you said, which is, “Okay, the manager is going to be the one to solve the problem.” While it may resolve some of the conflict, I promise and guarantee you that that approach is absolutely going to create a whole new set of problems. It is because then you are not empowering anybody. Then you are creating a bottleneck where everybody has to go to one person to get answers to their questions and their solutions. And so now you have a whole new problem on your hands.
I love that they pointed it out in this practice owner's defense. I do absolutely think that every member of our team, part of our role as leaders, whether you're a practice owner or you're a practice manager, when you run a hospital, part of the tools in your toolkit should absolutely be that the members of your team get taught interpersonal skills in conflict resolution. Because the reality is we're human and we're working with other humans and it is never going to be all kumbaya, everything is hunky-dory 100% of the time. That is just not reality. If we don't teach them how to mediate conflict themselves, how to work things out, how to speak to each other with kindness and compassion and it seems… I know. I hear in my head the practice owners who are listening right now going, “But why is it my job to parent them? Why didn't they already come to me with those skills? I'm hiring adults.”
That is not reality. We can be mad about that or we can just accept the fact that even if they do have skills, we can still help them get more skills, and so get over the mad. I'm saying that with all the love and kindness but camped off love because I've been there. You can get sucked down in the mad or you can teach them how to do the thing that you're frustrated that they can't do, and in this case it's a soft skill. I think when we look at it, shout out to this practice owner because they are expecting them to work things out and we don't know because we didn't get all of the information. We're only getting one side of this story.
But if they're expecting that and not equipping the team with the tools to actually do it, then they're shooting themselves in the foot. Because you don't get that many people, especially like, I'm just going to go out on a limb and make a generalization, veterinary medicine is very female-dominated at this point in our industry. You don't get that many people or that many women in the same space without having conflict. It just doesn't happen. You are crazy to think that that is a thing. It is irrational for us to think that you could put 15 people on a team in close-knit space and not expect there to be conflict at some point in time. If you are not helping them equip with the skills to deal with that, you're just shooting yourself in the foot.

Dr Andy Roark:
Well, there was four of us in the minivan and we all love each other deeply and there was conflict. There was conflict. No, I really like this about people sorting out their own issues. I just want to call out, because I'm not saying that this is going on here necessarily, but whenever we get into this I need to call out either-or thinking, and this is a behavioral psychology trap that people follow too. And so people are like, “Well, either they need to solve their own problems.” Or, “If I weighed in, then they're always going to come to me and I will be stuck doing this forever.” And I go, “That's either-or thinking. That's not true.” That's not true. You can be very cognizant of the desire to not be involved in a lot of interpersonal issues and also recognize that sometimes we do have to get involved and we can get involved in a way that does not mean that we're going to see an increase frequency in this. But I think a lot of people are afraid of that. They're like, “If I weigh into this, I'll have to weigh into every one.”
Here's my last piece of headspace, when do I wade into interpersonal conflicts? I'll tell you when. This goes down to the thing you've heard me say many times before. The difference in a struggling business and a thriving business is this. A thriving business has a new during problem every day and a struggling business has the same during problem every day. And when I feel like we're having the same during problem every day, at some point I have to intervene and that can be, “Hey, you guys need to sort this out.” Or if in fact we've tried that and that has not yielded results and we're still stuck on this problem, I am going to get increasingly involved in this problem one way or another. How it turns out will remain to be seen. It may turn out with one less team member than we had going in. It may, two less team members. Hopefully it won't.
But that for me, just so you know, when I'm like, “When do I know to keep pushing this back to them and pushing this back to them versus letting it go.” To me, it's that, if there is a problem that I see in our team, in our business and it's the same problem again and again and I have nudged them and I have told them they need to work this out and the same problem persists, at some point you're picking your poison. You're either deciding to live with this problem which may very well go ahead and escalate or you are deciding to get involved in this specific problem. But not many problems rise to that level and that's important or else you get stuck in either-or thinking of, “If I help these people, if I get involved, I'm getting involved in everything.” I go, “No.” You're only going to get involved in things that you have pushed and tried to have them resolve themselves again and again and again and they are past frustrated and now you're going to get involved. I think that's okay. That's what I got for headspace.

Stephanie Goss:
I love it. Should we pause here and take a quick break and then come back and talk about action steps?

Dr Andy Roark:
Let's do it.

Stephanie Goss:
Did you know that we offer workshops for our Uncharted members and for our non-members? So if you're listening to today's podcast and you are not a member of Uncharted yet, you should be. But this is not a conversation about joining Uncharted. This is a conversation about all of the amazing content that we have coming at all of you, whether or not you're a member, through our workshop series. You should head over to the website at unchartedvet.com/events and check out what is coming. We have got an amazing lineup on the regular. We've got something every month, sometimes two or three things in a month, coming at you to expand your brain, to talk about leadership, to talk about practice management, and dive into the kind of topics that Andy and I talk about on the podcast every week.
Now's your chance. Stop what you're doing, pick up your cell phone, I know it's not far from you, and type in unchartedvet.com/events, see what's coming and sign up. They are always free to our Uncharted members and they have a small fee attached to them if you are not currently a member. You can get all of the details, pricing, dates, times, and register, head over to the website now. I want to see you there.

Dr Andy Roark:
All right, so let's get into action steps here. The question that was asked was the owner is opposed to having a manager, what are the best options? I would start to lay this down in my responses to our technician that was writing. This is how I would coach that person who's asking me what do I do? Where do I go from here? The first part of headspace for me is assume good intent.
If you decide the practice owner is stupid, that he's a jerk, he doesn't know what he's doing, he doesn't know how to run a business, you are setting yourself up for a really hard go of it and you're not going to be very effective in talking this out. You're not going to be very effective in finding solutions. The first thing is I would just say assume that there is a good reason that the practice owner feels this way and assume that the practice owner is trying his best and he really wants to have a good place to work. Just go ahead and get that in your head. To me that is the low bar for engaging in this conversation.

Stephanie Goss:
I think one of the best tools that I've ever been taught to help do that… Because when you're sitting there looking at it from your perspective, it is hard to get yourself out sometimes of the emotions that go along with viewing it through your lens. One of the most helpful tools that I was ever given was someone taught me to ask the question, what else could this mean or what else could be going on here? And so when I actually forced myself to sit down and answer that question, what could be happening, there are a million other things besides the fact that they truly are just trying to make my life more difficult by not hiring a manager. Let's be real. When you're in that situation, that is a part of how you're probably feeling, which is my life is immeasurably more difficult because none of these people are getting along and I have to come to work and deal with this BS every day. That could absolutely be where this technician is sitting.
There could also be a million other reasons, why. When I ask myself that question and I let myself hallucinate in that way of what else could this mean? Why else could they be making this choice? Maybe they can't afford it yet. Maybe they're not sure that it will solve the problem. Maybe they had bad experiences in the past with a manager. When you let yourself go down that road and hallucinate different answers it, in my experience, has become a lot easier for me to find that place of not only assuming good intent but also putting on my empathy shoes so that when I sit down to have this conversation with them and try and understand, I am ready and prepared to do that.

Dr Andy Roark:
Yeah, I agree. That takes me right to the next step. I think this is probably two different conversations. I don't know that you can do this in the same conversation about what I'm going to say. The first thing that I would like to do is seek first to understand why does the owner not want a manager? Honestly, there is so much value there and you have to figure out how to ask this question in a way that doesn't come off as challenging. Because just imagine that Stephanie has been just writing me about hiring a manager and she's like, “Andy, we need a manager. Andy, we need a manager. Why aren't we hiring a manager?” It's a match. Then she comes to me one day and says, “I have a question for you. Why won't you hire a manager?” There's a very good chance that that's going to sound like challenging. It sounds like we're headed right back into this argument again. You're not going to get good information on me.
I'm going to put my guard up. I may not be totally honest with you, especially if it's because I'm afraid I can't afford a manager. It's because I had a bad experience with a manager before. They embezzled a bunch from the practice. Say something like that. If I'm feeling defensive, I'm probably not going to share that information with you. So you really want to try to figure out the best way to broach this subject in a way that feels safe and allows the person to be open. It's sort of genuine curiosity. But I would like to know why this person who's got a team of 15 does not want to have a manager. I'm not saying they're wrong, that's why I laid that down up front.
It's like I made great reasons. I said, “I absolutely had a mentor that I worked with who had a practice manager and she took him for $90,000, I think, embezzlement. He felt so betrayed and taken that he did not want to have a manager. He wanted to be the one who knew all this stuff and he did not want to delegate to someone else because he had been so burned and felt so betrayed.” I'm not saying that's how you should feel, that's how he felt. I'm not saying he's right, but I'm saying I get it. It may not mean like they get it-

Stephanie Goss:
There may be reasons for their behavior. There may be motivation behind their behavior in that sense of something that they've experienced.

Dr Andy Roark:
There may be constraints on the business that we don't know. He might be like, “Look, we have not been profitable in the last three years. And having someone who comes in who does not generate revenue directly does not make sense for us.” I think you can make an argument that the person could justify their salary, but if that's what he thinks, at least we can understand, “Okay, we've got significant financial constraints,” that changes the picture. All of these things affect what is our best option because the question was what's our best option? He goes, “I can't tell you because I don't know where all these… I don't know where the pinch points are. I don't know what's holding us back. I don't know what the real internal obstacles are.” But we got to understand that before we can pick our next move. Anyway, to me, why are we opposed to having a manager? And the more clear answer I can get to that, the more I can understand what options are in play.

Stephanie Goss:
Okay, when you were talking about potentially feeling challenged when somebody asks you about this, I immediately flashed to… I remember before I became a parent and I swore that I would not tell my kids, “Because I told you so.” Then I can think of a lot of times in the heat of the moment when I'm super frustrated and I've gone on the defensive and the answer is because I told you so. And that's the end of story and will walk away. Because it's that feeling challenge. So how do we set up that question in a way that makes somebody less likely to be defensive?

Dr Andy Roark:
Sure, everybody's a little bit different, of course. Ideally you have a good personal relationship with this person. You know them as a person, they like you. You have a good relationship and that makes it a little easier. But basically I think probably if I was going to do it, start shooting from the hip. I think this is how I'd step it up. I would step in, I would lead with vulnerability and then appreciation.
Basically how this would start off is I would say something along the lines of, “Hey, I love working here. I love this clinic. I love being here. I really appreciate the opportunity to be here. I enjoy what we do here. I really want our clinic to be very successful. I look at what we're doing and we've got 15 people. I look at all the other vet practices that I knew of that have 15 people and they have someone who's in a designated manager role and we don't. Obviously, that's an intentional decision and I was wondering why you made that choice. What's important about not having a manager? I want to understand because I want to be helpful and I know a lot of other places that have gone this way, and so are you willing to tell me what you think?” So it would sound something like that.
Again, when would I do it, ideally? I don't know. The time and the place, all that stuff matters. You know what I mean? There's a lot of different ways to do it. But basically, that would be it, is to say, “I really love it here. I like this practice. I respect what you're doing. I want to be a contributor to this practice, growing and growing. I look around, I see other practices that have a designated manager, and it seems like we're getting to that size, but you've made it clear that's not something that you plan for. I want to understand why that was. What is your philosophy on managers?” And then I would honestly listen. I would not argue. I would not be like, “But, but, but…” Nope, you asked the question, just listen.

Stephanie Goss:
No, you need to let them be heard.

Dr Andy Roark:
And now you got to let them be heard. I would just go, “Okay, I got it. No, I just wanted to understand. Thank you.” I would take that and I would probably go away with it, but I would not let it turn into a debate because otherwise, and then a lot of people mess this up because they'll even get the question right and the other person will open up and share the information and then the person asking the question will disagree with the perspective of the person who's explaining their why, and then it will turn right back into the same old argument and it goes nowhere. That's not the point. The end result we're looking for here is to understand. Anyway, that's how I would set that up and sort of how I would try to frame it.

Stephanie Goss:
Yeah, I love that. I would probably do very similar. I would start with talking about how you care about the team and about them. You have noticed that there seem to be challenges in the team. One of the things that you thought of that might help the situation would be someone to play that conductor role.
Like you were talking about Alison in that role being the conductor to help solve some of the flow and challenges and take… I would frame it in the way of helping them take some of the burden of that off of their shoulders and then ask them, “I really would love to help you. I would just love to understand where your head is at when it comes to having someone in a position to manage the day-to-day of the practice. Tell me why it looks the way that it looks in your head and really just open up the door from that hopeful… I want to help you. I want to understand.” I think that that feels very different than when, fellow parents will understand, when my kid is like, “But why?” That's just immediately going to make me be like, “Because I freaking said so.”

Dr Andy Roark:
Yeah.

Stephanie Goss:
That's your point about arguing back, right? Then you're right back in that argument loop and the answer has not changed. When you ask it from a place of curiosity and then say, “Thanks, I really appreciate that. I would love to… You've given me a lot to think about.” My phrase is, “I want to marinate on that, I want to process that.” Then I agree with you, this is not one conversation, this is, potentially, multiple conversations. Then I would walk away, change the subject, let it drop.

Dr Andy Roark:
Yeah, I agree with that. That's the first conversation I would try to get is this, is why is this person opposed to a manager? There's a second conversation you can have and you do not have to have the first conversation before we go to the second one. Doing that conversation and understanding where the person's coming from can be helpful. It's not required to have the other conversation. The other conversation is this, okay, the other conversation that we want to have is we want to step back one rung on the decision making ladder. Imagine this for a second. Imagine that we're in a vet hospital and we've got this place and we are having front versus back issues, meaning the techs and the CSRs are fighting and it's going on.
So Stephanie Goss is sitting here and she's thinking about this and she's working the practice and she says, “The front and the back are fighting, so we need a manager.” She goes to me and she says, “Andy, we need a manager.” I'm like, “Goss, we're not getting a manager.” She's like, “We need a manager.” “We're not getting a manager. Not going to.” Well, what's the obvious next step? I've told her we're not getting a manager. We can either continue to fight about a manager and why can't we get a manager? And what if we got a part-time manager or we can step back one rung and say, “Andy, the front and the back continue to fight and here are examples of them fighting. Here is the impact this has had on the clients. This is how the fight manifested yesterday and this is how it manifested last week. They are clearly fighting. What are we going to do about the front and the back fighting?”

Stephanie Goss:
And I would add one thing in there that would be really powerful, which is that I would say, “I know your expectation is that we're empowered to solve this ourselves, and these are the things that we have tried,” especially from your perspective of what have you done to help solve the problem, call that out too. And then say, “I need your help because I feel like I'm stuck and I don't know what the next step is. This is what I've tried. These are the examples, this is what I've tried to solve the problem. I'm at a loss for where to go and I would love your perspective and your help on how you would like us to approach this situation, or how you would approach the situation if you were me.”

Dr Andy Roark:
I really like that, asking for help. I like that, asking for help. That's a really good play. I also like, “This is what we've tried,” and I really think that that's the play in my mind, is you need to put the manager thing aside and don't take him a request for a manager, take him the problems and say, “These problems persist. This is what we've tried. We're really stuck. How do we want to move forward from here?” And then have that conversation. It's very possible that the owner will look at the problem and ultimately say, “You know what might help this?”

Stephanie Goss:
“A manager.”

Dr Andy Roark:
“A manager.” And then it's their idea. And don't make them feel stupid. Don't say, “I told you so.”

Stephanie Goss:
That's a great idea.

Dr Andy Roark:
Yeah, that's a great idea. That's exactly it. It really is. That is to say, “Here's the problem,” or if there's three different problems, I would say, “These are the problems that I see that persist,” and lay it out one, two, and three. It might be that a manager would fix all those problems. It might not be, I don't know. I don't have the insight or the background to be able to know what those are. But regardless, that's how I would lay it out. I think that there's probably some people who've listened to this whole episode and they're just mad because they're like, “Andy, it's a team of 15 and they don't have a manager. How could you tell them that they don't need a manager?” But every team is different in what they're trying to do and that the players on the field really matter.
I have seen putting a weak manager over a strong team generally just frustrates people. You can absolutely do more… Managers can do more harm than good. Don't think they can't.

Stephanie Goss:
Oh yes, absolutely.

Dr Andy Roark:
They can absolutely make things worse.

Stephanie Goss:
Yes.

Dr Andy Roark:
And so just the presence of a human being with a pulse in a management role, I don't know that's worth anything.

Stephanie Goss:
No.

Dr Andy Roark:
I mean I can a hundred percent say, and this is just kind of how my mind works and stuff too, it depends on the people you have. So we said we got 15 people, so just walk with me for a second. Imagine that one of these people is an office manager, this is the person that does the administrative stuff for the practice, they pay the bills, do inventory, whatever, office manager. All right, so you got that person, you got three doctors, so that's four employees. You got four people at the front desk. So now we're at eight. We got seven support staff, right? I don't know, two techs, five assistants, stuff like that. That's your 15 people. I can a hundred percent see a high functioning team that has an office manager.
The practice owner is the lead doctor, let's say. You elevate one of your CSRs to be the lead CSR, and you elevate one of your techs or support staff to be the lead tech or a lead support staff or whatever. Well now you've got a lead doctor, a lead tech, and a lead CSR and an administrative support person. I think you can run a damn good team of 15 with a lead doctor, a lead tech and a lead CSR. I think you can do it. And again, but it depends on the people that you've got and things like that. Anybody who's just like, “The obvious answer is this,” I would say there's a lot of different ways to make a team work and function. Anyway, that's kind of where I come out.

Stephanie Goss:
Well, and I think that that goes back to where we started from the headspace perspective is remember the two extreme ends of the spectrum. You can have the layers of bureaucracy at one end where you have managers who have managers who have managers, or you could have, it's just a total free for all and there's no rules and it's total anarchy. We said finding that space in the middle. Part of it is thinking outside the box of what those solutions could be to find the right fit for you and your team and asking the question, why do I think we need a manager? What am I looking? Am I looking for someone to be a mediator or a problem solver? Because if that's the reason you think you need a manager, you don't need a manager. You need to teach everybody on your team the tools to be able to mediate the conflict management and be able to mediate the problems themselves and someone on the team who can act in that mediator role.
And that might be your practice owner, it might be somebody else on the team, might be somebody from outside the hospital, but you can solve that problem without saying, “We're going to hire a full-time, 40-hour-a-week person to fill this role.” So it goes back to the why are you asking, are you also asking because the practice owner is overwhelmed and you're getting paid a day late sometimes because they're trying to do payroll and they're trying to be all things, all people. What is the why behind it? Because I don't think that you can get to that creative problem solving space on both parts, the practice owner's part and on the team's part in terms of trying to help, without having asked yourself the question of what does that middle ground look like? Why are we asking this question? What do I think the practice manager's just job is actually going?

Dr Andy Roark:
Yeah, I think you're spot on. Anyway, that's how I'd approach it. I think that's my big take. I enjoyed this a lot. I like to be a bit of an anarchist and a little bit contrary about some of these things.

Stephanie Goss:
You do?

Dr Andy Roark:
I do. I like to push back on the idea that more rules and more managers and administrators is always the answer for a more harmonious workplace. I do not buy that. In some cases obviously, adding managers and systems makes all the sense in the world, but there's a point of diminishing returns and it's not always the obvious answer that people think it is. So anyway, I'm glad we got to talk about that and why.

Stephanie Goss:
Yeah, me too. This was fun. Take care everybody. Have a fantastic rest of your week.

Dr Andy Roark:
Yeah, thanks guys.

Stephanie Goss:
Well, gang, that's a wrap on another episode of the podcast. As always, this was so fun to dive into the mailbag and answer this question. I would really love to see more things like this come through the mailbag. If there is something that you would love to have us talk about on the podcast or a question that you are hoping that we might be able to help with, feel free to reach out and send us a message. You can always find the mailbag at the website. The address is unchartedvet.com/mailbag, or you can email us at podcast@unchartedvet.com. Take care everybody, and have a great week. We'll see you again next time.

This week on the podcast…

This week on the Uncharted Podcast, practice management geek Stephanie Goss invited Dr. Phil Richmond back to the podcast to tackle a personal perspective on burnout together. Dr. Richmond is the Founder of Flourishing Phoenix Veterinary Consultants and a practicing veterinarian. He is an advocate for positive culture and individual, team and organizational psychological health, safety, and wellbeing in veterinary workplaces. Dr. Richmond both leads and is involved in state, national and international projects for the advancement of wellbeing and culture in veterinary medicine. This episode was inspired by a mailbag email but led Stephanie and Phil on a journey through some of the tricks and tips they each have learned while on the winding journey of aiming to become better leaders than the day before. Let's get into this…

You can also listen to the episode on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Google Podcasts, Amazon Music or wherever you get your podcasts.

Do you have something that you would love Andy and Stephanie to role play on the podcast – a situation where you would love some examples of what someone else would say and how they would say it? If so, send us a message through the mailbag! We want to hear your challenges and would love to feature your scenario on the podcast.

Submit your questions here: unchartedvet.com/mailbag

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Upcoming Events

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Uncharted’s Team Leads Summit is an immersive 1-day virtual event designed to connect team leads and help you tackle the challenges unique to your role in veterinary practice. Kick off the day with an inspiring general session, learn from some of the brightest minds in vet med, and then dive in to gain exactly what you need with a discussion-based format to create game-changing connections for your career. This Summit features interactive workshops and Choose Your Own Adventure sessions, a signature of Uncharted events. Start the day telling us what you need RIGHT NOW, and leave having worked on exactly that.

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Episode Transcript

Stephanie Goss:
Hey, everybody. I'm Stephanie Goss, and this is another episode of the Uncharted Podcast. This week on the podcast, I am joined by one of my favorite people in veterinary medicine. He is a beacon of light and positivity. He is an Uncharted member. He is a colleague. And he is truly a dear, dear personal friend, Dr. Phil Richmond, joins me as my co-host. And we are having a conversation about burnout.
But before you turn the podcast off because you're like, “Not another burnout conversation,” Phil is one of the most positive people that I know, which says a lot because I feel like I'm pretty positive and bubbly. But Phil is truly a beacon of light, and we have a mailbag question that started with addressing burnout in teams, especially in on-call settings.
And as it does, our conversation meandered and we wound up talking about our own experiences with exhaustion and some burnouts in veterinary medicine, and giving some candid stories. But also, really some leadership lessons that we wish that we had learned before we became leaders. So, I had a lot of fun recording this episode. I hope you all enjoy it. And now, let's get into it.

Speaker 2:
And now, the Uncharted Podcast.

Stephanie Goss:
And we're back. It is me, myself, and I. I am here today but I am, sans Andy, but I am instead joined by one of my most favorite human beings on planet Earth, my dear friend and colleague, Dr. Phil Richmond. Hi, Phil.

Dr. Phil Richmond:
Hi, Stephanie. And as I like to call myself the Wish app, Andy Roark.

Stephanie Goss:
Oh, man. So many ways I could respond to that.

Dr. Phil Richmond:
It doesn't really look like or sound like him.

Stephanie Goss:
No, it isn't. It doesn't.

Dr. Phil Richmond:
But, okay.

Stephanie Goss:
This episode is not going to look or sounds like a typical Unchartered Podcast episode in the slightest. There's going to be lots of laughing, probably lots of squirreling. But we are together today because we got a mailbag topic. And we're not actually going to answer the direct question that was asked in the mailbag as I do with you, because when I read it, I was like, “Ooh, I want to have a conversation with Phil about this,” because it involves some bigger themes that relate to you, what you do in veterinary medicine. And I just thought it would be a good chance for you and I to have some good conversation.
And since Andy is on vacation when we're filming this, while the cat is away, the mice will play. So, let's begin and have some fun. So, for our listeners who don't know you, welcome to the podcast. If you have not had the opportunity to interact with or talk to or hear Dr. Phil Richmond's present, you are missing out because you are an amazing human being, and you have a lot of wonderful things that you are sharing with our profession. And we're going to get into by way of the mailbag, get into some of what you're doing.
So, the mailbag topic I got was about a hospital who is a specialty practice there, specialty surgery practice. And by the nature of their work, they have after hours on-call rotations for their team. So, they're taking care of their patients postoperatively. So, they have on-call hours, overnights, and weekends. And so, it is one of those things that is inescapable in some facets of veterinary medicine. On-call has to happen for them to support patients postoperatively. And I totally get that.
And the manager who wrote in was like, “This takes an incredible toll on the team because being on-call is hard.” And they were looking for some tips and tricks that we'll get into in another episode in terms of how do we structure that and support it from a systems perspective. But what interested me in talking with you with the burnout aspect, and because we have big pieces of veterinary medicine and specialty practices in ER practices. And even GP practices that… Particularly, the ones that are more rural and don't have overnight.
There's lots of people in veterinary medicine who can't avoid being on-call. And this manager's point was that, burnout is a real thing and it impacts the team. And so, when I was thinking about it, I was like, “Who better to talk about this with than my friend, Phil?” So, tell us a little bit, Phil, about who you are and why you and I would want to talk about this because it's right up your alley in terms of the work that you're doing in veterinary medicine.

Dr. Phil Richmond:
Yeah. Thanks, Steph. And it's just always a pleasure for us to get together and talk. And we just have so many things in common, and I just love being able to share space with you.

Stephanie Goss:
We love your face, friend.

Dr. Phil Richmond:
Thank you. And it is. So, I jokingly say, those of us that are working in this field, none of us… I wasn't in vet school fourth year going, “You know what? I cannot wait to work on wellbeing and burnout in the profession.” And I say that like, “This is someone tongue in cheek, but where it is, is that most of us have lived experience or personal story, why it's so important for us.”

Stephanie Goss:
Sure.

Dr. Phil Richmond:
And so, briefly, I was a new grad. It was about 2008, dating myself a little bit. But I was working, I mean, this is right up this alley. I was working 60, 70, sometimes 80 hours a week. Now, that was self-imposed. I also want to say is that, I was working on my days off at a clinic that I grew up working at. And then, I was picking up emergency shifts on the weekends.
I would come in on my days off to do surgeries that I hadn't done before, which I'm not suggesting that you shouldn't do that because there's some benefit to doing those things. However, even the owner of the practice was like, “Hey, you need to throttle it down.”

Stephanie Goss:
That's a lot.

Dr. Phil Richmond:
Yeah, that's a lot.

Stephanie Goss:
Right.

Dr. Phil Richmond:
But some of that stuff was not… It was self-imposed for me. And so, what I found was is that, I got to this point where I had the hallmark signs of burnout are exhaustion, cynicism, and inefficacy. It's just taking us longer to do things. We just can't get through stuff, that type of thing. And I only had one tool in the toolbox, and you and I have shared our stories, but I just had alcohol and substances like, that was it.
And so, add that to all the stresses of veterinary medicine and all of this. And then, getting into burnout. And I really was in a dark place, and I'm going to mention suicidal ideation, but that was where I got. So, what I realized was, is I ended up going to treatment. I got a lot of tools, individual tools that were very helpful for me, and they helped save my life, and helped me love veterinary medicine again.
What I realized though is that, when I went back into practice is that it wasn't the whole story, is that I played a big part in some of that like, I misinterpreted things. And how I viewed situations, that was stressful for me and burned a lot of emotional energy. But even when I do that, there can be external factors, which is really what burnout is, is burnout is really a systems issue. It's not a personal failure.

Stephanie Goss:
Right.

Dr. Phil Richmond:
And when I learned that both of those things were true, it was one of the things that pushed me to want to help our colleagues and because it's so common for all of us. And especially now, with COVID and that type of thing. So, not only leaning into the individual nature, the things that we can do with resilience training, with gratitude, with intentional induction and positive emotion, and these types of things as well as seeking mental health support from professionals.
But then, also the importance of team level, wellbeing team level, psychological safety, where our leaders and how we work as a team is vital. And then, the third thing is organizationally, or when we talk about the me, we, us. And I just love that model. So, me being the individual. We being team and leadership. And then, us, being the organization.
And then, organizationally, looking as the organization, do we have policies in place? Are we measuring burnout? Are we measuring the wellbeing? I mean, we're all clinicians listening to this. We all know, “Hey, if something's going on with our patients, we run tests.” How often are we doing that in veterinary medicine? How often are we taking the pulse? Excuse me, if our team… To find out what's going on.
So, those things are important. And then, okay, now we get this information, what do we do with it? And so, those things are just, what I found is that I want… I have a vision, like a lot of us in veterinary medicine, I want it to be here for years to come. And it's a beautiful profession. It really, there's a lot of joy and a lot of reward that can come from this profession. And we just need to… There's some things that need to be in place to make that happen.
So, the sky is not falling. But there's things that we need to address that are challenging. And then, we also need to lift up the positive aspects of the profession. So, in a nutshell, that's what I do is working on psychological health and safety, and team cohesion and individual skills of resiliency, and that type of thing. And how important that is to patient care, how important that is to longevity and sustainability as a veterinary professional.
It's things that we don't generally get taught. I mean, we're much better now, I should say. But just not taught in vet school or tech school, or I think it's more now in the CVPM that's part of, part of that as some of the leadership development and wellbeing of the teams. So, I'm glad there's much more awareness, but yeah.

Stephanie Goss:
Okay. So, as you do… I love you so much. There's so much to unpack there because you just crammed 10 pounds in a 5-pound bags there, friends. Okay. So, let's go back to a little bit about… So, what you're doing now with your work has to do with falling in love with the profession again and wanting to help yourself and help your peers, which led you to where you are? Let's go back for a second because this topic resonated with you because you found yourself in a place of burnouts.
And you and I have similar steps along our path where we found ourselves in dark places, and feeling really overwhelmed and exhausted. And you and I, both being long-term members of the recovery community. I think both found ourselves looking inward as you do when you're in recovery, you do a lot of work on yourself, hopefully.
But also, looking outside of ourselves and recognizing that we can only do so much on a personal level. And I love… You're actually going to be talking about this topic at the Uncharted Culture Conference…

Dr. Phil Richmond:
I am.

Stephanie Goss:
… shameless plug here, because you were going to be doing a session specifically on your… You mentioned the idea of we, me and us, right? How do we as individuals exist in veterinary medicine? There is responsibility and work that we can do on an individual level. And it doesn't exist in a vacuum, right?
The burnout on us can't only be on the individual because as you mentioned, there's external factors that impact from a team level, and team dynamics, and the safety that the team has in being able to talk to each other, ask for help, support each other, all of that. And then, there's the systems piece of it in the organizational structure.
And so, I'm super pumped. You are actually going to be doing a session for everybody who is attending the Culture Conference in October, and I'm super excited about that. So, if you're listening to this and you're already like, “I want to hear more about what Phil has to say,” you should head over to the website and sign up for that. Because it's virtual, so anybody can come, you don't have to be an Uncharted member, and you're going to be doing a general session.
And so, I don't want to spoiler too much of the details of what you're going to talk about there, but I do want to dig a little bit about where you started and empathizing with that on the personal me level. And then, talk a little bit about the organizational stuff.
So, when you found yourself out of school and getting into practice and you found yourself at the place where you recognized that you were burned out, was that a place where you could see what you were doing to your… So, you said that you were doing it to yourself regularly or you were working extra hours and you were taking on more and more and more in that space though, was that something that you recognized in yourself? Or was that something that others pointed out to you? Because like you said, your practice owner even said to you like, “Hey, you need to throttle this down.” What did that look like for you?

Dr. Phil Richmond:
No. So, I had an incorrect assumption on what I was supposed to do and what I was supposed to be capable of my first years out. And I thought, I just had this idea that I was going to go in, that I came out of vet school, I should have all the answers. If something went wrong, it was this weird thing is, for me, one of my thinking traps was, is that if something went wrong, I would blame everything else. But I also would then question like, “How responsible am I?” But it was almost like a defense mechanism.
And so, a lot of us in recovery have that. But when I'm going with this is that, the biggest thing was, is that I had… Now, I can see the signs of burnout in myself. And those signs were so clear back then, but I looked at them as they were failure. And instead of saying, “Hey, I need a break,” it was like, that horrible negative self-talk was, “You're just weak. You should be able to do this.”

Stephanie Goss:
You can't get it all done.

Dr. Phil Richmond:
Yeah.

Stephanie Goss:
You can't hang.

Dr. Phil Richmond:
Yeah. The reason why is, you're just not working hard enough. You need to be up later. You need to…

Stephanie Goss:
Just work harder, yeah.

Dr. Phil Richmond:
Just work harder, right?

Stephanie Goss:
Yeah.

Dr. Phil Richmond:
And as we know, I mean, it's like the battery analogy and the phone, you're just not even magically going to put all that in there. The spoon's theory is that, we've got a certain number of spoons we can use during the day. And it's like, when they're gone, they're gone. And that whole concept was just… I didn't have that, and I didn't know. I just thought the answer to everything was work harder.

Stephanie Goss:
And so, going back, you said the three of the classic hallmarks of burnout are the inability to focus and stay focused. Tell me what the three that you said again.

Dr. Phil Richmond:
Right. Yeah, absolutely. So, and there are different definitions certainly, but this is what the World Health Organization describes it as. So, there's exhaustion. So, that's really a feeling. I think we can obviously all relate to just that physical, mental, emotional drain that we feel.

Stephanie Goss:
Yeah.

Dr. Phil Richmond:
And what happens is, when we go through that just chronically, we begin to isolate. And as we know in recovery like isolation is that's when we start spiraling, is that when I disconnect from people, that's a challenge. So, exhaustion is one.
The second is cynicism and, “Ooh, do I… Yeah, leaning in the negative?” So, and to give you an idea of what this looks like on the ground in a veterinary hospital, our clinic, I should say the practice that I love… I'm getting to go back to the great group of practices. We worked really hard on psychological safety on all of these things and teamwork. And we just, generally speaking, I mean, we just didn't talk stuff about clients or one another. I mean, we were very intentional about that over the years.
And it was a red flag for me, is that I noticed when our team started, and this was during COVID. When they started talking stuff about clients. It wasn't normal for us. It was out of the norm.

Stephanie Goss:
Sure.

Dr. Phil Richmond:
And for myself, because I've been in some burnout lately, and I just become… The negativity bias kicks in. And instead of looking at the positive, I start going into the negativity bias. And so, that cynicism of the everything is bad, everything is this. And then, what happens is that, that creates a spiral as well. And then, the last thing is the inefficacy. So, go ahead. Yeah, I think the cynicism is…

Stephanie Goss:
No, no, I was just… You're getting there. It's funny because listening to you describe those things and you were saying like, “What does it look like in veterinary medicine?” I can totally recognize that exhaustion. And we talk about it jokingly in a lot of the manager groups that I'm in. But when you think about painting that picture and you think about how many… Everybody wakes up and is like, everybody has bad days, right?

Dr. Phil Richmond:
Yeah.

Stephanie Goss:
Everybody has stuff going on in their lives. And there are absolutely times where you wake up and you're just like, “I don't want to go to work today.” You feel tired. You wake up and you're just like, “I can't… I'm dragging.” I mean, I knew I was getting up and getting to talk to you today, and I still was like, “I'm so tired. I just want to go back to bed,” where everybody has those days.
And when you were talking and thinking about it from the burnout perspective, and then leading to the place of cynicism, I think about when I was really struggling in the practice. It's that every day you wake up and you're like, “I just am so freaking exhausted. I don't want to get up. I don't like, I can't.” I got it. I'm getting up, and I'm pounding multiple energy drinks in the morning. And then, I walk in the door of the clinic and that cynicism immediately kicks in, and it's that that.
When I'm going in the door with that frame of mind of what such hell is awaiting me or everything is just like, “Can't you guys just leave me?” Somebody asked me, “Hey, when you're ready and you're settled in, can we talk about something for a second?” And I'm like, “For the love of God, why can't you just leave me alone?” I found myself in that place where it was like everything was reactive, everything was negative. And so, hearing you talk about that immediately, I can empathize with that because I can see it in myself.

Dr. Phil Richmond:
Yeah. And so, what's interesting about these concepts is that, I mean, it's a blurry line. It's not all overload necessarily. And that's where the recovery stuff came in is that, I found that I learned ways to challenge my negativity bias like, “Oh, this person did that.” And it's like, “Really? Did that like, am I filling in the blanks with stuff?” And that was something that I learned over time.
What was interesting to me is almost like an experiment is like, here, I have the tools and I still can't overcome it. I'm going… And that's what's been not just personally, but that's what's fascinating, if I can even say that about burnout, is that again, it's an external issue. And man, that's cynicism. I mean, we have our great friend Josh Weissman, amazing human being. And I shared that with him a few weeks ago. I was like, “I can just tell, because it's not my norm to be looking at the bad side of things. Or, oh, this is crap, or this is that.” It's like, “Damn, what's going on with me?” It's a sign. It's a clinical, almost like a clinical sign.

Stephanie Goss:
It's a sign, yeah.

Dr. Phil Richmond:
Yeah. But it's also, sometimes, when you're inside the pickle jar, it's hard to read the label. And so, if you have people that can… When you're in it, sometimes you don't know that you're in it, you're just… But I had friends, and then my wife is very kind of, to let me know, “Hey, you've mentioned this.”

Stephanie Goss:
You're not yourself.

Dr. Phil Richmond:
Yeah, that you're bitching about for the fifth time. Maybe you need to…

Stephanie Goss:
Nineteenth time.

Dr. Phil Richmond:
Yeah, right, right, right, yeah.

Stephanie Goss:
Hey, friends, you have heard Andy and I talking about some of the big things that are coming in the back half of 2023 for Uncharted, but we are not done. In fact, we are not even close to done with releasing all of the new fun and exciting stuff that our team has been working on.
So, I want to make sure you don't miss out on it. Now, if you listen to the podcast, you're going to hear about it. But if you want to guarantee that you are the first to hear about the big giant announcement that we have coming soon. So, so, so soon, but not soon enough.
You want to head over to the website, unchartedvet.com/insight, that's I-N-S-I-G-H-T, unchartedvet.com/insight, and sign up for the newsletter. That will get you on the list and guarantee that you have first dibs access to the big, big news that is coming soon. Don't miss it. I promise. You're not going to want to miss out. And now, back to the podcast.
Okay. So, the exhaustion and the cynicism, and then I was emphasizing and cut you off with the last one, yeah.

Dr. Phil Richmond:
Which here comes the shame spiral like Brené Brown. Inefficacy. is that the harder we try to push, the less efficient we can be, which is ironically, which is why, we well, burn out, is that when we do that, the cure for it is rest and changing the system. But what we do?

Stephanie Goss:
Oh, we just try and work harder.

Dr. Phil Richmond:
We do the opposite. And that's what all the evidence shows us is that, we can't do those things. And that, maybe we can go 110% on the reactor for a few weeks maybe, but it can't be a chronic state. Our bodies then physiologically, the release, excuse me, the chronic release of the stress hormones and all of these things, our bodies are not meant to function at that level. We can only do it for so long before body's just kind like, “Hey, I'm out.” And then, we start to see physical manifestations. And we get into that.

Stephanie Goss:
That feeds right back into the loop, right?

Dr. Phil Richmond:
100%.

Stephanie Goss:
Then, you're exhausted.

Dr. Phil Richmond:
Yup, yeah, right.

Stephanie Goss:
And it feeds the exhaustion model because you're physically feeling the toll of that. And then, it spirals and you feel like, you can't get out of it.

Dr. Phil Richmond:
And then, you're not doing… You can't do as much work as you did even though you're trying. And then, what happened?

Stephanie Goss:
Inefficient?

Dr. Phil Richmond:
And then, inefficient. And then, oh… And then, as I said in the Uncharted Conference, my inner critic's name is Carl. And then, Carl's up here going, “Oh, Phil, you are POS like, you really, you shouldn't even be doing this job. You can't do this. You can't do this. You're not getting this done. You are… Man, you are worthless.” And all that negative self-talk.
So, and we'll get into a little bit of what are some of the ways that we can combat that. I think as we go in the future. And just really, I have to do a shout-out to Dr. Michelle McQuaid and Dr. Danielle Jacobs from the Wellbeing Lab in Australia because they've done a lot of the work on this that I really lean into. And so, anyway, I just wanted to say like, yeah.

Stephanie Goss:
Yeah, okay. So, let's talk about that. So, you like career wise and path wise, you got out in vet school…

Dr. Phil Richmond:
Right.

Stephanie Goss:
… and you were a new grad, and you almost crashed and burned, right? Because you were…

Dr. Phil Richmond:
Definitely, yeah. I mean, I would say by… I mean, I was out of practice. So, I reached the bottom, I guess we can say to where I was pulled out of practice. I was in a treatment facility for 90 days, which by the way, is way more common than we just don't hear about it. But that saved my life. Not only did it give me the rest because of that. Remember we were talking about the physiologic stuff, chronic stuff, and then filling my cup back with tools that I then had to go back into that environment that I didn't have before. So, yeah.

Stephanie Goss:
And so, that kicked off the passion for you because when you meet Phil, one of the words that immediately comes to mind, if you have had the pleasure of spending time in your company, Phil is passionate. And I think that you are passionate about just life in general, which is one of the things that I love about you.
You just have great energy and being around you is wonderful, but you're so passionate about looking at veterinary medicine, and it would have been very easy for you to come out of treatment and stepping back into practice. It would've been very easy for you to look at it in a very cynical way because there is a lot that is challenging. And so many people will say, veterinary medicine is broken, and we're a hot mess. And there are a lot of people that look at it from a negative perspective, and feel like it's so systemically, we have so many problems, it's not fixable.
And you chose to look at it from the perspective that resonates with me, which is there is so much that is wonderful about veterinary medicine, and we need some help. And so, I feel like that kickstarted getting those tools and starting to fill your toolbox, kickstarted for you very much the same way my own experiences and my own… I mean, I was in recovery before veterinary medicine. But very much, we have similar paths in that way of like, it became a passion project for you.

Dr. Phil Richmond:
Yeah, yeah.

Stephanie Goss:
And so, you started doing education and work around wellbeing and burnout, which led you down a path of positive psychology and the wellbeing work that you're doing now with Dr. McQuaid and the team in Australia. So, tell us a little bit about where your winding path took you next.

Dr. Phil Richmond:
Yeah, so quickly. So, there was a 10-year area where I was in practice. I was going to meetings. I was trying to help medical professionals in recovery. But I was really quiet about it because of the stigma. And then, just as we know, the anonymous nature of 12-step recovery.
And then, there was just a point where I got to where I had the opportunity to be of service for the FVMA. And where I'm going with this is that it was like, now I knew these things worked. I knew these concepts and these principles and these things worked. But how was I going to go into talking to veterinary professionals and say, “Hey, I'm in AA, and this works.” And it's like… And then, so what happened was, is that I got put in a position of… And this is where Carl comes in, by the way. Carl, it was like, “Hey, you're just some drunk that learned some stuff and it just makes your life.” But…

Stephanie Goss:
What qualifies you to talk?

Dr. Phil Richmond:
… what qualifies you to… And then, I was like, “Shit. Shoot, sorry.” I was like, “Maybe I should go do…” So, I looked into potentially getting a master's. But then, so now, I'm a certification nut.

Stephanie Goss:
Junkie?

Dr. Phil Richmond:
Yeah, yeah. I mean, anyhow. But yes, I do. So, yeah.

Stephanie Goss:
I know, I know. Trying to change our language.

Dr. Phil Richmond:
Trying to change our language because it does matter. It does matter, by the way, everybody that's listening. However…

Stephanie Goss:
It does matter. It does matter.

Dr. Phil Richmond:
So, the first certification I took was… But I ended up taking the compassion fatigue professional certification. At the end of that, it talks about the cure for compassion fatigue or the treatment for compassion fatigue is skills of resiliency. I look at these and I say, “Steph,” if we knew each other back then.

Stephanie Goss:
Yeah.

Dr. Phil Richmond:
I'm like, “Oh, my gosh. This is exactly the same stuff that I learned in 12-step recovery.” It's just there's… I jokingly said, “There's $20 words associated with it.” And I'm like, “That's it. And truths are truths.” So, I just got down. I was like it, “This is it. This is it.”
So, I got into positive psychology and cognitive behavioral coaching. And all these things that basically take the same, they take very similar principles and put that together. But then, I remembered also is that there is an importance to the self-portion of this or the me portion of this. But it is multifactorial, is that we do need, our leaders have an outsized influence on that. And how we work as a team is vitally important, and is the organization there. So, I ended up getting a bunch of certifications because Carl told me that I needed to.

Stephanie Goss:
Qualified.

Dr. Phil Richmond:
Yeah. And so, now, I don't know. It's like, 22… I think, yeah, I have 22.

Stephanie Goss:
I was going to say, you have an alphabet. You have an alphabet after your name.

Dr. Phil Richmond:
So, but I mean, I also, one of my strengths is love of learning. So, my wife's like, “Well, whatever. At least he's not doing what he was doing 15 years ago.” So, she was with me, by the way, through all that. God bless her. She's a veterinarian as well. She's amazing that she is.

Stephanie Goss:
She's a wonderful, wonderful human being.

Dr. Phil Richmond:
Carl… So, where were we?

Stephanie Goss:
You were heading towards what you're doing now…

Dr. Phil Richmond:
Yes, that's right.

Stephanie Goss:
… and looking at other countries that are doing way more about it, less than we are in the United States. Because you recognized, as did I, that while you… Especially as a person who is in recovery, you're hyperfocused on the me part, right?

Dr. Phil Richmond:
Right.

Stephanie Goss:
Because you're working on yourself, you're working on what can I control? What can I do to make amends? Like fix your own backyard first before you go fix in anybody else's, right?

Dr. Phil Richmond:
Right. Which is as the phrase that we use in recovery stuff, as you know, is what is my part? What's my part in this situation? And so, while that is vitally important for us in veterinary medicine, if the organization has a part or if the team or the leader has a part, we do need to work on both. So…

Stephanie Goss:
Right. They don't exist in a vacuum.

Dr. Phil Richmond:
Yeah, right.

Stephanie Goss:
You can't just solve your way out of burnout or fatigue by looking onto me.

Dr. Phil Richmond:
Right. And then, what happens, as we know, and this gets into what we were talking about is that, if I am at as close to 100% spiritual… I'm doing all the things right. If the environment I'm in, if I'm having to see 50, 60 patients a day, I'm short staff, and my boss doesn't care about me, it doesn't like…

Stephanie Goss:
It doesn't matter how hard you work.

Dr. Phil Richmond:
It doesn't overcome those things.

Stephanie Goss:
Yeah, yeah.

Dr. Phil Richmond:
So, we need to help those things. Now, the flip side is, if I have a great leader and they're doing all these things and I'm like, “Oh, this is just… Everything's crap and this is crap, and this is…”

Stephanie Goss:
Right.

Dr. Phil Richmond:
That part is on, I need…

Stephanie Goss:
If you're not taking the ownership.

Dr. Phil Richmond:
Right. But usually, again, it's not a black and white line. There's parts of all of this.

Stephanie Goss:
They've study you make sure of all three.

Dr. Phil Richmond:
Right. And so, intuitively, it's like you start looking at, “What are these things in the workplace?” And so, come to find… So, when I did my positive psychology certification, I also did a certification and positive psychology consulting. So, actually, taking positive psychology into workplaces like, how does this actually…

Stephanie Goss:
Right.

Dr. Phil Richmond:
These concepts sound all good, but what's the evidence that this actually works in a workplace? Obviously, there's ton. There's a whole field of study. We know Adam Grant from University of Pennsylvania is one person that we really hear a lot about. But this field of positive organizational scholarship, which means, how does this stuff work in business? How does this stuff work in the workplace?

Stephanie Goss:
Right. Right.

Dr. Phil Richmond:
And so, that led to finding out about the ISO 45003. And ISO is like international OSHA. And 45003 are the psychological health and safety standards, international psychological health and safety standards. So, things that need to be in place in workplaces. So, the way that I like to describe it to veterinary professionals is, we go in and take x-rays on a patient. What do we do, Steph? Do I go into my scrubs?

Stephanie Goss:
No.

Dr. Phil Richmond:
No, I don't because I know that that x-ray is dangerous. So, I take precautions. I put on my lead down.

Stephanie Goss:
Put on your lead down.

Dr. Phil Richmond:
Put on my thyroid shield. I put on my gloves. Yes, wear your gloves.

Stephanie Goss:
Yes, yes, yup. Put on your gloves and dosimetry badge.

Dr. Phil Richmond:
Because I know that's a hazard.

Stephanie Goss:
Right.

Dr. Phil Richmond:
Well, guess what is that? Those things… There are psychological hazards in our workplaces that we can take the same precautions of. Or if we can't remove them, at least we can mitigate them, is that we can do that.

Stephanie Goss:
Sure.

Dr. Phil Richmond:
And that's one. And then, the other aspect is that we have to actively promote flourishing and thriving. We have to do the positive things as well. And it's not enough to… We're not coming in and just saying, “Oh, everything's… Good vibes only.” I'm not saying that.

Stephanie Goss:
Right.

Dr. Phil Richmond:
There are evidence-based ways of inducing positive emotion, engagement using our strengths, building positive relationships at work. All of those things are vital. And saying, for instance, conflict management. Saying, we know that if I want to implement a change at work, and I just go in and I say, “Okay, we're getting a new PiMS system. It's starting Monday. I'm changing the prices on everything, and you guys are now all responsible for…” We're also doing 12 new initiatives around all these things. “And we're going to do them all at once and we're going to do them now, and that starts Monday. Cool, everybody good? Bye.” That's poor change management. And however, we're not…

Stephanie Goss:
I'm laughing because I guarantee that there are people who are listening to this episode who are like, “Oh, my God, he just described what the hospital…”

Dr. Phil Richmond:
Describe the what? How? How? The part of it…

Stephanie Goss:
I'm laughing. I'm laughing not because I empathize with that because I have been there in the organization…

Dr. Phil Richmond:
You know what? 100%.

Stephanie Goss:
… that has changes…

Dr. Phil Richmond:
And by the way, everyone that's listening, that's in recovery. Somebody shares something to the outside would seem horrible, and then the whole room laughs because we all know like, we've all been there. It's all the same thing, yeah.

Stephanie Goss:
Yeah. Get it, yeah.

Dr. Phil Richmond:
So, but in all seriousness, poor change management, and they found this out in Australia through McQuaid's research. Is that poor change management was one of the highest psycho… So, these things that we see are called psychosocial risks or psychosocial hazards. That was one of the biggest areas that caused psychological harm, and workplaces was poor change management.
So, knowing when I do that, I'm going to instantly drop the level of like, if I just say, “Hey, we're switching PiMS, and go in. If I don't know the level of stress or the things that are going to happen to my team in doing that, and not throttle the schedule, and not do this, and not do things to mitigate that, knowing that I've just… I don't want to say throw a grenade. But I've put something into my team that is going to negatively affect their mental health because it takes time to learn. It's like onboarding.

Stephanie Goss:
Right, right.

Dr. Phil Richmond:
We can't just throw somebody into a clinic and just expect them to know everything day one. Same thing with the PiMS like, it's going to take us… No matter what it is, no matter how great the system is, it's going to take us… We're human beings probably, take us three months to catch our groove.

Stephanie Goss:
Right, right.

Dr. Phil Richmond:
If we haven't scheduled that in, we're setting our teams up for psychological harm. We're setting them up for burnout. The other thing…

Stephanie Goss:
And so, there are places where… There are actually, places in the world shocking because as Americans, having had the privilege of living in multiple countries, it's funny how I can see the American viewpoint. And this feels like very one of them because shocking to know that there are countries outside of the United States. We are not the center of the world. And there are places in the rest of the world where like, you were telling us that there's the ISO standards…

Dr. Phil Richmond:
Yeah.

Stephanie Goss:
There are actually places that say, “Hey, not only can you not do this…” And here's what the… But they set the bar in terms of expectation for employers, just like OSHA would hear with setting the safety standards, you have to take care of your team and protect them safety wise.

Dr. Phil Richmond:
Yeah.

Stephanie Goss:
There are standards that are applicable in other countries that say, “Hey, when it comes to your team and their wellbeing and their mental health and their emotional, you're responsible for that emotional safety. And here's what the expectation is.” And that's fascinating to me like, fascinating to me because I'm like, it makes perfect sense. And also, it makes me sad that we are once again, so behind other countries.

Dr. Phil Richmond:
Yes, but there's more. There's chapter two, which is exciting. So, one, just knock on your roof. I know you're in Washington. Just knock on your roof and wave to our neighbors, to the North.

Stephanie Goss:
Canadian neighbors, yup.

Dr. Phil Richmond:
Yeah, one of those certifications I have is I'm a certified psychological health and safety advisor, and I had to get that from Canada because we don't have…

Stephanie Goss:
You can't get it here, yeah.

Dr. Phil Richmond:
No. So, shout out to the Surgeon General of the United States. Surgeon General's Office, just put out recommendations for US workplaces. So, they're great. So, there's a five spoke area on that that's all centered around worker voice and equity. So, that's the central cog, if you will, in the wheel. And so, it's protection from harm.
So, we want to mitigate these things, connection to community, creating belonging, work-life harmony, creating opportunities for us, knowing that leaving our stuff at the door is BS like, that doesn't work, mattering at work. And then, having opportunities to grow. And mattering means, as a leader, as a team, you let me know through reward and recognition. You let me know I'm doing a good job. You give me constructive feedback. You do these things. And then, obviously, opportunities to learn and grow and that sort of thing.
So, in general, the ISO 45003 standards encompass a lot of those things. So, now, each country, most countries or many countries have their own psychological health and safety standards. And again, the US has come out with that and kind of cool things. It's not super-secret, but I'm on this awesome team. Josh is on it, Makenzie Peterson from used to be with AVMC, working with veterinary visionaries to help create psychological health and safety standards for US veterinary organizations.
So, but what is that again? How do we protect our brains? How do we protect our brains and souls from the stuff that we see in veterinary medicine? Because there are things that are specific to veterinary medicine. But the interesting thing is that most of the things like conflict management, we're not the only ones that have conflict management. Oh, yeah, poor change management? We're not the only ones that…
But yet, those are the things that cause it and role clarity. That was, by the way, in Australia in the study that McQuaid's group just put out, low like, not understanding, not being very clear on what my job is and who do I go to for what? And when this happens, when low role clarity was the most encountered psychosocial risks that caused harm. So, that's amazing. Yeah, go ahead.

Stephanie Goss:
It would shock no one to think about veterinary medicine, and think about how many of us have worked in jobs in veterinary medicine where we have no idea what our actual role is…

Dr. Phil Richmond:
I didn't know… Yeah, and then what happened? And then, throwing out all these terms, low psychological safety. Doctor comes in or owner, “Why didn't you do, whatever?” I didn't know…

Stephanie Goss:
I didn't know…

Dr. Phil Richmond:
And then, that person gets mad, then they're blaming you for something that you didn't even know that you were responsible for. And that is not… And everybody listening has been in a situation similar to that where it's like, we're almost held… Why didn't you know? Like, I don't know. How am I supposed to know that? I can't intuitively know it.
And so, again, it becomes how important it is. And this starts to even go into onboarding, why it's so important to connect people to onboarding and what role clarity and where you go to for what. Because when that stuff hits the fan, we want to know what the plan is.

Stephanie Goss:
Right.

Dr. Phil Richmond:
And also, that increases efficiency, which efficiency is, it's not sexy, so to speak. But that is a huge area of importance for wellbeing in the workplace is practice efficiency, is if I'm doing…

Stephanie Goss:
Right. Yeah, well… And, I mean…

Dr. Phil Richmond:
Yeah, go ahead.

Stephanie Goss:
That makes perfect sense because it's the third, the inefficiency is the third wheel of the burnout. So, it makes total sense that those two things are tied super closely together.

Dr. Phil Richmond:
Yeah, yup.

Stephanie Goss:
Okay. Don't give away the…

Dr. Phil Richmond:
No, this just the sprinkles. This isn't even the cake.

Stephanie Goss:
Okay. Friend, I can talk to you all day long. But…

Dr. Phil Richmond:
Yeah. Oh, my gosh.

Stephanie Goss:
Andy will kill me if we do a five-hour podcast. But I have a question for you before we wrap up.

Dr. Phil Richmond:
Yeah, that's right.

Stephanie Goss:
So, one of the…

Dr. Phil Richmond:
Can I say just some of the things to try to look into combat, and this won't give stuff away?

Stephanie Goss:
Oh, yes, of course, of course.

Dr. Phil Richmond:
If we've got these, because I don't want to go, “Oh, here's all the crap.” The things that is going on is making sure… So, four things, and this was actually from McQuaid research as well, is that Carl…

Stephanie Goss:
Okay. And we'll put links to…

Dr. Phil Richmond:
Yeah, we'll put links to the article.

Stephanie Goss:
… what the thing that Carl is talking about the article and the research in the show notes. So, don't worry about that. Okay. So, Carl…

Dr. Phil Richmond:
So, Carl's talking crap about me. There's a concept that's called self-compassion, and we've talked about it. Our friend Jamie at Uncharted, really leans into this. I found coaching wise, that is the tool that I lean into more than anything else with people is self-compassion, replacing self-criticism with self-compassion.
Kristin Neff, N-E-F-F, we'll put a link to her stuff in the notes as well. She's the Founder of the Concept of Self-Compassion. Great, great stuff. It really helps change our thinking. What are we crappy at setting for ourselves as veterinary professionals?

Stephanie Goss:
Yeah, boundaries.

Dr. Phil Richmond:
Boundaries, that's what…

Stephanie Goss:
Boundaries.

Dr. Phil Richmond:
Yeah, we got to learn how to do that. That's another… I'll just leave that. I'll leave in that, yeah.

Stephanie Goss:
All right. So, I was going to say, you just gave us two giant boulders because…

Dr. Phil Richmond:
Boulders. So, lean and self… Yeah.

Stephanie Goss:
Self-compassion is hard, AF. And boundaries…

Dr. Phil Richmond:
Yeah, but get curious, get curious.

Stephanie Goss:
… are real hard.

Dr. Phil Richmond:
Yeah.

Stephanie Goss:
Okay. All right. So, we got some mountains to climb. Keep going.

Dr. Phil Richmond:
So, then rest… When people take vacation, make that reward and recognition like honor people for taking vacation. Like, “Hey, make this a good thing.” Not, “Oh, I can't believe you're leaving us in the lurch.” It's like, because again, remember, if we get beat up chronically, our bodies can't… They can't recover. We have to prioritize rest and recovery. We have to prioritize rest and recovery. We have to prioritize rest and recovery.

Stephanie Goss:
Yeah, rest and recovery. That is what we are doing right now because we are reporting this. You and I are not resting and recovering, but we are doing this because Andy is resting and recovering…

Dr. Phil Richmond:
Fearless leader.

Stephanie Goss:
… and taking… The fearless leader is taking a break. And I will tell you that that, I mean, some of you heard the podcast that I did with our dear friend Eric Garcia, and my colleague and amazing partner in crime, Tyler Grogan from our team last year…

Dr. Phil Richmond:
Oh, my God. Such great people.

Stephanie Goss:
… on unplugging, they are both amazing. But we talked about unplugging and rest and recovery. And we are actually, about to record a follow-up to that episode for everybody because we've been getting a lot of questions about how it's going now. And all of us took some unplugged time off this summer, and we're talking about that.
But I love that because your point is a really valid one because that's another boulder for veterinary medicine. Because what do we do? What do you think about it in the burnout spiral? And you think about Carl sitting on your shoulder and being the negative self-talker in your ear, we just tell ourselves, “Oh, just keep working. Work harder, work harder, work harder.” And you'll dig yourself out of this hole. And we do not think about it in terms of rest and recovery. And we just try and work harder as the answer. And that is exactly what leads us to the place of burnout.

Dr. Phil Richmond:
Yeah. And the last…

Stephanie Goss:
Okay.

Dr. Phil Richmond:
Prioritizing opportunities to experience positive emotion, gratitude.

Stephanie Goss:
What?

Dr. Phil Richmond:
What? That's the evidence. I'm not just making that up because the sun shine. That is literally prioritizing positive emotion is that… And as I said in Unchartered, celebrate the wins, hold the trophy, hunt the good stuff. I love saying that, is that be intentional because good stuff is like, Teflon and bad stuff is like Velcro, is that we have to be very intentional about experiencing positive emotions in veterinary hospitals.
And what does that mean is that, as leaders, we need to do that, is that we have to stop and celebrate the wins. We have to sit down and let the puppy kiss us in the face that we saved, sit with those things. And so, what's wonderful is I, now because we've been so intentional about it, I can remember those things in the workplace. Yes, Stephanie.

Stephanie Goss:
That does not mean you sit down and let the puppy give you kisses in the face, and then bring that puppy home. Just throwing it out there, friends. Because…

Dr. Phil Richmond:
One puppy, maybe. I can't…

Stephanie Goss:
No. No more puppies. So…

Dr. Phil Richmond:
I'm wrong. So…

Stephanie Goss:
You're the problem.

Dr. Phil Richmond:
So, this awesome like, super quick. So, I got to go back and help a mentor, a new grad vet that used or works where I used to work. And they sent me a text message like 9:00 at night and were like, “Hey, sent me pictures of this fracture.” And I was like, “Y'all want me to come up and give you a hand?” And they're like, “Would you?” And I'm like, “Yeah.”
So, I came up. We're doing the fracture repair and Dr. Ortiz does it. I look at, and he's just trying to help this kitten. It's a 10-week-old kitten that got hit by a car. It's got a fractured femur. So, we fixed it. And I look up at him and I said, “You know, this is your cat, right?” And he's like, I mean, he's like, “I thought about it.” I was like, “No, no, no, no.” I said, “This is your cat.” I said, “That's the rule.” I said, “Because that's what I did.”

Stephanie Goss:
It's not a rule!

Dr. Phil Richmond:
It is a rule. Hold on, let me qualify that. Let me qualify that. Your first fracture repair on a kitten that got dumped and like, it can be your cat. It's not a rule. It's not a rule. But it can be. It doesn't have to be a rule. But it happened to me, is what I was saying.
So, 15 years ago or whatever, that's what happened. I had a kitty that got… She got shot 18 times with a BB gun, and had a fractured femur. And they brought her in. She was on the news, and everything. And we fixed it. And she was on national news. And our receptionist was like, she's like, “You're going to keep this kitten, aren't you?” I was like… I mean… She's like, “Will you just please?” Because she's like, “I'm getting calls from all over the country to adopt this kitten. Will you please just tell me that you're taking the kitten?”

Stephanie Goss:
That you're keeping it?

Dr. Phil Richmond:
Yeah. And so, I did. And her name was BB. And she was great.

Stephanie Goss:
So, that's fantastic. So, did Dr. Ortiz adopt the little kitten?

Dr. Phil Richmond:
He did. He did. The kitten is great.

Stephanie Goss:
Shut up.

Dr. Phil Richmond:
Of course, he did!

Stephanie Goss:
You're such an enabler.

Dr. Phil Richmond:
But I will say… I will say, is that that's part… So, you don't have to have 20 cats. But you could have one, if you're not allergic. You could have one kitten that you saved. You could. Everybody's got… I mean…most

Stephanie Goss:
I want to do a whole podcast series on the stories of the animals…

Dr. Phil Richmond:
How did people got…

Stephanie Goss:
… from, yeah.

Dr. Phil Richmond:
Oh, yeah.

Stephanie Goss:
Because you are the shining representation of having no boundaries in veterinary medicine when it comes to animals. And saying…

Dr. Phil Richmond:
That's my wife. My wonderful wife that we described like, how many animals are in this house that I'm directly responsible of for? None. Like zero now. None. None of them. She brought everyone in the house. She brought every one of them all. Every one of them. But…

Stephanie Goss:
But wouldn't that make a fun podcast series?

Dr. Phil Richmond:
It would. I mean, yeah, we'd have to be a video podcast and that we… We probably should have like a Nat Geo show. I don't even know. I told you we got finches now too.

Stephanie Goss:
Oh, my Gosh.

Dr. Phil Richmond:
So, everyone, we had zero birds in January of 2022, and we have 17 birds now.

Stephanie Goss:
Because Carl can't say no.

Dr. Phil Richmond:
Because I was at VLC with Tasha, and we were speaking and I get a message and she's like, “This happened.” And there's a giant cage in the back of her sister's huge pickup truck because she bought a Macaw, and we had no birds January 2022, we had no birds. And now, we have a Macaw, two Caiques, and a Conure and 13… We have 11 finches and two canaries. But it brings us joy. It brings us joy.

Stephanie Goss:
Oh, my gosh. I can't.

Dr. Phil Richmond:
I know.

Stephanie Goss:
But it brings you joy.

Dr. Phil Richmond:
Send help. And help us, please. Please, anyone.

Stephanie Goss:
We are going to drop… We've done it now. It's done completely.

Dr. Phil Richmond:
We squirrel, we squirrel.

Stephanie Goss:
Normally, Andy and I go off the rails in the beginning of an episode. But we, you and I, I think mostly saved it until the end of it.

Dr. Phil Richmond:
Yeah.

Stephanie Goss:
We did good. We did good.

Dr. Phil Richmond:
Yeah, we did good. We did good.

Stephanie Goss:
Okay. So, if people want to find you, we're going to drop in the show notes links to some of the resources and research that you were talking about. But if people want to find you, they can find you at Uncharted in October, as I already said. But besides that, where can people find you on social media?

Dr. Phil Richmond:
Yeah. So, I am at Flourishing Phoenix Vet on Facebook and Instagram and www.flourishingphoenix.com. And then, on LinkedIn it's preferred. Pretty positive like, I like LinkedIn. So, LinkedIn, I think it's Dr. Phil Richmond is my account, yeah.

Stephanie Goss:
Okay, I love it. I love it so much. Thanks for having this conversation with me today, friend.

Dr. Phil Richmond:
Yeah, thank you.

Stephanie Goss:
This has been fun. Thank you all for listening. We'll see how many people got to the end of this one because as always, we did some squirreling. But we stayed… High-five friends because we stayed decently for two people that have as much in common as we do, whose brains work very similarly.

Dr. Phil Richmond:
Yeah, we feel good.

Stephanie Goss:
I feel like, we did justice.

Dr. Phil Richmond:
We did good.

Stephanie Goss:
So, we're staying a little bit on target with this. We're knocking Carl, I'm flicking him off my shoulder. We're patting ourselves on the back with this one.

Dr. Phil Richmond:
And by the way, if not… So, I worked with an amazing human being named Carl Ashman. Carl, if you happen like, it's not you at all. This was long before I knew you. So, I just want you to know it's 100% not you.

Stephanie Goss:
Disclaimer.

Dr. Phil Richmond:
Yeah, disclaimer. Carl is not that Carl at all. Carl is a wonderful human being.

Stephanie Goss:
Thanks so much for joining me today, Phil. And thank you all for listening and have a fantastic rest of the week, everybody. We'll see you next time.

Dr. Phil Richmond:
Bye. Thank you.

Stephanie Goss:
And that's a wrap on another episode of the Uncharted Podcast. Thanks for joining us and spending your week with us. If you enjoyed this week's episode, head over to wherever you get your podcast and leave us a review. It's the best way to let us know that you love listening. We'll see you next time.