We Want Them To Love Their Jobs, Is That Too Much To Ask?

A young practice manager is struggling to maintain the momentum and enthusiasm of a high-quality team that, after an initial burst of energy, has started to settle into complacency. Despite intentional efforts to create a strong culture, clear pay scales, and a supportive environment, the leadership team is finding it difficult to inspire the same level of excitement and growth-driven mindset among their staff. Dr. Roark and Stephanie dive into the complexities of team dynamics, the importance of patience in building trust and culture, and the challenges of sustaining motivation in a growing practice. They explore how to gauge whether a team's resistance is due to processing time, differing communication styles, or simply a need for clearer direction. Through personal anecdotes and practical advice, they offer insights into how leaders can align their vision with their team's enthusiasm.

Let's get into this episode…

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Episode Transcript

Andy Roark: Hey everybody. I am your host, Dr. Andy Roark. And this is the Uncharted Veterinary Podcast guys. Before we get into it, This is our 300th episode. 300th Episode. I cannot believe it. From humble beginnings, Stephanie Goss, and I started out making this podcast together. It has been goodness gracious, five years, at least of, of working together, making episodes. 

We've had some amazing guests on here. We have laughed a lot. We have told a ton of stories. It has always meant the world to me. When people come up to me at conferences or out in the world and say, Hey, you guys made an episode and it really helped me. We were dealing with this in my practice. It's just, specialness of it, it never wears off. This has been a wonderful journey for me personally. I just, I'm so fulfilled doing this podcast. And I just love taking questions from you guys and, and talking about the profession that I love and how to get more out of it. 

So I just want to say, thanks. Thanks for those of you who have been with us. Some of you guys have listened to every episode. I cannot believe that I'm the only person I expected that of Stephanie's mom, Patty. Patty was our first listener and been with us the whole time. for those of you who have been with us for, for years, and thanks for just making this worthwhile and just, I don't know. 

I, my, my heart is just full of gratitude for you guys for, for being around and participating and encouraging us when you see us and things like that. It means it means a lot to me and to Stephanie. So anyway, 300th episode, we have no plans of stopping. We think we're going to lean in. 

We've got some new things coming. We will, I'm going to try some different stuff and just, just keep going. make, I don't know, make it fresh. Just the world is changing. Our profession is changing. I want our podcast to change. As well to continue to be maximum beneficial. If you have ideas about what you'd like to see as always, if you have things you would like us to tackle in the mailbag, send us email. 

That email address is podcast@unchartedvet.com that's podcast@unchartedvet.com. And again, I liked, I liked to hear your feedback. I want to make sure that we're serving our listeners as best we can. Anyway, guys, we got a great episode today. We want them to love their jobs. Is that too much to ask? It is episode 300, of the Uncharted Veterinary Podcast. Let's get into it.

Dr. Andy Roark: And we are back. It's me, Dr. Andy Roark and the one and only Stephanie Don't Have Me Break This Thing Down For Nothin Goss. I wanna see you on your baddest behavior, Stephanie Goss. How are you?

Stephanie Goss: I don't know. I feel like you have seen I, I feel like you have seen just like hints of what bad Stephanie could look like. I feel…

Dr. Andy Roark: Oh yeah, no. Oh no.

Stephanie Goss: That's not an open invitation.

Dr. Andy Roark: No, no, it's not, it's not an open invitation. Like, let's just That was not me flinging the door open for you to be yourself. Like, no, just keep yourself. Keep yourself contained like you have. Pass. I don't know! I know enough to know that I don't know what I would be okay with.

Stephanie Goss: Yes.

Dr. Andy Roark: I'm not, we're not insured for it, I'll tell you that.

Stephanie Goss: How's it going, Andy?

Dr. Andy Roark: It's good. It's good. It's good.

Stephanie Goss: I mean,

Dr. Andy Roark: Full swing into summer now, buddy. I have I have two teenagers in the house as well. 

Stephanie Goss: You do.

Dr. Andy Roark: Hannah's 13th birthday, came and went. It was not a big deal though. Hannah was one of those kids that was 11 going on 17. You know what I mean? Like, it did not, I asked her about it. I was like, how does it feel to be 13? And she was like, it feels like I should be 14. 

Stephanie Goss: It’s different. 

Dr. Andy Roark: That's what she said. She was like, I feel like I should be 14. I was like, ah, for whatever reason, when, when Jacqueline turned 16, we just kind of auto graduated Hannah to 13 for some reason in our minds. So this was like, it's, it's basically morbid parallel.

My, when my wife's grandmother died in January, she died, and then, We had to wait until June to bury her because she was getting interned at the Naval Academy with her husband. And so when we had the funeral in June, it was, you know what I mean, you're like, Nah, we feel like we've, we're, we're, you know, we're in, we're processed this. 

Stephanie Goss: We've done this

Dr. Andy Roark: We've done this. That's how I felt at my daughter's 13th birthday party too. But in a happier way, in a happier way.

Stephanie Goss: That's funny.

Dr. Andy Roark: Man, oh yeah. It was, yeah, it was,

Stephanie Goss: That’s funny. 

Dr. Andy Roark: It's been a whirlwind journey. Oh..

Stephanie Goss: I think some of that is the second or beyond the second kid syndrome, you know, like you do, you do all of the things with the first kid and, and then the second kid. And I also think some of it is just who Hannah is as a person. Like she's always just been a little bit of a sassier, older soul.

And like, I don't, you know, I think it just, I've just always put her on the same, on the same age wavelength as Jacqueline.

Dr. Andy Roark: oh, yeah. No, she's like, sassy and precocious and Jacqueline is just her own, her own self. Very kind hearted and so they do kind of square off pretty evenly. But, you know, also, I can't deny, like, we've got, we're those parents, we've got numerous photo books of our first child. And second, there's like a shoebox with some Polaroids of our second kid.

It's so bad. But so I totally see myself being like sweet 16. Jacqueline. How old are you little kid? Thirteen? Like,

Stephanie Goss: Yeah.Uh-huh.

Dr. Andy Roark: That’s just having multiple kids. The married couple I, I do work for is at Traveler's Rest Animal Hospital.

They got, like, five or six kids. I'm like, I would lose a kid somewhere. I'd be like, at some point the kid just wouldn't make it into the car and we were pulling away. It'd be, it'd be a couple of days before I was like, “didn't we have a blonde haired kid?”

Stephanie Goss: You'd be the home alone. You're the Home Alone parents?

Dr. Andy Roark: I would be home alone, except I would come back from vacation. I would get back and be like, oh, oh, we, ooh, boy, is my face red. I would, I would have turned around embarrassed. I would have been like, ooh 

Stephanie Goss: You're 

Dr. Andy Roark: Why are the lights on, we would have pulled up, why are the lights on at home? That's a lot about me, too. I just, it's possible I don't pay attention to detail as much.

Stephanie Goss: What? You not paying attention to detail?

Dr. Andy Roark: This is me giving myself a 360 degree eval.

Stephanie Goss: Shocker.

Dr. Andy Roark: If we ever have grandkids, I won't remember their names,

Stephanie Goss: Well, I I'm excited about this one. It's we got kind of a long mailbag. It's funny because I love when we get the longer mailbag letters because I love hearing the details of what's going on in people's practices. And, sometimes I struggle with like, how do I summarize this because there's so much here

Dr. Andy Roark: There’s a lot. There's a lot here.

Stephanie Goss: and I could spend the first 10 minutes of an episode reading, reading a letter.

But we got an email from a young practice manager and I just love so much about this. So they're, they are in a newer hospital. It sounds like a ground up build. It's a private general practice and they've been open.

Dr. Andy Roark: It’s a brand new hospital. It's a new practice. Yeah. I love this!

Stephanie Goss: they've been open for a couple years and they very intentionally set out to grow their culture as a practice.

And so they, they really took the time to develop a leadership team and the ownership team really was intentional and, and was like, this is the vision that we want to create and set out to create, you know, set out to achieve that vision. So they're super excited. They feel like they have kind of a different philosophy and approach.

They intentionally set out to have pay scales and, and set the wage bar higher to be very clear about what they were offering team members. They feel like they attracted a really large high quality team, they got up and going and now they're in this stage where they as a hospital are still in a growth mode.

Right? Right. They've only been open a little, a little bit of time and they feel like the team has kind of, settled back into this mode where they're like, okay, we've worked really hard and now we're just going to kind of kick back a little bit. But the leadership team is like, Hey, hi, we're still a brand new baby practice.

And we still need to be working really hard and pushing to get our, to get to the place where we want to be as a, as a practice and as a hospital. And so. The management team is really struggling because they're like, we're trying all of the things we're, we're you know, we were intentional about who we hired.

We have been supportive of them. We're trying to share information. We're having team meetings. We're being as open with them as we can. We feel like we've put in all of the work. And I really like how they, how they said this. They said, You know, we're ready to get behind support and help people who want to grow and do more and be a part of something bigger and we see such a great opportunity, but it doesn't feel like anyone on the team is biting at what's in front of them. What gives? 

And I just really liked how they said that because they're, you know, they have all of the best intentions. They're really trying to put their money where their mouth is. And they were like, you know, we've put in the work to give the team the quality of life, develop the culture, have a pay and work environment that people in this field deserve.

And we were hoping that the trade off would be that we would see more enthusiasm and that the team would be excited as we are to kind of grow together and build this thing. And so this leadership team is feeling like, how do we get them as excited? A, as they were when we first started, but B, how do we get them beyond that?

How do we get them to buy into the vision and want to grow this as much as we do? And, and they ask themselves, like, are, is that setting the expectation too high? Are we, are we trying to ask for too much? Are we being too idealistic to want everybody on the team to kind of have their own growth goals and want to not just show up and work a job every day?

I just loved this because I was like, this is, this is so meaty and there's so much here. To kind of dive into and I thought we could I thought we could have some fun with it.

Dr. Andy Roark: Yes. All right. So I I love this. I love this person. I think that the the way they lay things out, they're clearly trying to do really great stuff. They really want to have a meaningful purposeful place where people are excited to go work and boy does that resonate with me? Okay, that is a always been a huge thing for me I it's you know, and you know this you're laughing over there because you you you know I've seen from the beginning.

This is, this is, this is young Andy. It says it's current Andy. I, I am a pragmatic optimist. I, I am. I, but I think, I was funny. I was I was interviewing Josh Vaisman for the other podcast I do, the Cone of Shame. and we were talking about creating a positive sort of workplace and things.

And we were talking about the title of the episode when it comes out is going to be, Are We Happy Enough? And basically the idea was, I think that we make a mistake when we say to ourselves, I want my employees to be happy. And I think that happy is a terrible indicator to focus on. 

Because it's a, it's a lagging indicator.

Stephanie Goss: Then also, how do you measure that?

Well, and also, like, it's the most fleeting, ephemeral, up down thing in the world. Like, how many times have you gotten out of bed and been like, This is a terrible day! And then something great happens, you're like, This is wonderful! And then, you get stuck in traffic, and you're like, This is terrible!

And it's just, this yo-yo moving target metric that's terrible. It's just dumb.

Stephanie Goss: Well, and also like what makes you happy totally different than what makes me happy.

Dr. Andy Roark: Oh, and, and also, like, is the mark of a good life how happy you are? I don't think it is. I don't think it is. And so anyway, it was really sort of one of these neat philosophical questions. But, I had that exact, this exact confession that's in this letter I made to Josh Vaisman yesterday and said, I always just really wanted people to be excited to come to work.

Like, that's, that's, that's my idealistic thing I've always wanted to try to create. And I've always tried that, but boy, that's a harsh metric. But I have always aspired to that, so I really feel this a ton. And again, I don't know this practice, so I can't, I, we're gonna speak in a couple sort of generalities.

I'm gonna make some guesses and some assumptions, and I apologize, but, but we're gonna try to cover a broad, a broad swath of real estate here. I will, let me tell you a story about when your superpower gets turned against you. And you, Stephanie, have seen this so many times. So I am a high I in the DISC you know, space. And we teach DISC as communication styles. 

And so if you want to know about DISC, it's in our Leadership Essentials Certificate, which you can get there. through Vetfolio, or you get for free if you're an Uncharted member.

Anyway I am a high I, which means I am an influencer personality type, which means I or communication type. The first thing i'm going to think if you bring me a problem is who better get the team in here. Like who do I know who I could ask about this problem? 

That's the first thing I think and you will see me telling stories getting people fired up getting everybody together so we can swarm a problem and like I'm really, really good at it, and it is really one of the keys to my personal success, and like every super power, it has a flip side that makes it a super weakness, and so this idea, this feeling of talking to a team that has their arms crossed and is sitting in silence is a nightmare that I have lived through many times. And it just sucks my soul away. And the fact that I want people to get excited about something and they're not getting excited about it is really hard on me. In a way, and I think I hide it pretty well.

I've been doing this a long time. But it is challenging. As opposed to when I go in and get people excited and I get excited and the whole thing spins up And it turns into a rave in the treatment room at noon, you know what I mean? And it's just like yeah, and then we could conquer the world and I I feed on those exchanges. But I've been through many of the other ones and as a result I thought a lot about sort of why they happen and things like that.

But anyway, if you are you are someone like me and it feels like the person writing this letter might kind of be one of those I people or you know They they clearly someone in the leadership team wants to get the team fired up and fully engaged.  Boy, it's really hard to to have those meetings and people just you ask them questions and they just lean back. That's that's brutal. So anyway, I feel I feel this. 

First thing in headspace, I would say to the leadership team here, be kind to yourself. Be kind to yourself. Building trust and building culture, it just takes time. As much as you want to bring people in and say, alright, let's go, it takes time. for  them to come to believe that you genuinely want to hear what they have to say.

And, depending on their past experiences, it might take a long time for them to actually believe they're not going to get in trouble for telling you what they actually think. It can also, and again, lessons learned from me, it can also be hard when people really like you to give you negative feedback on the thing that you're excited about.

So, if people don't like you, they'll just go, I don't want to do that. But if they do like you, they don't want to crush your dreams. They don't want to pop your balloon that you're excited about right in front of your face. And so they'll often just, unless there's Stephanie Goss, who does it every Friday at 3.

Stephanie Goss: (Laughter) I was gonna say this is a perfect illustration of our team because everybody on the team, everybody on the team, not that I don't love Andy. I love Andy deeply and I have worked, you and I have worked together long enough. That I feel comfortable giving you feedback about things that you are excited about that I maybe don't think are the best of ideas or maybe we should approach different ways.

Dr. Andy Roark: Yep.

Stephanie Goss: And the rest of the team for a long time was in the phase of, Oh, we don't want to hurt Andy's feelings. So we're just going to kind of be a little bit quieter and slower to speak up. And I'm like,

Dr. Andy Roark: On a completely unrelated note, Stephanie Goss has never once been the employee of the month. Not one time.

Stephanie Goss: True story. I do have a crown though.

Dr. Andy Roark: That’s true. But it's true! It's true! I say this because, like, I have, I, it is a  thing you have to 

Stephanie Goss: It is. It is 

Dr. Andy Roark: it, it, it, if people, if people really like you and they don't want to hurt your feelings and they, they sometimes just won't be honest with you about what they're really thinking and that cripples your ability to move the team forward.

And so it goes back to this thing we use a lot, which is a Brene Brown thing is, but it's what is kind. And, and. I have really taken that into my, into my life as far as if there's someone I really care about and I don't give them feedback that they need to hear, that's not the kindest thing.

And that does not mean I walk around just being mean to my wife. This is not that. You know what I mean? And you pick your battles. And there's some things where I go. Yeah, It's kinder for me to not correct this person who really, really enjoyed the Bridgerton movie. I don't know whatever it's like.

I'm just like, I don't have to tell them that was a stupid movie. It's not, that doesn't matter. But if someone asks me for my feedback, and I know that they're trying to make decisions about how we're going to take care of pets and patients and clients based on my feedback. It's not kind for me to protect their feelings, necessarily.

I'm gonna be really nice to him. You see what I'm saying? So anyway It can be hard if people really like you or they see your enthusiasm and sometimes when you come hard with the enthusiasm. People, it's funny people read the tone of the room when they decide they're like, is this a feedback thing or is this a pep rally?

Because if it's a Because if it's a pep rally, I don't want to stop the music But if it's a feedback thing, I you know, I I would I have some questions um, and so it all those things can be kind of can be kind of hard and we just sometimes when we're trying to generate enthusiasm we skip the step of Getting buy in that the idea is solid and workable.

Stephanie Goss: Yes. And I think that goes back to your, your first point very, very much so about, you know, building that trust and that ability to, to read the team and know the team. Like, that takes time. And that was, so from a headspace perspective, one of the, one of the first questions that I had was this person had had put in their email you know, that they had worked really hard at hiring and they had found they had found outstanding team members was the, was the word that they, they used.

And I was interested and stuck on that because the question that I had is, are they really truly like shining examples of what you want in a team member or are they experienced? Because those two things are very different, number one. And number two, you can hire a whole crew of amazing individual People, you can hire outstanding candidates and you could hire five of them.

Just because you have five people who are truly exceptional at their job and who you see good qualities in, does not mean that they then immediately gel as a group. And so for me, like I, I agree with you, Andy, that had that the time piece is important in so many ways because so much of this takes time, the building trust, the gelling together as a team, the setting, the stage, for them to be able to give each other and you feedback, all of those things.

And so, I think that the biggest, the biggest piece to, for me I love that you started with the being kind to yourself, being kind to yourself and remembering like, this is, This is a marathon. This is this and this is like an ultra marathon. This is definitely not a sprint. And so it's really easy to your point for people like you and I who get excited and we're the golden retrievers and we're just wagging our tail all over everybody.

It's really easy for us to get like sad about well, why isn't everybody as excited as we are? And I think it's really important to remember like, yeah, This takes, this takes time. This is a process.

Dr. Andy Roark: Talk is cheap. I think that's really important. Talk is cheap And if people got wildly fired up every time some boss came and told them how great the future was going to be they'd be fired up all the time like but as a lot of people who have sat through a lot of really Inspiring talks from their boss that did not really pan out to be what they were sold. And so again, that's not about talk You but that is about the state of the world the fact that talk is cheap I I will say there's some Talk in this letter about you know establishing a vision and a plan and things like that.

It's helpful for me as a big idea person to remember that most people can't create out of nothing. So just as a point on creativity It is very hard if I said to you stephanie goss write a book you'd be like, I don't have, like, I don't, I don't know what to do with that. If I said to you, Stephanie Goss, write a book about you know, about vampires living in modern day Chicago.

Stephanie Goss: Washington? 

Andy Roark: And whatever, you know what I mean? Like, and again, that's silly. But if I give you these, suddenly it gets a whole lot easier. Like, you can actually probably already envision some pieces, you know, like, what would this even, you, you can even start to put it in your head.

Stephanie Goss: They won't, they won't sparkle in my book. Let me, Let me put it that way. 

Dr. Andy Roark: But, you get, you get the point.

It's really hard for someone to, to It's just the whole idea of We can be whatever you want us to be. What do you guys want? Where would you be happy working? People can't answer that question. They would say, if you said Hey Do you guys do you think so we're thinking about doing more technician appointments than we currently do.

They're like, oh, they have an opinion on that right away, because they can see that. But, but you have to, you have to give them something to create in. That's hard. 

Stephanie Goss: Mm hmm.

Dr. Andy Roark: Resting B Face is also not always what you think it is. And this goes back to the, you know, I'm trying to get the team fired up, and they're just sitting there.

And sometimes, you are dealing with people who are not negative, they just are processing. And again, I, we work with people like that who are wonderful, but they're, if you expect them to get fired up about your idea, you're going to be disappointed. They are not, they are going to sit there and they might ask some questions.

But they won't be like, when can we start, yet there will be much harder questions. And they're just processing people. I, one of the biggest things that happened to me early in my career was I was, you know, I was, I was lecturing, it was like the first year that I was speaking. And so, literally, it was my first, first year doing a new speaking.

And I got picked up to go and speak at this event and, and I was talking about exam room communication and I was about two, three years into being a vet. I, my stuff was really well backed up with research. You know what I mean? It was like I had personal experience of me trying it and doing it, but, but it wasn't like I was just saying after two years, let me tell you how to do it.

It was, but I was like, this is what the research is. This is the classic selling structure fit into a compassionate framework of that medicine. I really put a lot of work to it. And so anyway, so I go and I do this talk and in the audience is this guy named Bob Carton and Bob is, was a legend, like I, he was in the West Coast I had met him because he had presented other management stuff, he was, he had owned multiple hospitals, like I knew exactly who this guy was, and he's sitting there in the audience listening to me, Andy Roark, two and a half years, three years out of vet school, lecture on education on how to do exam room communication stuff. 

And he had his arms crossed, and he just looked disgusted. He looked nauseous. He looked like, he looked like I had, you know what I mean? He looked like I was serving just pieces of lemon for him to eat. And then he came back to the second hour, and then he stayed all day. And all day, he just looked at me like that. And I was just like, this is terrible. 

And at the end of the day, he came up to me and he said that was the best exam room ever. Communication presentation I've ever seen. And I, I, I have never forgotten that. Because one, it was high praise from someone that I respected.

It was like a big deal early on for me. I was like, oh my god. But also, I have literally never forgotten how unhappy he looked. All day. Before he gave me one of the most meaningful compliments I have gotten in my entire career. And so I have seen that again and again and again, is that sometimes you, you are just working and you feel like you're bombing because you're not getting this.

I don't know. You're, you're not seeing the positive body language. People are not jumping in.

Stephanie Goss: Yes.

Dr. Andy Roark: You're not being perceived the way your unkind inner voice is telling you you're being perceived.

Stephanie Goss: Yeah. It's so funny. It's so funny that you bring that up and I, I think that that's true, and especially in the context of team meetings. You know, I, I learned pretty early on in my career, like you, I am, I am a high I. And I'm a very animated talker. This is hard to believe, I know. But I use my hands a lot, and I gesture, and I get really excited.

And I learned early on that my, my team does, It seemed to be like, it seemed to be a little too much for my team. I had a team of kind of introverts. And so I started, I started doing this thing kind of early on where I had somebody give me feedback that like, you get really excited and you're gesturing and it's just like, it's a lot for me and that it was somebody that I cared about.

And so I like, I internalized that. And so what I, what I realized years later is that I started, I started crossing my arms when I was talking and like, it's so funny that you said that about Bob because, so I started, I started sitting there and I always sit there with my arms crossed across my chest when I'm having meetings and it's an, it's intentional because I'm trying to stay focused and I'm trying to keep myself calm or I'll sit on, I'll sit on my hands.

And it's funny because my team at my California practice, we participated in, in the first iteration of the Bayer Brackey study and part of it was doing work with some awesome, awesome colleagues and we, the whole team learned about communication and a bunch of other things, but we did a class on body work and on body language and how it's perceived from a client perspective.

And it was super interesting because we did the whole thing, like now that they do in vet schools where they bring in the actors and they have, that you do the practice appointments and you get feedback on your, on your experience. And I had that experience of getting the feedback from my team who were like, you know, what when you cross your arms, I feel like you're, I feel like you're angry, or I feel like you're about to tell me something that I, that I don't want to hear and they're reading it as, as like, like you were reading Bob.

They're reading me as angry and I'm like, Oh my God, I'm just trying to listen to you guys and not like get excited and like spit on you and like give you hugs in the middle of the conversation because I'm excited and I'm doing it for a very different reason. And so. I think that point is super, super valid, especially when you're building relationships with people on your team, which is really what's happening here.

You don't know. I mean, maybe you've worked with some of these people before, but as you're, you're learning each other, it's just like learning a relationship in your personal life. It takes you time to learn somebody else's body language, their facial expressions. But it does come in time. 

And I think, you know, you and I learned that when two years ago when Maria joined our team and she had been with us a couple of weeks and she was just like, I freaking hate being in meetings with you and Andy. And I was like, Oh God. And she was like, no, because you guys just look at each other and you give each other looks and you're like, yeah, okay. And then we move on. And she's like, I don't know what just happened. Like, what did I just miss? 

Well, it's because decisions are made because we can finish each other's sentences. A lot of the time we know what the other is thinking, but that's, that's almost eight years of working together intensely, right? Like that takes time. And so I think that's the part about learning people, learning people. How they process, how they think, their body language, all of that is important and it all sits squarely in your first headspace about that. That all takes time. It doesn't happen overnight.

Dr. Andy Roark: Yeah, I agree. I would make the point that strategic planning when you're tired is a bad idea. And again, I don't know if that's what's happening, but they're like, We have come out and we are growing and we've got more growth to do! And in my experience, if you take the team and they're like, Oh boy!

We're working really hard and you go to them and you're like, what are you guys excited about in the future? Where should we go? What services should we add? You're not going to get the enthusiastic response that, you know, that you, that you're looking for. And again, I have, I have run into this one as well.

it's, that, that's 

Stephanie Goss: Or they will cry, you know.

Andy Roark: Yeah, totally. I mean, honestly, it can go the other way. You can, people, people can break down crying when you're like, this was, this was amazing. Guys, we saw a record number of patients this month. Let's talk about adding a new service. And people just, they'll cry and it's because you know that you have a hiring plan in place and you're planning to staff up and support, but they don't know that or they don't necessarily believe it.

And again, it goes back to it. Talk is cheap and people have been told a lot of things in the past and so if they feel like they're working hard I have learned that you, it's, it's very challenging to get them really fired up. They'll hopefully listen to what you say. You need to make sure that you're helping them see the path.

And I think that this is a big part of when I said, it's hard to create out of nothing. One of the problems is you say, well, we can have this, but. Well, the people who are actually doing the work are much more interested in how, what does the process of going from where we are to there look like as opposed to let's make a vision for the future.

Like they really want to know how does this affect my next shift when I clock in and you can, you can lose people there.

Stephanie Goss: And I think that's really important because in this, in this email, they were like, you know, we, we want, we could go anywhere and we could do anything. There was the sense of that. Right. And to your point, that's really hard for a lot of people. And there are people in this world who clearly this leadership team has that can, can get a vision that can, you know, create out of nothing that can look at the future and say, this is where we could go.

Let's go there. And recognizing that a lot of people can't, when you talk to the team and you ask them questions like, what do you guys want to do? Who do we want to be as a practice? Where do we want to go? And they're sitting there and they're giving you nothing. 

It's not necessarily because they think that that's a bad idea or they don't want to work hard for a lot of people, especially those process people they can't see that if you tell them, Hey, we would like to be known in town as the best white glove, high touch practice that takes care of their clients. And we would love your input on what that could look like. You're giving them that framework to then see a little bit of the path and see potentially themselves on that path.

And they're probably going to give you more feedback. There are a lot of people where if you just throw those doors open, they are just going to sit there and look at you because they don't even know where to start.

Dr. Andy Roark: I agree. I think I think when you, when you look at this there's a balance. Especially, all these things that we're saying are true. At some point complete and total enthusiasm and buy in may just not be possible for where we are. The analogy I always use is this OxyClean idea. So OxyClean is this cleaning, you know, detergent product.

And in the commercials what happens is there's like dirty water and laundry, like it's like literally muddy water.

Stephanie Goss: Like the the white baseball pants or the

Dr. Andy Roark: Exactly right, in  like muddy water, and then they dump the OxyClean in, and then the water becomes crystal clear. Right, and then you can add more dirty stuff and the water doesn't turn clear.

I use that metaphor in my mind for culture building. The first thing you have to do is get the culture going, and then you can add more people to it. But, right now, you're just sitting with a big vat of water, and maybe great people. But the culture has not started to spin yet. And again, a lot of times you're going to toil away Behind the scenes pushing this and we're gonna get into action steps here And I got I got a solid plan to say we're gonna run you through a checklist Just sort of wrap up headspace a couple things to remember it might not be possible to have a complete democracy right now and honestly, we're probably never gonna want to complete democracy but we can ask for feedback and if we're not getting anything then my advice to you is to go ahead and make a plan. Make a short term, make the next plan, make the one year plan and then ask for feedback on the plan because now I'm giving them something more tangible.

I'm asking them specifically, does this look reasonable to you? What do you guys think about approaching it this way? And now I'm giving them something much more tangible to give me feedback on,right? Remember, at some point, like I said, getting complete and total buy in is not, may not be totally possible.

That's okay. It's important that everybody feels heard and at some point we're gonna make a decision about what we're doing. I tie this back a lot to the family dynamic of, and again, I don't like comparing employees to children, but in my family, there are times that my wife and I decide we're going on vacation in the mountains and we're going to hike and my kids are like, I don't want to go on the vacation in the mountains and hike. Sometimes we want to reach it, we want to reach a consensus. And sometimes, this is what we're, This is what we're doing. This is because, some, my wife's work has, you know, a given opportunity, whatever the reason is. Sometimes it's, I hear that and I understand, and I understand what your concerns are.

And so we are going to go to the mountains. And, we're going to try to do some things to address your concerns and make sure that you're not bored and your legs don't fall off your body from walking up the mountains. But, we are, I hear that and this is what we're doing. And so, so there's, but you, you always want to find that, that, that sort of the balance.

I'm not, I'm not trying to advocate for tyranny, but, but, but sometimes, especially getting going, if people are noncommittal, sometimes we make a choice and we go, and then we take feedback on how the trip is going and what adjustments we can make. 

And so that is, that is a possibility. The last thing that I want to say is this, now there's a headspace, but this is important. This is where we see real strength. In leadership, right? It is easy to cheerlead and high five and celebrate when everybody's laughing and pets are getting fixed and money is rolling in the door like it is easy to manifest the positive culture you want to see when you're just winning and winning and winning, right?

What's hard is being the one who smiles and greets people warmly when revenues down 20%. That is hard. It is hard to demonstrate the behaviors that you want to see in the practice when your toddler kept you up all night. But my friends, that is when real strength comes out. That is the difference between people who have the discipline and, and yeah, the discipline to, to manifest the culture they want to have.

And people who don't have that discipline. I'm not trying to shame anybody. Trust me, but I have been kept up by my toddlers back in the day and I was not my best self the next day and I have come into our meetings and been like, Oh, we had a bad month last month and I am not my best self. And again, but that's why I say this is strength.

And sometimes, especially here when the team kind of leads back and they're not really sure. Yeah. You have to have the resolve to continue to manifest the culture that you want to see, to positively reinforce other people when they show the culture that you want to see, and to continue to be optimistic about the future and where we're going, even when other people are just being quiet, drinking their coffee and not saying a whole lot you have to and it is strength because it does not come easy Until you get other people to get on board, but this is the oxyclean, right? This is trying to get the first cycles going and get things to start turning over and turning crystal clear. You have to be the one who walks with a smile on your face when nobody's smiling back at you.

Stephanie Goss: And I think, I think to your, to your point, Andy, like the, the discipline to show up and keep doing that is what sets people apart because you made the point earlier. And it is so true. An employer can tell you anything. But it's how they show up every day or how they show up when it matters the most to you as a person that really tells you who they are.

And so when you bring a new team together, you know, you can have a big vision and you can have all of these ideas and you can sell them on all of that and how you show up, how you show up when it's good. And how you show up when it's not so good, not only allows them to see that you are walking your talk, but it really opens the door for the team to see themselves inside of that vision, because it's all a part of building those relationships and building that trust and when they see you able to show up and be really kind to the clients at the front desk, even when You know, the someone's driven a car through the back of the hospital like that makes the difference for them to be able to say, Oh, they're showing up, even though this is hard, like, this is how I want to show up myself.

You're setting that example for them. And I think that that that part of it is really, really important because they can you can sell them on your vision, and you can even sell them on your idea of their role in your vision, but until they actually can see themselves inside your vision in, in a role.

And it may be the role that you, you know, saw them in, it may be a completely different role until they can get to that place. They're not going to step up in a big way. And so I think that that discipline matters a lot.

Dr. Andy Roark:  I think of good culture as a song. And you got the employees there and you're like, Alright guys, we're gonna sing this song. When no one around you is singing the song, it's scary to sing the song. It is not enticing. You're not like, I feel like being the only person singing. When everyone around you is singing, it's easy to sing.

And that's how, that's how good culture is. The problem is, somebody's gotta start the song. And somebody has to sing first, and that's the leadership. Now, the one thing I would say that's just, again, I want to leave headspace on a really positive note. The person who wrote to us says that we have a leadership team, and they are bought into what we're doing.

They're excited. It's like, you're not singing alone, it doesn't sound like. It sounds like you've got a couple other singers. Sometimes, you might have to be content with five people singing in the middle of the group. That confidence to say, I don't really care if the people around me start singing this, I'm singing this and this is what the good culture is going to be.

And you know, at least for now, I don't need everybody to sing. I'm going to sing and I'm going to keep singing. And like, honestly, a lot of times what will happen is people around you, they'll break and they'll start singing and that's good. And there's some people, and there's some people who will never sing and you can decide what you do with those people.

But right now, when nobody else is singing you know, we're just gonna, we're gonna deal with it. So anyway, let's take a break real fast, cause we are, we are late in the, late in the podcast to get to Action Steps.

Stephanie Goss: Let's do it.

 Hey guys, are you a team lead who has not yet registered for the Uncharted Team Leads Summit? if you are, if you're a head technician, head CSR or something like that. You need to be at the team leads. Some is a one day virtual event. It is taking place on September the 18th and early bird pricing is about to end that's right. 

The early bird pricing ends on August 16th. You should be there. You should be growing your career. You should be stretching and expanding your skills. You should be getting better at managing and leading other people so that you enjoy your work more and your patients get better outcomes and your team runs more smoothly. And your practice culture is better. 

All those things come from you being comfortable, confident well-trained able to handle the stresses that are put on team leads. Cause guys, the team lead role is just growing in importance. 

I'll be there. I've got a session is called the Jedi mind trick how to get doctors to do what you want. Sarah Parsons. Is there talking about boosting morale? Maria Pirita is doing conflict management, mastering mediation. 

So you know that there's going to be times that you are going to have to get in between two people that you lead that are not getting along. Let's make you a better mediator. Let me give you the basics so that, you know, sometimes they're not able to sort it out on their own and we have to help make that happen. To keep the team functioning at a high level. 

Let's let's get some skills guys. Tyler Grogan and Kelsey Carpenter are going to be doing becoming the coach. Not the referee. As you can tell, this program is absolutely jam packed with useful sessions for team leads. Grab it before early bird registration ends on August the 16th, and we will see you on September the 18th link in the show notes. I hope to see you there. 

Dr. Andy Roark: Alright, so I've got I've got a, a checklist here, but I think I can go through it pretty quick, but we're, it's gonna be tight.

Sounds good? Alright, we're gonna get into Action Steps, and just buckle up, cause I wanna, we're gonna Move through these, but I've got I've got a checklist. I've got eight things. And again, I don't exactly know what's going on or where the pushback is, but this is a checklist I would run through. That's kind of a mixture of diagnostics and action steps.

So sound sound good. All right. Cool. All right. The first thing I think you got to do In this case is get comfortable lifting from the top, not the bottom. So the idea with this is imagine your team is a string and there's two ways to lift the string. You can take one into the string and you can lift it.

And that's just taking your high performers and lifting them up. And ultimately the rest of the group will come along with it. Or you can lift from the bottom, which is, we're going to take. The least engaged people and push them up. 

We're going to start working on at the lowest level and come up I am a big believer in taking the top and lifting from the top and then letting it come up. If you want to change the culture start celebrating and investing into the people who are on board like that. That's it and just do not get don't get totally bogged down in the fact that some people are not on board so my wife and I went on a college trip.

It was a college trip that she was running. And there was a group of college students who were great. And there were about 20 college students, and about 4 of them were not as engaged as the others. And it was very easy to focus on those 4, and think, ah, these kids are not engaged, or blah, blah, blah. The truth is, 16 of them were awesome.

Awesome. And totally. Now, the four were not bad. Don't get me wrong. They just preferred to do their own thing. But it was really easy to focus on that as opposed, and think, Oh, this is not working. Forget those guys. Make a great experience for the other 16. Hopefully those four will decide this is awesome and come along.

But the same thing I see in practice all the time. It's really easy to focus on the people who are sitting back with their arms crossed. And you don't see the people around you who are all gently nodding. And you're getting them. You know, and they're starting to hum the song with you, but you're only looking at the people who are refusing to sing.

So anyway, get comfortable lifting from the top. Don't worry about lifting up from the bottom. We'll deal with that. Again, this is a marathon, as you said, not a sprint. I think you were spot on. Alright, number two, get your goals and values straight so that you can validate yourself. Now, it's what I hear from this is, oh, we've got this vision or we've got these things we want to do but the staff's not buying into them.

Again, this is just bullet proofing yourself. Yeah, if this is the impact you want to have on the world, and it's truly the impact you want to have on the world, forget what the staff thinks. Go, go and live those values. Work on making the hospital the place that you want it to be. If you have decided this is the impact we want to have on the world, go do it.

And have that impact and validate yourself and don't judge your success by whether or not the staff says nice things to you, but you have got to know why are you doing this job? What does fulfillment and reward look like to you? And then go and make that thing and fight that battle. But a lot of times, it's really easy as a leader to feel like your success is dependent on the emotions or the buy in of the people around you.

And that's a really delicate and fragile place to be. You need to decide how you're going to impact the world, and then go and impact the world. And use your staff to do it, but they may not like it.

But we're making the world better, and I'm okay with that. The truth is, they're, they do like it. They're going to like it.

Especially if you're doing something good in the world. So anyway, but it's that, it's that, find that internal validation about what your practice is doing and recognize, I don't need to be cheered on by the practice. I know that we are practicing the best standard of care. I know that we are supporting the community.

I know that we're making care accessible. Like, whatever, whatever our things are. So anyway, Get yourself so you're gonna feel okay.  right? Figure out what the team values and what they find meaning in. Do not try to figure out what makes them happy. And you and I talked about this before. Don't try to figure out how to make the staff happy.

Happy is a lagging indicator, right? There was a study I referenced a couple weeks ago in the podcast AAHA put out their retention study survey thing. And they call it Please Stay, which I think is a terrible name, but but it just, it sounds whiny and desperate. But anyway, they didn't ask me, there's a long trend of them not asking, I know, it's a long trend of them not asking me what I think that continues on.

I'm just doing it right now, I'm very passive aggressively giving feedback to them anyway.

Stephanie Goss: Yes. 

Dr. Andy Roark: They, they, so they surveyed veterinarians and technicians and they asked them basically what do you care about the, the most at work, what is most likely to make you stay. And both techs and veterinarians said meaningful work was nothing more than a thing for both of them. 

What the heck is meaningful work? It depends on the individual. One of the ways to start building the culture is make sure that you're asking them. What meaningful work is, when do you feel fulfilled, when do you feel proud of the work that you have done here?

Tell me about a time. Those are the questions you want to ask, because again, getting them on board with the culture is figuring out partly who they are and what do they value. And it's really hard to get people fired up about a culture that's built on values that I don't have.

Stephanie Goss: Yes. And I think, I think so I, I really had one, one chunk that fits right in here from an action step perspective. And I think you're, you're spot on, Andy, in figuring, figuring out what do they value and what do they find meaning in? And I think I don't, this is, I'm going to make an assumption if you're not already doing one on ones, and I don't know whether this person is or not, but if you're not regularly meeting with the team in a one on one setting, or even if you have a practice owner and yourself, like a two to one, but like regularly doing conversations with your team to see How's it going?

What do you, what are you loving about your job? What's making your job hard right now? How can we help support you? If you're not having those regular conversations to dig into what they want, how are they motivated for you to figure out how to, how they're motivated, not for them to tell you what they're motivated by, although you can ask them that question, but also asking them how they see their place on the team and in the company if you're not digging into those three things on a regular basis with different questions you are absolute like that's where you have to start because you that's that's how you get to know them and someone it takes a brave person to stand up in a team meeting and say, I want to take charge of this project.

It, that, that takes it takes confidence and it takes trust in the environment and takes vulnerability. All those things don't happen overnight. And so if you're expecting them to step up and say, Hey, I want to do this thing, you might be disappointed over and over and over again. If you're asking them in a quiet, one to one environment.

Hey, what do you love about your job? How can I help you do more of that? What are you excited about? What, you know, what ideas do you have? If you're asking them that and creating an environment where then they can say, well, you know, I would really like to try doing this. You're missing that opportunity.

Dr. Andy Roark: Alright, so, if you've gotten yourself set up for some internal validation, you know what your values are, you know what your team is trying, how they're trying to impact the world, you understand what your employees, what their values are, and like what fulfillment, meaningful work looks like to them, then you're ready for step four, which is get to work.

Now, when you get to work, what it means is, get to work. Get out there and start living the culture that you want to have. And this is important. Consistency is key. 

Consistency crushes grand gestures. Now, the number of times that you and I have seen people do over the top gestures for staff appreciation one time, and then disappear. It's huge. And I get it. And like, boy, grand gestures are what we see in movies. You know what I mean? It's the big, win the girl back at the end of the movies standing outside with the boombox over your head. Like, it's that. It's that grand gesture. And that works in the movies. But if you want a real culture, like the OxiClean we're talking about, where it just keeps going and new people are added in, they get swept up, that is all about consistency.

It is not the sexy, we did this for our staff and I posted it on the Facebook managers group and everybody told me I was amazing. It's not that. It's, it's the actual Appreciation, living the values, patting people on the back, giving them good feedback, celebrating little wins privately, doing the one on ones.

It's all those things that make the culture happen, but it's consistency.

Stephanie Goss: It's not what you do for tech week or CSR week or assistant week. It’s what you do the rest of the 52 weeks throughout the year.

Dr. Andy Roark: Correct. Yep. Exactly. So that's it. You just gotta get to it. And it's consistency. And I hope we've made the point. Rome wasn't built in a day. This is a marathon. And so, get to work. And don't be crestfallen if after three weeks people haven't radically changed.

Um, you're in it for the long haul. Alright, number five. Set clear expectations on what behaviors you were willing to pay people for. And which ones you are not It's clear expectations is this is who we are. This is what we're trying to do. Do not set clear expectations around how people are supposed to feel. I expect you to show up and be happy.

I expect you to be fully engaged in the staff meetings. Like I don't know what that is. Like no, we expect you to treat people with respect. We expect you to, you know, to follow these protocols, to get this robust history, to support the doctors, to do like you what, what do you expect from people? I expect you to be on time whatever.

But it's funny, you can't set expectations about how people are supposed to feel. Set expectations about the behaviors that you are willing to pay for. And I put that as it's funny, I've seen practices that have swung so far into believing that they are a democracy and everyone has to be fully bought in before we can start to do things.

And I'm like, we aspire to people feeling great ownership and that's what we're working towards. Sometimes we have to tell people, this is your job and, and this is what I need you to do and this is what we're paying you for. And again, it's a very gentle conversation. It's not tyrannical, but at some point I'm not giving you a paycheck hoping that you're going to feel like doing the work that our team needs to have done.

Like that's not how this works. So anyway, but you can, you can set those expectations and mean them. But also, I, you can't it's the, you don't want it to be the old beatings will continue until morale improves. Like, that doesn't, that doesn't work. Um. 

Stephanie Goss: Alright, what’s number six?

Dr. Andy Roark: Walk your talk, live your values, celebrate the behaviors you want to see more of, right?

Remember, positive reinforcement of culture is the key. You cannot negatively reinforce your way to a great culture. You cannot catch people and tell them they're being booby bands. Until the culture becomes wonderful. You have got to identify people who are doing the things that you want to have done Or behaving the way you want to behave.

You need to tell them very specifically This is what I saw you do and I am thrilled because it supports this value. It is making the impact that we want to make in the world. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. That's how you build the culture that you want. And so, get out there, demonstrate the culture, and then really get people get people, get people feeling good when they do the culture and you pat them on the back. Right? 

Stephanie Goss: I think you can celebrate the people who are stepping up and are doing the things that you want them to. And that doesn't always look like calling someone out front and center in a team meeting. And what I mean by that is like when somebody on the team steps up and maybe they bring you an idea, But maybe they're not, maybe they're, I don't know, like me and they hate being acknowledged or praised in front of the whole team.

You can still hold it up and say, hey, someone on the team brought me an idea and this was the idea they brought me. And I just loved that they took ownership of our values in this way. And I thought it was a wonderful idea. And I would love to know how. What things the rest of the team would like to do that look like this, or that tie to the, you know, have to do with how we interact with clients in the exam room, or our workflow, or whatever the idea was, right?

You can use that as a stepping stone to opening the door to the conversation with the rest of the team without putting that person up for praise. Because sometimes what happens is when we put one team member up on a pedestal, The rest of the team sits back and just stares at you because they're feeling like, well, they had a great idea.

I'm not going to speak up now because whatever I have is not going to measure up to what that person's idea was, right? So we want to praise our team. And also sometimes this is a thing that can backfire when you put someone, single someone out, you're doing it with good intention because you want to celebrate that person because they did the behavior and recognizing that that can backfire in front of the group.

But you can still use that in an anonymous way to get them to do the behavior that you want them to do

Dr. Andy Roark: Yeah, I agree. And when I was saying that positively reinforced, I didn't necessarily mean make a presentation in front of the team, I meant catch that person and thank them and tell them directly. And again, some people want to be called out in front of staff. I wasn't thinking about that. I was honestly just thinking about catching them and praising them.

Alright, number seven. Don't force the team meeting format. If you're, if you're having these team meetings and nobody's talking to you, maybe that's not the right format for communicating with your team. Maybe you've got a bunch of people who are never going to want to sit in a circle with 25 people and talk like that.

Try, try some different stuff. Maybe, maybe a suggestion box to get feedback. You know, maybe they'll never raise their hand and tell you, but maybe you can ask them for emails or, or an anonymous way to give feedback, things like that. Maybe we're not going to do team meetings. Maybe we're going to do huddles in the morning and the evening, and that's how we're going to communicate with the staff and work in smaller groups.

Maybe we're going to have team co presenters at the meeting. If you want to get staff involved with the meeting, give them a part of it to run. And again, that all works with certain groups, but that is a thing that we have definitely done. I've had a really quiet group, and boy, I tell you, when you split it up real quick and say, well, you guys are going to handle this part of the meeting, you guys are going to handle this part of the meeting, suddenly I got people a lot more engaged in the meetings because they're terrified.

Use, use breakout groups. A lot of times, I see people standing up and trying to talk to the whole team, and the whole team is not interested in talking to you in front of everybody. Let them turn to their neighbor, let, put them into, get in groups of two to four, and you guys discuss what you think, and then come back and the groups can share, and that way, a lot of times people have ideas, but they're terrified to put it out because it might be a stupid idea, but they're okay to bounce it off of two other people, very quietly, and the other two people go, That's a great idea.

You should say that. That's really good. And now they'll share it with you. And so again, that, that, Pair and then share model. That can be really useful as well. 

The last thing is sort of you can ask the team for advice on getting people to engage more in the staff meetings and tell them why it's important.

Just sort of say, Hey, I really want your feedback. What would make these meetings more accessible to you guys? Like, are, is there a different format? Is there other ways to communicate that might be helpful for you? And, and asking them how they would like to engage. That can be, and then they might say, Oh, we'd like to have more small meetings.

We'd like to have meetings by role and we can talk more there. I, I don't know. But that's, that's number seven for me is, is, is don't be married to a team meeting format. That's not working for you. You're interested in shaking up the team. The profession in the world and you're interested in growing and changing and developing. Well, if this meeting format ain't working for you, I know one place you can grow and develop right now.

Stephanie Goss: I, I, you hit on a soapbox right as we're trying to go. So I'm just not, I'm not going to say, anything. What's What's number eight?

Dr. Andy Roark: Number eight is to go big on positive feedback and hold people accountable. Which means really lean into celebrating and rewarding the people who are living your values and your culture. I am a huge fan of empowering the team to call each other out when they see people.

Doing good in the world living the values. I really love that. I am all about doing some nice bonuses or gifts or celebrations for people who for people who are living the values. I think that that's great. But you can't be everywhere. And so some sort of a way for someone to give imaginary clinic bucks to someone when they see the person doing something great, I think that's awesome, but but you have to tell me why you gave that person imaginary clinic bucks so I can be excited about, about what they did.

And so anyway, but go big on the positive feedback, and while you're going big on the positive, hold people accountable. If you see breakdowns in the culture, you need to say something about it. But that only works when you're going really hard on celebrating the behaviors you do want to see. Otherwise, it becomes punitive path to good culture, and that doesn't work very well.

Stephanie Goss: I love it. 

Dr. Andy Roark: That’s all I got.

Stephanie Goss: Oh man,we did it. 

Dr. Andy Roark: I'm out of breath.

Stephanie Goss: I, I'm hoping that this, this was helpful. I honestly, this was one of those letters where I'm like, we could do five different episodes out of what's in this email.

Dr. Andy Roark: This could have been a three hour seminar. 

Stephanie Goss: Yeah. Yeah. Episode. It could make a case study. Okay. Take care everybody. Have a great rest of your week and we'll see you back here next week.

Dr. Andy Roark: Thanks everybody.

And that's it. That's what I got for you guys. Thanks so much for tuning in. Thanks for being here. Thanks for listening to the 300th episode. Thanks to all of you guys who have been with us for a long, long time. If there's any of you out there, who've listened to all 300 episodes and you feel like doing it. 

Shoot me an email@podcastatunchartedvet.com. I just, I would blow my mind that someone has listened to every episode that we've done, but anyway, gang take care of yourselves. I'll talk to you later. Bye.