VMP 286: Cultivating Culture: The Secret Sauce for Thriving Veterinary Practices With Josh Vaisman

Brandon 00:00:01  Welcome to the Veterinary Marketing Podcast, where it's all about how to attract, engage and retain clients to your vendor. Practice using digital marketing. My name is Brandon Breshears. Thank you so much for taking the time to listen or watch to today's podcast episode. And in today's episode we have a very special guest. We have Josh Vaisman. And Josh is the co-founder of Flourish Veterinary Consulting. He's also the author of Weed to Thrive The Science of Crafting a Positive Veterinary Culture. And in today's episode, we talk about how marketing can affect and influence culture, help with hiring, and I think it is a fantastic episode. A lot of times I have blind spots when it comes to managing teams and growing the like, nuts and bolts of how do you grow your vendor practice? How do you make sure you're attracting the best types of people? And I think a lot of that has to do with also how you're attracting your clients and how you're valuing and growing your team, because your team is so important when it comes to delivering great service for your your practice.

Brandon 00:01:01  But also, how do you make that, a place where it's fun to work and, it's where people want to work. So today's episode I think, is full of value. Be sure to say hi to Josh and let him know you listen to this. He's on LinkedIn. He's always posting great stuff there. And also be sure to check out his book Lead to Thrive. So before today's episode, we have two sponsors and then we're going to jump right into the interview. Are you looking to get better SEO ranking for your writing practice? Probably everyone I know that runs a veterinary hospital would be benefited from having better local SEO, and that's why I want to give you some free tools from one of today's sponsor. It is White Spark.ca. If you go to Veterinary marketing podcast.com/seo, that's veterinary marketing podcast. Com forward slash SEO. You can sign up to get a free account to give you some amazing SEO tools. White Spark gives you everything that you need for better local SEO. If you haven't heard the episode I did with Darren Shaw.

Brandon 00:02:03  Be sure to go back and look at it. He is the founder and owner of this company. It is fantastic. They have Google business profile management, local rank tracking, local citation finder, reputation builder. They even have professional SEO services if that's something that you're looking for. So go to veterinary marketing podcast Forward Slash SEO to check out White Spark and the free tools that they have available for you. You won't be disappointed. They're really cool. let me know what you think too. If you need help with any of that. Please don't hesitate to reach out. But again veterinary marketing podcast.com/seo. Have you ever said to yourself, I wish I knew where these clients were coming from? If you've ever been wondering, you know what is actually driving conversions in your practice? Then I have something that I think will be great for you and that is call Rail. Call Rail is a fantastic tool that allows you to measure and see where your conversions are coming from, and which of the calls and call sources are driving clients into your practice.

Brandon 00:03:07  Calderdale makes it really simple to not only see where your calls are coming from, but the AI tools that they have that track and record the conversation so that you can assign outcomes to the calls is amazing. I highly suggest all of the clients that I have used call rail, and if you've ever wondered where are my clients coming from, you can try Calderdale out for two weeks for free if you go to Veterinary Marketing podcast. Com forward slash call rail. You'll be able to try call rail for yourself and finally know where your clients are coming. Well, thank you so much for being on the podcast, Josh. I'm sure that people know of you more than me, but if somebody doesn't know who you are, can you just tell us real quick how you got started in vet med? What was your story getting here?

Josh 00:03:51  Sure. I'm happy to share. Brandon. I stumbled into vet med. I was working in the specialty department at a PetSmart in Boulder, Colorado, and there was a PetSmart veterinary services in that building, which is like way, way, way old school.

Josh 00:04:08  they don't exist. Well, no, they do exist. Now again, they've come back. Anyway, there was a PBS there, and the medical director there was this amazing human being by the name of Doctor Donald Davidson Dodge. The third. No joke. Triple D the.

Brandon 00:04:24  Third. That's a great alliteration name for sure.

Josh 00:04:26  Oh, yeah. It was awesome. he was hilarious. He was super friendly. And I, you know, I found myself sort of like, gravitating over there on my breaks and chatting with him and his team, and and then I got super interested in what they were doing, and I started to kind of, you know, pay close attention. And then one day, I asked him if I could volunteer there on my days off to see what it's like working in a vet hospital. And instead he offered me a job. And so that's how I started working in vet med in 1998.

Brandon 00:04:53  Amazing. And so you started Flourish Vendor Consulting. what led you to go from starting in vet med to being focused more on, like, workplace well-being and leadership and things like that?

Josh 00:05:09  Yeah, that's a great question, Brandon.

Josh 00:05:11  I think probably for me, it was a story that's, similar for a lot of folks that, you know, strike out at an entrepreneurial endeavor. I found myself over the years, continuing to stumble forward, you might say, and eventually becoming a practice owner. so I was the managing partner in a couple of small animal hospitals, which put me on site and in charge of running the business and leading the human beings that made the business go. and almost, you know, I don't know, 8 or 10 years of doing that. I realized that I was terrible at it. I did just such a bad job. and not because I didn't want to do a good job, I, I feel like the the sort of the inner intentions that I have and the values that I have as a human being have been with me for decades now. I always wanted to be a good leader, the kind of person who made a workplace that people enjoyed going to. I always felt like work should be part of the good stuff in our life.

Josh 00:06:06  It shouldn't be a barrier to it. And so that's how I tried to show up. But I realized, I didn't do that very well. In fact, I actually unintentionally often did it the opposite. I often caused harm to the people that I was trying to lead. Not on purpose, just because I didn't know any better. And it occurred to me that no one ever really teaches us how to do this stuff. You know, we to start an LLC, you could do that online with a few bucks and a couple hours of time, right? Like, you don't even have to have any special level of expertise to put yourself in a position to be in charge of other human beings in the workplace. Nobody really teaches us, especially in vet med, how to be a high quality leader. How to be the kind of person who leads successful human beings that then result in a successful organization. And so I wanted to figure out how to do it better, and then I wanted to teach others how to do it as well.

Brandon 00:07:06  Definitely. So when when we think about, leadership in general, I think that with relation to marketing, because we talk about marketing a lot, deciding who you're going to be targeting, what kind of clients you're going to do, or attract into your practice, when it comes to being a leader in in your practice, do you think that it's more important to focus on building the practice first and then letting the right clients attract? Or do you think it's better to figure out, like from a mission statement, like we're going to service these clients? does that make sense? So which do you think should come first? Should you know who you want to serve first? Or do you think you should know what you want to be and then see who resonates with your message? Does that make sense?

Josh 00:07:59  Yeah, I think so. I think so, so so are you trying to, create the organization from the inside out or from the outside in? I think that's what you're asking.

Brandon 00:08:10  I think so, and the reason why is, I mean, so many times I'll talk to people.

Brandon 00:08:13  And I think that generally speaking, the most the practices that are struggling the most these days, I'll say, what kind of clients do you want? And they'll say, you know, everybody and, their site and their website, you could copy and paste their about section with the one down the street. You wouldn't know the difference. Yeah. Everything is like middle of the road. Where do they price the high prices here. Low prices here. Let's pick the middle. There's no rhyme or reason to it other than just like, you know, let's do as much as we can type of thing. So. yeah, I think the practices that I've seen, you know, that come to mind that are very successful, they're very, very intentional about culture, but also about the types of clients that they're they're attracting. And I've actually never asked them about it, but I'd be interested on your opinion. Do you think starting with culture first and then letting that kind of attract the right people or repel the wrong people, even, or really building that into the process of, you know, we're only going to target clients that, for example, will take all of the recommendations that we make and they want, you know, all the preventative and they have to do dentistry and things like that.

Brandon 00:09:27  What are your thoughts about that?

Josh 00:09:29  Yeah, it's a really wonderful question. I love that you're asking that. This is one of those places where I feel like there is quite a bit of parallel between, you know, culture, design and marketing. because I, I do feel that the, the sort of, the, the shotgun approach to, you know, to creating a culture to creating an environment or in this case, the shotgun approach to who do we want to be so that we attract the right people, so on and so forth. It doesn't work. I mean, that was one of the things that I, I think I personally failed at was that both of the practices that I ran, we tried to be everything to everyone all the time. That's impossible. It's not possible. Like you just you can't actually do that as a veterinarian. You can't just say, I want to practice veterinary medicine and then go out into the world and practice veterinary medicine. I mean, that doesn't make sense.

Josh 00:10:22  The reality is, is that most veterinarians do actually differentiate already to an extent, even though they sort of behave as if they're trying to be everything to everyone. They've they've already differentiated. You don't see a small animal hospital that also does bovine medicine. Yeah. Right. Like that. That's that's just not the case. They they decide well, I want to be a small animal practice. I want to work in exotics. I want to be a general practitioner. I want to be an oncologist. Like that's already differentiation. You have to do that. Otherwise you can't do anything. Well if you're trying to do everything all at once. I think that applies internally to culture as well. So I suppose my response to that would be in the ideal world, if I were working with, you know, a startup of some kind, a veterinary startup of some kind. And the proprietors of that practice came to me and said, we need help designing this practice. And they asked me that question. I would I would respond to them that you have to figure out who you want to be in the world.

Josh 00:11:26  First, you have to figure out what is the what is the type of organization that you want to walk into every day. What is the experience at work that you're willing to tolerate? there's, there's an author by the name of Mark Manson. I don't know how you feel about colorful language on your podcast.

Brandon 00:11:44  It's okay. Not too many children listening to this. Okay. Marketing.

Josh 00:11:48  That's good. In my defense, I'm quoting the title of an actual book. Yeah. he wrote a book. The Subtle Art of Not Giving a fuck. Yeah. And one of the. Yeah. It's amazing. Right? I can't remember if it's actually included in the book or if it's just on his original blog online, but he wrote an article about, the kinds of questions that we need to ask ourselves. And that one of the problems that Manson believes we have is that, we ask ourselves the question, what will make me happy? And I think that that this can also apply to, to the workplace, to culture design and probably to marketing.

Josh 00:12:25  Like, you know, we ask ourselves, like, what is the workplace that's going to make me happy? What are the things at work that are going to make me happy? What are the type of clients that are going to make me happy? And what Manson, I think would argue and what I advocate for as well, is what we should actually ask ourselves is, is what is the type of practice environment, What's the culture and workplace and experience that I'm willing to fight for, that I'm willing to, you know, spend blood, sweat and tears on that. I'm willing to endure because sometimes it's going to be shitty, you know? What are the types of clients that I'm willing to tolerate that I'm willing to put up with? Because even the best client is going to have an off day because they're a human being. Right. So I think you have to start there. You have to start defining what are the core values that are non-negotiable, what are the kinds of things that we absolutely have to hold on to with a death grip? And then what are we willing to do to ensure that that death grip persists? And then that will tell you the type of clients that you're going to go after.

Josh 00:13:28  I'm not a marketing expert. You're an expert here. And maybe you will push back on me and I will welcome that. But I think if you start with defining who you want to be in the world, then it becomes very obvious the type of people you want to attract as a client, and then you can start directing your efforts towards attracting those specific people. Otherwise, you're just throwing a bunch of stuff out into the world, and you're going to get what you're going to get, and you're probably not going to be very happy with a lot of it.

Brandon 00:13:56  Definitely. I think that's that's very interesting and I would agree with that. like an example would be if you want to pay your staff more than minimum wage, for example, you can't just do low cost medicine like you have to charge what you're worth. You have to find the clients that are, you know, able and willing and happy to pay for your services. Yeah. Otherwise, you're you're not going to be able to achieve that goal.

Brandon 00:14:22  I know, most likely I don't know. I've never run a practice. Right. But like I would assume if you have healthy margins, you could pay your staff better.

Josh 00:14:29  Well, so I think that's the key point. So I'm actually if it's okay with you, I'm gonna I'm gonna go for it. Play a bit of a divergent role here. I think the point is you started by saying if you want to pay your your staff really well above minimum wage, those kinds of things, you can't be a low cost hospital. But then you went on to say it's really about the margins. And I think that's actually the key. So if it turns out that, like it, I am willing to suffer through a day where I have to see 50 patients to make sure that I'm, you know, a high functioning. I've got a bottom line of 20%, like I'm generating 20% EBITDA. And I want to be the kind of practice that generates that kind of EBITDA and is high flow. Like, I'm just I'm trying to serve a a low socioeconomic community.

Josh 00:15:20  That's what matters to me. That's what's important. And so I am ready to endure the pain of seeing 50 patients a day. And I'm willing to do that for the next 30 years. Great. Now, you've defined who you want to be, which means that you have to generate an environment that's going to attract the same kind of people. right? You have to. You have to go out into the world, and you've got to find yourself associate veterinarians and credential technicians who are, like, just deeply driven by the mission of serving this community that is underserved. And they are ready to endure the same kind of pain that you're ready to endure. Don't B.S. them, don't oversell it. Don't try and be like, oh, we're the hospital where you're going to get, you know, a 30 minute break every three hours and you're going to get four weeks of PTO every year. And we're going to, you know, like it's don't try and be that like, be who you are. Say, we are the hospital that is trying to serve this community that is currently not served.

Josh 00:16:20  And that means that every day we're going to come into the practice and we're going to hit the ground running at 7 a.m., and we are not going to take a breath until 7 p.m. but my God, at the end of that day, we're going to look back at 50 patients together that we made a difference in their lives. And we're going to have grateful clients that can't afford to go anywhere else, you know, like, okay, great. That's the kind of hospital you're going to be then be that.

Brandon 00:16:41  Yeah, that's that's totally good point. And I've worked with low cost vaccine and spay and neuter places that were volume. And they were profitable and they actually did very, very well. Cost per acquisition for clients was low. But I think the the thing that is you'll have just kind of the middle of the road practice who they they aspire to really high levels of medicine and having a beautiful practice and all these things. But it's not them because they're not willing to do the work. They say it.

Brandon 00:17:11  And that's where the mismatch between delivering on what they say and what they are. and so I think that's that's very, very interesting. And so yeah, choose choose. You're going to be and be it. And then I do think too, that what I'm seeing a lot of is as people are opening practices, especially with startup practices that they're opening, and the market is vastly different from what they imagined it would be, because past two years the market has gone from the Covid hype of over busy you know, to now you know where where are the clients that type of thing. Which is interesting. and so, I think actually that's becoming more and more kind of, especially with like certain urgent care practices that are opening, they're having to completely pivot from their mission. and general practices are trying to fill appointments and things. So my I guess a question for you with that is within the leadership and culture that you're you're building in your practice. how much do you think your, your team and, and how do you go about really instilling what your practice is about, like the key ways that you communicate value? Like how do you how do you go about actually practically doing that in a practice? because I think that's one other thing, is that I'll listen to phone calls from the marketing that we're doing, and without I'm there almost always the CSRs that are picking up the phone or are mostly making up things as they go.

Brandon 00:18:49  And so you'll have people that are really skilled and great on the phone and people that are awful, and there's really no rhyme or reason to it. And so how do you go out really instilling like who you are and what your practice is about from a practical standpoint?

Josh 00:19:06  Yeah. okay. So I think the question that you're asking here is, is how do we take a core set of values or a cultural ethos and ensure that it comes alive and the people that deliver on that ethos consistently, like, how do how do.

Brandon 00:19:22  We make everybody in practice has a part in that, right? Even down to the CSRs, which are a lot of times overlooked.

Josh 00:19:28  100%. I think you're absolutely right. I'm going to give a bit of an oversimplified response, but I think it's backed by a lot of evidence on our team. Here at flourish, our director of operations. Her name is Tess Warner. Tess is one of the smartest, most thoughtful and insightful human beings I know. Among her many skills, are an MBA, a real knack for business operations and strategy.

Josh 00:19:52  But also, she's a certified dog trainer. she went through some pretty advanced training, and got some some pretty cool certifications to train dogs. Tess jokingly often says to to us in team meetings that what Andy and I say, Andy is my colleague. That's, you know, for outward facing. We're the the positive change agents that do the work of flourish. That what Andy and I do is essentially dog training for people. And I think it's funny, but it's also really quite accurate. I think that culture, it's going to sound unbelievably simple because it actually really is. It's where simple becomes challenging is on the day to day intentional delivery of it. Culture is basically a mix of three elements. We are damn clear on who we're trying to be in the world. Like, clear. I have a list of five words that are my values. Integrity. Teamwork. Honesty. Kindness. Like that is not clarity when I say the word integrity. You're already thinking things, Brandon. And I'm thinking things.

Josh 00:20:57  And there is no guarantee that what you and I are thinking are aligned. Yeah. Integrity can mean so many things to so many people. We have to take these values, and we have to define them with such vivid veracity that, like everybody, it is inarguable what we mean by that here. And one of the ways to do that is to turn it into a clear list of behaviors. These are the kinds of behaviors that indicate to us that this is really happening here. It's our version of it. It's our way. So getting that clarity, that's the first thing. The next two things are nudges and incentives. So there has to be something operationally in the system of the environment that actively encourages people to behave in that way. Like that sets them up for success and behaving the way that we want to see in the world, because that's behaviors are indications of values. Nobody can see in your heart and mind. All that they can see is the way that you show up, the behaviors that you do.

Josh 00:21:56  So we have to be clear about what those are, and then we have to create nudges that that encourage people to move in that direction. That can be a lot harder than, than we think. And then the third thing is the incentives. So there has to be some sort of an incentive that either enhances that nudge and encouragement or rewards the appropriate behavior or both. So I'll give you some very, very clear examples of what I mean by this. We've got several values that we talk about constantly. we we haven't really finalized them yet because they're they're ever evolving and the way that our organization is evolving. But one of the things that we often talk about a lot is doing serious work without taking it or ourselves too seriously. It can be really easy for, you know, the the important work I'm doing. Air quotes. The important work that that we do to be all consuming, just like it is in a veterinary practice when a veterinarian feels like I am the source of care for all these animals in the community, that can be all consuming, right? It's serious work.

Josh 00:23:07  Not taking it or ourselves too seriously means that we don't get caught up in the, you know, the minutia and trivialities of the day to day work. And we also are cognizant of when we are becoming consumed by it. And so we create structures to prevent that from happening. So one of the nudges that prevents our work from being all consuming so that we can do the serious work without taking it too seriously or ourselves too seriously, is twice a year flourish as an organization completely closes? We shut down the week of the 4th of July and the week between Christmas and New Year's. Our entire company is closed. We block off the calendars. We do that a year in advance. We pick the dates and we block off the calendars, and then we all set out of offices and nobody checks their email or responds to any messages during that period of time. We make it very clear to the world, like, this is why we're doing this, and you're not going to we're not going to reach out to you like, these are the dates that we'll be back, and that's when you'll hear from us, right? So that's okay.

Brandon 00:24:11  Yeah.

Josh 00:24:12  And then an incentive that we use is we're a virtual team. There's four of us and we're spread all over the country. So we use slack to communicate quite a lot. We have created custom emojis in slack is like little like peer to peer incentives for when we're actually, like, living out our values. So whenever like for one example of this, whenever somebody on the team does something that really closely matches with how we're trying to show up in the world and, and all of us will do this to each other. we, we put in we embedded a Mandalorian mask emoji. Do you watch The Mandalorian?

Brandon 00:24:48  This is the way. Yeah.

Josh 00:24:49  Yeah, exactly. Exactly. So whenever somebody does something that, like, matches the flourish way, we just post a Mandalorian emoji. Like, yeah, this is the way. so these are ways that we're incentivizing each other. Like, hey, that was a behavior that we want to see more of. This is the way. Do it again.

Josh 00:25:08  Right. I think that those are kinds of the things that have to be embedded. If you're doing that, if you're very, very clear on what who you want to be, how you want to show up in the world, what the behaviors are that indicate you're showing up that way, then you can teach those behaviors Throughout the organization, you can create operationalized nudges that encourage those behaviors. So, for example, for your CSR, maybe, patience is a virtue in, you know, a value that you hold true in your organization. And patience for you means that whenever you're engaged in a conversation with a client, you give that client your full attention until that conversation is completed. Now think about that. That's you're nodding. You said, That sounds pretty good, right? Yep. Imagine you're at the front desk and you're talking to a client who's standing in front of you, and the phone rings, and there's no other CSRs up there with you. How do you handle that situation? If patience is the value, right.

Josh 00:26:08  That's something you can train on. You can have that conversation you could talk about how would that show up that that's creating nudges for that and then incentivizing it when you see them doing it. Oh my God, you better recognize that and you better applaud that. And that can be just a really quick like Brandon. Hey, you know, I saw that you were talking to Josh up front and the phone rang and you just ignored it and let it go to voicemail. Brandon, that was awesome. Because, you know, one of our values is patience. And one of the ways that that shows up is we give the client the full attention until that conversation is done. And you just did that with the client standing in front of you. Bravo, man. That's it. That's it. Do that over and over and over again. That's how culture is created. If you don't do that, culture will still be created. It's just probably not going to be the culture you want.

Brandon 00:26:59  Definitely. That totally makes sense.

Brandon 00:27:02  And I, I can think of I mean, there's just so many, so many little steps that need to be handled and, and taught and then reinforced like that, just that are not natural, especially to people that I think are personality types that will typically wind up as CSRs for attending practice, which are not usually like people that are super extroverted. Generally speaking, they like animals. They want to hang out with animals. They'll go work in animal hospital like that makes sense. But then they're dealing with people all day, which is kind of exactly opposite of what they signed up for.

Josh 00:27:34  So funny.

Brandon 00:27:35  That's interesting. Well, one thing that I wanted to talk to you about was and get your, your take on was, so attracting clients is something that I talk about very, very heavily, but I think the opposite of that is just as important. So repelling clients that are not going to be a good fit, and then even possibly firing clients that are bad, that mistreat your staff and team and things like that.

Brandon 00:27:59  how important do you think the inverse of, like, attracting the right clients versus repelling the wrong ones? And then also, do you think that it's really important that you make that public in terms of, you know, we are defending the culture. We want to make this an amazing place. So how much do you think people should be showing their work when it comes to like this type of thing within a team. Because if you're like, I can remember a few times where, in working with organizations where somebody genuinely mistreated me very poorly, and I remember that the boss threw me under the bus and it was just like, I'm done at that moment. I'm like, I'm gonna start looking for something else. Yeah, I have no value here. and so what's your take on that?

Josh 00:28:48  Yeah. Okay. So you had an experience. Let me just make sure I'm understanding this. Right. You had an experience where you were working somewhere, and there was a client interaction that went badly, and your boss actively blamed you for it.

Josh 00:29:03  Through you on the bus of the client.

Brandon 00:29:04  Absolutely was not my fault. Was, some somebody knew that we were working with they were new in the role, so they were trying to basically establish dominance in the position, threw me under the bus wrongfully, and they blamed and piled on to save face Yeah. And look better.

Josh 00:29:21  Yeah. I mean, that's horrible. And in the ideal world, that should never happen. my my personal philosophy is that, the people that deliver on the outcomes of the organization should be the most important. and so a single client interaction, even with a major client. all things being equal. If there's any way that, that team member is not responsible, not at fault, for that interaction, you you just have to take the team members side. the big reason for that is that for me, this again, goes back to culture. Every decision that we make when we hold power in an organization. Every decision that we make when we hold influence in an organization, but certainly when we hold power, is an indication of the culture that we intend to create.

Josh 00:30:21  Whether it is our intention or not. So. Everything that we do that boss, that through you under the bus with a client that is sending a clear message to the team that this is a place where I will take the client side over the employee side. People aren't going to interpret that as a one off. They're not going to interpret that as a singularity, unless there is a long standing history of taking the employee side. Right. So if if you had had five interactions like that and five of them, your boss came to your defense immediately, unequivocally. And then the sixth one, they took the client side. You're still going to be hurt by it, but you're not going to be like, oh, okay, I see what's happening here. You're going to be like, what the heck just happened? And then you might have a conversation with that person, right? So we need to keep that in mind when we're in a leadership position. Every decision we make is an indication to the environment, the type of culture that we intend to have.

Josh 00:31:24  And so that's how people are going to interpret it. So I do think that it makes a ton of sense to whenever you can, whenever possible, whenever even remotely reasonable, take your team members side. I think it makes perfect sense to part of defining who you want to be in the world is also implying who you're not going to be. Right. And so if there are clients or customers that fit in that category, you know, working to actively filter them out directly or indirectly, I think makes a ton of sense. And then sanctioning the the those who are damaging to the potential culture is also critically important. You said firing clients. I sometimes tongue in cheek say liberating people from our mutual discontent. I mean, I do think that that's really important. I'm thinking about. I'm pulling this in. We don't have to go in this direction, but it is a bit apropos. One of the things that's becoming a bit of a buzzword in, in veterinary circles is this idea of psychological safety in the workplace.

Josh 00:32:31  And I'm grateful to see that, although I think that there's a lot of misunderstanding about what it is and isn't. But anyway, Doctor Amy Edmondson, who's one of the preeminent scholars on this concept of psychological safety, she often talks about that cultivating psychological safety is about intentional action, and it's about creating a culture of safe voice. It's also about sanctioning things that damage that culture. And so if you're trying to create psychological safety and you're actively building that within the organization, and then you have a team member who is constantly shooting down other people's ideas, telling them that they're, you know, Brandon, you don't know what the heck you're talking about here. You may as well just shut up. Right? Like that is a clear violation of psychological safety that needs to be sanctioned by somebody in charge. Like that person needs to be pulled aside and coached or even coached in front of. Others in a productive and appropriate way, or if they simply cannot get on board with. Like this behavior is unacceptable.

Josh 00:33:28  Here are the behaviors that I would like to see. As replacements, if they can't get on board with that, then they need to be let go. They're not right for that environment that applies to clients as well. If we want to be the kind of place we'll go back to our patients example. We want to be the kind of place where that one on one relationship is so important that we're willing to sit with it patiently, like Zappos does on their, you know, their their customer support lines. Like we're willing to take it to that level if we have a client who is like walking in and seeing you talking to me and then is interrupting and getting agitated and angry, we need to have a conversation with that client like that. Is this is not how we roll here. And when it's your turn, you're going to get exactly the same attention. And if they can't deal with that, they need to not be our client. Yeah.

Brandon 00:34:18  Totally. Makes sense. Absolutely. yeah, that that all makes sense.

Brandon 00:34:23  And, I guess the when when you're coaching practice owners and leaders in, in the veterinary industry, how much do you suggest that they go and like, actively bring the team into the conversation. So like, do you think it'd be productive to go through on a regular basis and say, like, who are our favorite clients? Who do we absolutely love working with? And we're going to go out and find more of those people. And who are our biggest headaches that we might want to say, hey, we should say, maybe you need to find another practice. Do you think that those types of conversations are helpful to have in a team setting, or do you think that should just mostly come from ownership, or is it just depends on philosophy of how you run your teams?

Josh 00:35:04  Yeah, it probably I mean, to some extent it probably depends a bit on philosophy, but man, I think that could be such a powerful intervention. Brandon, can you imagine you're working somewhere and the owner comes to you and says, hey, tell me who are like, your top ten favorite clients here? What is it about those ten people that make them such favorites? What do they do differently that you really enjoy and look forward to? What do you think it would look like to find more people like that? Brandon, what are like the 2 or 3 people that you most dread picking up the phone for or seeing walk through our front door.

Josh 00:35:41  Like, what is it about them that's dreadful? what do you think, if anything, would make it easier for you to work with people like that? I mean, can you have. If somebody asked you that you're working somewhere? The owner asks you those kinds of questions. How are you feeling?

Brandon 00:35:58  Amazing. Yeah. Absolutely amazing. And excited to because you always have clients that you love seeing and you're excited to see come in. And I'm, you know, it it would just make you energized and excited about your work for sure.

Josh 00:36:11  Now imagine that the owner takes your input and combines it with the input of others. Or even this is like a group conversation. And then the owner of that practice hires Brandon Breshears to create a marketing campaign to attract all of those kinds of clients that fit the model of your top ten favorites. And then imagine that that same owner hires Flourish Veterinary Consulting to help you cultivate stronger communication and conflict management skills. So that those bottom three people, maybe it turns out that they're not actually horrible people.

Josh 00:36:50  You just don't really feel super confident dealing with whatever personality traits they bring in the door. And now the owner provides you with those skills and support and sits down with you and talks with you through a plan of how it might look the next time they walk in, and how you know the things that you feel confident doing on your own and the stuff that maybe you need their help with. Now imagine that kind of stuff happens. So not only has your voice been invited and included, but some sort of positive action has come from your voice. I think it's so ironic that, you know, often I hear a lot from people in, in leadership positions, in veterinary practices. I just want a team that's motivated and accountable. And yet we do nothing to give them a sense of empowerment and ownership in the environment. Right. Like if you want a team that's accountable, give them a voice and the things they're accountable to. Like if you include people, if you have these kinds of conversations that I mean, I'll ask you honestly if all of that stuff happens, are you going to feel a little bit more motivated at work, maybe a little more accountable to the things that are expected of you?

Brandon 00:37:59  Absolutely.

Brandon 00:38:00  And I think it also goes to increasing like the your belief set in in the practice, the services that you're providing, the people that you're helping, and the impact that you're making. I think that's one of the biggest problems, is that when we talk about sales or marketing, it is kind of like a dark subject of like, I don't want to do sales. I don't want to close people. Yeah. Especially the, the front desk staff that are anybody in practice. They hate sales. Right. Generally speaking. Yeah. But if you can just increase the belief in the product like this is going to help people, we're going to provide better service. That's the easiest way to improve your conversion rate. And if your CSRs believe that you like the person who just called, they need to get in today because we're going to be able to help them. I can't tell you how many times I've listened to calls and somebody answers the phone. They say, well, you should probably call the practice on the street.

Brandon 00:38:53  They're a little bit cheaper. And you're like, what is this person doing? There's no belief in the practice. They're probably dead inside and they probably hate their job. Right? I would love to see if anybody listening could go through. Ask one of your people in practice. The ten favorite clients that you love, seeing them come in, and then look how many referrals those people have generated. My bet is that they probably are like part of the 20% that generates 80% of the referrals. Most likely. Yeah. but that's yeah. Why should they be motivated and have buy in to the outcomes when they don't have any say over anything? I think that's a really good point. Yeah, absolutely. So I guess another question that I wanted to talk to you about was how do we increase that belief? Is that just a function of culture? is what is your thoughts on that, and does that make sense to you from a sales perspective? Like, I think that's probably the most difficult thing to train, like increase the belief in the product as being a benefit.

Brandon 00:39:57  Yeah, it's something that is or isn't. Yeah. But it'll make it so that people want to set up appointments or refer to the practice down the street. It's a little bit cheaper.

Josh 00:40:07  Yeah. I think you're really on to something, Brandon. That word belief really stands out to me for two reasons. Number one, belief is an intrinsic experience, and it is an emotive experience. I believe in something internally, like I have come to believe in it on my own, of my own volition. And there is an emotional response to that belief, which drives me to act and behave in a particular way. So yeah, I think I mean that that applies both externally from a marketing perspective. A team member has to, like, genuinely believe of their own choice. Not because I told them, not because I educated them, but because they came to the conclusion themselves. That's an autonomous experience. That's a critical element in intrinsic motivation. We know that conclusively from 40 years of research. And then they have to see the value of that belief, they have to see that it contributes to something that's meaningful, that matters to them in some way.

Josh 00:41:09  That's also an essential part of intrinsic motivation. We know that from 40 years of research. And then the last element, the last piece, is that they have to know how like they have to feel empowered to do something with it. All of that comes also internally from culture. Like we have to first define what it what is the belief we're trying to instill in our team, and what does that belief look like and why does that matter? And how does that show up in the world? I mean, that's what a mission statement is, right? A really good mission statement evokes something. It's not just black and white on a page, it actually solicits an emotional response. If you can get to that, you're going to do really well. And one of the best ways to get to that is to include people in it. You know, whether it's the generation thereof. there are, modalities for including an entire organization in organizational identity in creating some of that, but you don't necessarily have to go that way.

Josh 00:42:05  Maybe their values are their legacy values. They're so deeply instilled. And, you know, this new CSR that's been working with me for for two months, he or she or they doesn't really they're not really a part of creating it. But we have to make it real for them. Which means you have to establish a relationship in a conversation with that person. You know, Brandon here at ABC hospital, like patients is it's just something we've always practiced. We've always sort of taken the James Herriot approach. You know, we're like, we we we cultivate the strong, enduring relationships with our clients, and we give all of our energy and time to them to take the best possible care of their pets so that they can have a great relationship with their pet. You know, some ways that that's shown up for us here in the past is this, this and this, Brian, based on that, they're branded based on that. What do you think patients is going to look like for you and your role? Brandon, you're telling me that patience is going to look like x, Y, and Z? How is that going to make a difference for you and for the clients that you're dealing with? How is that going to improve their lives? How's it going to make you feel like you're doing more meaningful work? Like having that conversation with somebody now you're helping them internalize it.

Josh 00:43:20  That's where belief comes from. It doesn't come because I told you that patience is a value here, and it better be your pay, your value. Right. It comes from. I came to it on my own. So guiding people that way, I think can be a really valuable way to create that shared belief.

Brandon 00:43:36  Yeah, definitely. And I'm sure higher levels of confidence in the reason, like why that is important and the actual benefit, which is just communication and and leadership, which again, doesn't come naturally to people. generally speaking I think. Well, do you think that people are do you think there is such a thing as born leaders? I'm asking because I definitely don't have leadership skills and it's something I've been working on for the past year. And so I don't know if there are people that are born leaders. what what is your thought on that?

Josh 00:44:09  I, I think some of it probably depends on how we're defining the word leader, but generally speaking, no, I don't think that there are born leaders.

Josh 00:44:19  I think all of us have the potential for quality leadership and our lived experience and the things that we learn along the way. And, you know, probably the people around us and our mentors and those kinds of things tweeze out that potential into actual behavior and action, consistent behavior and action and mindset, too. By the way, I think that's a very important part of leadership. or it doesn't. and then you go down the path that I went down, which is being absolutely, horrifically horrible at it. And then you figure that out one day and you're like, oh, shit, I need to figure out how to do this better. And then you go down the journey that I've gone down the last, you know, almost ten years of my life. but no, I don't think that people are born, which I think is actually one of the coolest things ever, because it means that we can all learn it.

Brandon 00:45:04  Yeah, definitely. Totally. Totally true. So when you're working with a practice, what do they typically say? Like what are the symptoms of somebody who wants to do better? Like what are the typical things that you'll hear.

Brandon 00:45:21  Yeah. Is it turnover the symptom that they come to you for. Is it just lack of fun and kind of dread in life? What is it?

Josh 00:45:30  Yeah. in in my mind, there are two categories of, folks who come to flourish. one of them, which is the smallest group. But it does happen. And it's happened more than once. Is there actually doing this pretty well already? And I just want to make sure that they continue to do it as well as they can, which I think speaks to the character of the people in charge there. That's pretty awesome. I mean, we've definitely had clients where we go through a discovery process with them. And I say to them, like, I honestly don't know why you would want to pay us all this money to do this work. Like you're already pretty good at it. And they say, that's exactly what we want to pay you, because we're pretty good at it, and we want to get better, and we want to make sure that we keep doing that well.

Josh 00:46:12  The largest group are people who are experiencing some form of suffering in leadership. So they're the hospital owner, they're the practice manager, they're the managing DVM. They're, you know, a chief medical officer for some corporate group, and they're experiencing some sort of pain or suffering within their workplace environment. And generally, I think that that pain and suffering comes from one of two or both areas, turnover. We're losing people and we can't find more and conflict, there's some interpersonal element that is creating uncomfortable tension within the environment, and we don't know what to do about it.

Brandon 00:46:54  That's, I think, definitely easy to identify. And I think most practices are feeling that. Do you think that I guess well does it depend on on the size when somebody comes to you? Is it more about the organization or the individual that you think it needs to start with, with respect to leadership training and culture building? yeah, it does depend.

Josh 00:47:20  yes. It's all it's it's all. We are. We are both contributing to and functions of the systems we participate in.

Josh 00:47:37  So one way you could think about it, Brandon, your family, you're married, you have two kids. Is that right? Two kids. Three kids. Right. Okay. So when you and your wife and your three children are hanging out in the house, the behaviors that you bring to the table are in, at least in some way, shape or form, informed or influenced by your wife and your three kids and your household and your idea of the family unit and those kinds of things that also applies to them. Your wife's behaviors, your children's behaviors are also influenced by how they view those things. And your behaviors are influenced by your wife's behaviors, and her behaviors are influenced by your behaviors. And all of that is influenced by your lived experience. Even way back before you met your wife and her lived experience way back before she met you. All those things systems are incredibly complex and messy, and so we are both contributing to the system and affected by it. When we're in a leadership position, we have more influence over the system than others.

Josh 00:48:48  So when you're the hospital owner in a private practice and you're the sole owner. You have the most influence over that system. You don't have all of it. You don't have all the power, but you have the most. The people who work there also influence it. Right. And so the things that you can control when you're in charge are your day to day behaviors and the nudges and incentives operationalized into the system. And so we try and start with both of those.

Brandon 00:49:19  What do we make sense. so for practices that are I guess, at what point do you think, practices would be best helped by reaching out to you? Because I get, I get I'm surprised how many startup practices I'm coming in into touch with. Like, obviously practice that's open. Yeah. And they would be benefited. But do you think that startup practices should be intentional with this too?

Josh 00:49:48  Oh yeah. I wish I.

Josh 00:49:50  Wish.

Josh 00:49:51  That every. I mean, I know this is not realistic, realistic time wise or financially necessarily, but every startup hospital, if they spend six months with us before they started working with the architect, before they started working with the vendors to buy their equipment, before they started hiring people, before they started planning for day one of opening, if they spent six months with us just working on who do we want to be in the world, what does that look like behaviorally? How do I create a system that attracts interviews, hires, and on boards the people who are going to match those values to the best of their ability? If we could just create that stuff before the doors open.

Josh 00:50:43  Oh my gosh. Yeah, I, I really, I don't I mean, I think we would be out of a job within a few years, like there wouldn't be a flourish. But I think, yeah, I think most often what happens, like I said before, is that folks, you know, I mean, I did it to write like, you know, oh, this sounds like a great idea. I want to do this. It's going to be awesome. I have a mental model in my head of what it's going to be, and then I charge forward and I do it. And then six months or six years later, it is a shit storm. And now I got a fine flourish veterinary consulting to help clean up the mess. It's a lot harder at that point.

Brandon 00:51:16  Definitely. Yeah. What do you make sense? Well, tell me, tell me about all of the events and things that you have coming up here. Because I think it's actually pretty timely, especially as people are, planning for end of year stuff and trying to make next year better, too.

Brandon 00:51:28  We're in the last quarter already. Yeah, I think.

Brandon 00:51:31  It's it's wildly approaching.

Josh 00:51:33  Yeah, man. This year is like flown by. has got a few exciting things, starting up, after the new year. So, we have, an arm of our firm called the Flourish Academy. And in the Flourish Academy, we provide some certificate programs, their cohort based certificate programs, their multi-month 6 to 8 months in duration, usually around 20 hours or so of race credit. 12 hours of KVM credit for some of them as well. the the next cohorts of the two programs that we've already had in place in the past, which is our Certificate in Positive Veterinary Leadership, loosely based on my book, Lead to Thrive. that program launches in January of 2025, so registration should open in November of 24 and go through the end of the year. for that. And then, Andy Davison's program, her certificate for veterinary resilience, which is also an eight month cohort style program, I believe, launches in March.

Josh 00:52:36  So registration or it might be February. Registration for that should be opening up pretty soon as well. And then next year, the second half of the year, we're going to be launching two brand new certificate programs. really on the idea of communication and conflict resolution? so they will be, positive communication for veterinary leaders is one of them. And positive communication for veterinary professionals. so really anybody on the team is the second program. And those will be coming out through the Flourish Academy in the second half of 25.

Brandon 00:53:06  That's very exciting. And, I didn't mention this to you before, but if if somebody made it all the way through the podcast here, if you send me a message on LinkedIn and the first ten people to do it, I'll send you a copy of, Lead to Thrive, your book, for people that are listening now. So I think it's a really good book. and also know a bunch of people who've been through Flourish Academy that have just sang its praises and things, and I'm so glad to have you on.

Brandon 00:53:33  I think I, I actually reached out to you for an interview almost when you just launched your book, but it'd been so long, things got in between. So I apologize for being delayed there.

Brandon 00:53:44  But anyways.

Brandon 00:53:46  yeah, send me a message on LinkedIn and I'll send you a copy of of your book. I'll buy those and send them out. That'd be cool. but I, I really appreciate all of your insights, and, I'm I'm envious of your skills, and and thanks to the struggle that I'm in right now. So I appreciate you. You have to do a flourish Academy for digital marketers.

Brandon 00:54:08  And you.

Josh 00:54:09  Got it. I'm on it.

Brandon 00:54:10  That's great.

Brandon 00:54:12  So I really appreciate your time today and all of your insights. And, thank you so much for being on the podcast.

Josh 00:54:19  Thanks, Brandon. This has been a blast. Always. It's always great to chat with you. All right.