DrAndyRoark.com

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Perspective

Thoughts On Discounting & Paying Staff

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A few weeks ago, I published one of my Cone of Shame podcasts on “Intentional Discounting.” I talked with Dr. Tannetje Crocker about when and how she gives discounts to clients in the emergency room, and the episode certainly got peoples’ attention. I ended up getting a bit of criticism over the piece, and now that I’ve reflected on it, I’d like to share what I have learned.

The criticisms I got basically fell into three categories. 

1. Drawn Conclusions

The first category was people who read the pull quote on social media, looked at comments from others, and then shared strong feelings about what they assumed was in the podcast. 

2. Questions About Fairness

The second category was one that I think is very valid and basically comes down to questions about fairness in discounting for some and not others, and also about how realistic it is for most practices to reduce their prices “as needed.” This was an error on my part in framing the conversation. 

I think reducing prices is one tool in the toolbox of practices trying to help pet owners provide care. I personally think it should be an infrequently used tool, and one that is a tiny part of a much larger system of supporting pet owners having financial difficulties. My mistake was not stating those beliefs at the start, rather jumping in with Dr. Crocker to discuss how discounting is done without enough surrounding context. That’s an adjustment I will certainly make in the future whenever talking about reducing prices.

3. Discounting & The Impacts On Staff Salaries

The third category is the one that has bothered me a bit. There were a number of people who felt that discounting services would prevent technicians from being able to earn a higher wage. They pointed out that I have regularly talked about the importance of raising technician salaries and felt that my openness to discounting in certain situations was counterproductive.

While I understand the basic idea that if practices do not collect revenue, they can’t then give said revenue to their technicians. I think the situation is a bit more complicated than that. 

Yes, I do believe that low salaries are damaging to our profession retaining and creating positive work experiences for paraprofessionals. However, let me ask you this… would you be more likely to leave a practice because it paid slightly less, or because it had a policy of turning pet owners away if they could not afford services?

There’s an undeniable emotional cost to withholding care based on a pet owner’s inability to pay the bill. That doesn’t release us from our responsibility to create a living wage for our people or to run a healthy business. It does, in my opinion, prohibit us from looking at financial policy in the black and white terms of “pay us or leave.”

The Importance of Balance In Access To Care

When we talk about access to care, we should never forget that success in veterinary medicine is balance. It’s about finding solutions that work for everyone. It’s about weighing our need to generate revenue against our needs to provide care to pets and people. 

No, this is not an easy position and most of us get it wrong from time-to-time. But the future of our profession is neither an exercise in maximizing income or in unsustainably sacrificing ourselves and our teams to provide the highest standard of care to all who walk through our doors.

My friends, our lives would be much easier if we simply demanded payment in full up front and turned away anyone who couldn’t afford it. After all, isn’t that what almost every other business does? But this is not our purpose and while our lives would be simpler, they would be poisonous to our souls. Yes, our road is a complicated one. Our challenge must always be to take better care of both pets AND ourselves.

Learner’s Permits & The Power of Referred Joy

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My oldest daughter recently got her learner’s permit. This permit now allows her to practice driving a car as long as an adult is with her. She is beyond excited. So it comes at no surprise when she asks if I’ll ride around with her at least once per day.

Helping teach my daughter how to drive has leveled up her driving skills, but also taught me an important lesson: referred joy is a powerful thing.

An evening driving lesson

On one of the first days she had her permit, I took my daughter to a strip mall that had closed down for the night to let her practice parking. I brought along two big cardboard boxes and placed them in parking spaces so she could better envision what it would be like to have to navigate around other cars.

I told her “if you hit the boxes… we’re going to go home.” Then I sat back and watched her work. The surgical precision my daughter used to avoid those boxes was nothing short of impressive. She was so proud of herself… until she lost focus while backing out and bumped one of the cardboard cubes.

Of course I didn’t make her go home, but the exercise and the perceived stakes made for a fun evening.

Acknowledging the presence of referred joy

My daughter couldn’t have been happier out there driving in circles around the parking lot, and it felt SO GOOD to be able to facilitate the joy she was experiencing. All in all, I wasn’t really doing anything. I was just there riding along, giving encouragement, and maybe providing a little guidance. Still, I was able to share the joy she was having with her new adventure.

It reminded me of working in the clinic. We are very lucky to have jobs where we get to be a part of other peoples’ joy as often as we are. 

Just think about it. How many times do you work with people bursting with excitement about their new furry family member or pride in the tricks their pets have learned? It’s hard not to feel those emotions with them. Think about all the times the smiles crept from their faces onto your own. Just by doing your job, you have increased their joy. 

Isn’t that amazing? Referred joy is the joy one gets from being a part of someone else’s happiness. It’s a beautiful perk not thought about often enough. Yet there are so many opportunities to tap into it. All you have to do is be present. To support the smiles and excitement that come through our doors.

Final Thought

So, what if you paid more attention to referred joy? Simply, look for happy people you can make happier. Look for opportunities to facilitate smiles and support laughter. Then, soak up the goodness that comes from it.

Happiness Is Looking Forward To Carrot Cake

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My friend Dr. Bruce Francke turned 57 last week. His birthday also happened to fall on his 30 year anniversary working at Bay Animal Hospital (not counting the three years he worked in the kennel in high school).

Bruce’s expectations for the day were pretty low. With his practice down three doctors in recent months, to protest his staff’s wellbeing, he and his partner have been working open to close Monday-Friday for three months now. His birthday would be no exception. 

When Bruce and I were talking about his day, he paused and explained that his wife had made him carrot cake from scratch, and that was one thing he was really excited about. It was “the thing he was looking forward to all day.”

At the end of the day, Bruce’s team told him the IT company needed to have yet another emergency meeting about the new server that had been recently installed in the practice. Bruce decided to work in his office while he waited for the IT people to arrive. 

Well, the IT company never showed up. 

Instead, Bruce’s friends and family packed the waiting room for a surprise celebration. When he finally emerged from his office, he was cheered, loved, and surprised with a video montage of people who couldn’t be there sending well-wishes.

I’ve been thinking about Bruce for the last few days. It feels so good to see someone who cares so much and tries so hard be told what they mean to others. As someone who desperately wants to help create a great workplace for my staff, I can’t imagine a more meaningful surprise.

But as I reflect, you know what I have thought the most about? The carrot cake.

Bruce is an amazing person. A joy to be around. He is someone I have gone to for life advice and I listen to whenever he has thoughts to share. Bruce has the most wonderful and healthy perspective on what really matters in this world. It’s one of the reasons I respect him so much.

I think Bruce’s mention of carrot cake highlights two of the greatest keys to living a rich life: 

  1. being happy with low expectations, and 
  2. always having something to look forward to. 

Too often do we fixate on our problems. We ruminate on why these things are happening to us. We get bogged down by the stresses of the moment and look ahead only to see what obstacles are coming our way.

But what if instead of fixating on our challenges we did what Bruce does? 

What if we accepted that our day would be full of hard work but there was something simple and good ahead of us to look forward to? What if we fixated on that? Would we be happier? I suspect the answer is yes. And when the day comes that someone drops a surprise party on us… holy moly! Can you imagine the joy?

I can.

Shouting Into The Void: How To Measure Your Impact

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Every week I write a letter like this. I talk to clients in the exam room, publish two podcasts, and post social media content. I teach multiple classes on communication, leadership, and management in Uncharted, and sometimes I travel and speak at conferences. All that to say… I put a lot of heart and ideas out into the world.

I put myself out there because I want to help, I love our profession, and I care deeply about my fellow veterinary professionals who are making the world a better place. I believe that each of us can lift others up, and that there’s not much that’s more important than that.

But how do you know if what you are putting out into the world is being received by others?

The one thing that correlates with your impact

To be honest, it’s hard to gauge if I am actually making an impact. Even when I can see how many people are reading a post on social media or listening to an episode of The Cone of Shame podcast, it’s hard to see. Afterall, there are terrible things on social media that have gotten much higher engagement than anything I have ever done, so the number of people you “reach” has little to do with the amount of good you do in the world. 

I often feel like I’m just shouting into the void.

However, there is one thing I’ve found that does correlate with the impact you have on other people. Do you know what it is? Hearing from someone that you’ve done or said something that has resonated with them.

Last week at the VMX conference in Orlando, a few people came up to me and spoke with phrasing that always gets my attention… “Andy, you wrote/said/did a very specific thing, and it really helped me.” 

The pieces they mentioned were all rather obscure, none of which I considered to be my best work. They were emails, stories I told on a podcast when I didn’t know what question to ask my guest, or videos I shot on my phone when I just wanted to send out an encouraging word. Still, they had an impact and these people gave me the gift of letting me know.

You’re not shouting into the void

I have looked at a million metrics around communication in the digital world. I’ve studied likes, reach, upvotes, retweets, plays, downloads, opens, and click-throughs. And I’m here to tell you, if you care about making a difference, I don’t think any of those metrics should be your primary measures of success. Instead, focus on the number of people who come and tell you that you did a specific thing that meant a lot to them. 

Sometimes we all feel like we are shouting into the void. Sometimes we all feel like we are pouring our compassion into an endless ocean. The truth is, if you are putting out love, care, and support into the world, you are NEVER shouting into the void. You are making an impact, even though you only hear about it rarely.

Final thought

Today, I want you to think about the people who have told you “when you did this, it meant so much to me.” I want you to recognize that for every person who has said that to you, there are thousands of people who have felt that way but never verbalized it. For every pet owner who has taken the time to write a note to you or your team, there are probably a thousand others who have felt that gratitude but did not pick up a pen.

I want you to recognize this pattern of speech from people you have touched, because that phrasing is the greatest signal I’ve found that you are having a real impact. And when you hear it, I want you to listen like you’ve never listened before. I want you to absorb it into your bones so that it permeates you. I want it to fuel a thousand more acts of kindness… and out of those thousand acts of kindness, I suspect one more person will come up to you and say “when you did this thing for me, it really meant the world.”

The Right Way To Introduce Yourself

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How you introduce yourself matters. An introduction helps tell people a bit about yourself, your personality, and can help you create a positive impression. Are you putting your best foot forward with your introduction?

Over the years, I’ve worked with and introduced dozens of veterinary speakers at conferences and browsed hundreds of veterinary clinic websites. In both arenas, I see veterinary professionals making the same mistake over and over again. What is it? They do a pretty bad job of introducing themselves.

Let’s explore where introductions are going wrong, and how you can avoid these pitfalls.

Where introductions go wrong

Veterinary medicine is a relationship business. Whether you are talking to colleagues from a stage or attracting pet owners with your digital presence, your success may not lie where you think it does. Making a positive impression does not depend on people thinking you are smarter, more learned, or less flawed than they are. Your success depends on whether or not your audience relates to you.

I think it’s some (understandable) level of insecurity that drives website or speaker bios, or even social media profiles, written in a way that tries to convince everyone that the author is smart. The fear that someone will look at you and think “What qualifies this person to give me advice?” can cause you to overcompensate. So you introduce yourself with a laundry list of factoids about the schools you went to, certifications you acquired, and even academic honors you achieved. You are not alone.

Holding up a truncated curriculum vitae as a shield, is one of the most common introduction pitfalls I have seen. It’s a way to protect yourself from questions about your competence while also hiding any human vulnerabilities out of sight.

After all, no one can decide they don’t like you if all they know about you is where you went to high school, college, and veterinary school… right?

How to make a more impactful impression

I understand the classic “shield yourself by your accomplishments” approach when shaping a public persona. I really do. The truth, however, is that people don’t care about your education beyond the point of knowing you are qualified to do the service they are seeking. 

The fact that you are a veterinarian or that you have been asked to present gives you just about all the academic credibility you need. The people looking at you are honestly just looking for signs that you are a living, breathing, human being who they can relate to.

When you introduce yourself to a group (whether live or online) make sure you answer two questions:

  1. What qualifies you to help these people? 
  2. Who are you as a person?

That’s it. Those are the only two questions that matter. Answer the first as clearly and concisely as possible. Answer the second not with the hope of making everyone like you, but instead with the hope of attracting people who will be drawn irresistibly to your passions, experiences, style, and perspective (like a bug-zapper, but for good!).

Final Thought

I see so many amazing people who insist on defining themselves to the world by their academic achievements. The truth is, the people you want to serve don’t care about academics beyond the base requirements. They care about learning from someone relatable. They want to deal with someone who will be happy to see them, and who won’t judge them. 

You don’t have to be perfect. People don’t trust those who try to present themselves as perfect. You just have to be real and comfortable telling people who you are so they can know you. That’s how relationship builders introduce themselves.

Resolve To Be Bored More Often

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What’s your #1 resolution for the new year? Mine is to be bored more often.

It recently dawned on me that I live my life in a state of perpetual distraction. If I’m not actively engaged with something, I listen to podcasts or audiobooks on my headphones or scroll on my phone in search of something interesting and engaging.

So it made me think, what do we miss when we fill our lives with distractions too often?

The downside of the distraction state

Podcasts, audiobooks, and articles can generally be considered “mental health food.” That’s how I’ve always justified immediately picking up my phone and being “plugged in” whenever I do the dishes, walk the dog, or wait for my daughter to finish dance class.

The downside is that distraction like this has two costs. 

The first is the energy cost. The energy cost is the steady mental drain that comes from processing information; even information we are excited about. Our brain only has so much processing power in a day. We should be at least a little mindful about how we spend it.

The second cost is the opportunity cost. This is the cost of not doing things because we are too distracted to recognize the opportunity.

Waking up to my distraction state

Late last year, I got tapped for jury duty. First thing in the morning, the bailiff took all of our phones away and didn’t give them back until we went home at the end of the day. I found myself, along with a dozen other jurors, sitting around a table day-after-day with nothing to do. Unable to grab my phone to read an online newspaper, I was bored. The situation pushed me to fill my time by getting to know the people I was with. 

I talked to the other jurors about the case, of course, and I also talked to them during the breaks. We talked about the case, and during breaks, we shared stories about our hobbies and families. Picture a strange version of that 80s movie The Breakfast Club. We all came from very different places, but we found that we had a lot in common and genuinely enjoyed each other’s company. 

I couldn’t help but reflect on how that discovery happens rarely in our modern, plugged-in world. And my resolution to unplug and be more bored more often was born.

Unplugging to engage more in the moment

Since taking up this resolution, instead of listening to, reading or watching media, the most wonderful things have happened. Instead of checking my email, I’ve found myself laughing with my technicians. Rather than tuning into another podcast or watching Netflix, I spend time talking with my wife and playing board games with my kids. And I am getting mental rest breaks during quiet walks with my dog… at least until the neighbors see me without my headphones and come out to say hello.

The point here is not that I am now distracting myself in different ways than before (because I totally recognize this. I hate being bored). The point is that by skipping the easiest, flashiest, most common solutions to boredom, I’m falling back to more rich, restful, and fulfilling ways of occupying my free time.

If you’re missing a resolution for 2023, maybe it’s not too late. Maybe you can be bored more often. Maybe if you’re bored and I’m bored, we’ll bump into each other and actually talk about it. Wouldn’t that be lovely?