Michael Woodcock | Veterinarian
SuncoastVet

Day 1 @ 12:00

Resilience through experiences - building your team culture

Resilience  building through experience – the SuncoastVet Way

Changing the way we develop our teams – Ankuara Animal Experience at SuncoastVet

For years as veterinarians and business owners we have experimented with various ways to stimulate our teams, provide rewards and prolong enthusiasm for a career in which many of us have spent decades.

Yes, the later generations of veterinary graduates and nurse and customer care are looking for something more. It's so easy and accepted nowadays to change jobs and even careers every few years. As business owners we know that the cost to procure talented team members is far higher than years ago and retaining them is harder again.

At SuncoastVet we believe in creating a culture that is a little bit different from the norm. Maybe it's not for everybody but we have had some great feedback from our team members and really do have a low turnover of staff.

In this talk I would like to concentrate on an initiative we created last year and have just returned from for the 2nd year.

Ankuara is an immersive 2-week experience in South America’s Colombia where thanks to our business partners we can provide an insight for several of our team members each year into veterinary and animal welfare conditions in another part of the world.

Veterinarians, nurses and customer care are asked to provide an essay on which they give the reasons why they deserve to be awarded this trip of a lifetime fully paid by SuncoastVet and our business partners. In the inaugural year we had a vet and a nurse head over and this year 2 vets and a customer service team member made the trip.

Vetoquinol, Mavlab – great veterinary manufacturers were a key in support of the trip this year and also Etairos accounting from the Gold Coast, DeCameron Hotels over in South America and Dr Richard Burchell’s new venture - Vet Tribal. The costs to run such a program are large but the rewards to the team members are phenomenal.

In Colombia we see - No compassion fatigue, long Hours, Vets and teams are working for the passion of animal care and with systematic approaches that ensure happy workplaces and very little monetary reward .

In this presentation we look into how Ankuara helps build resiliance in our teams.

Michael Woodcock, Veterinarian, SuncoastVet

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Michael Woodcock / Resilience through experiences - building your team culture

Michael Woodcock, Veterinarian,
SuncoastVet

I am a veterinary practice owner and veterinarian with over 30 years of experience building, growing, and leading successful veterinary clinics across Queensland. My journey began on the Gold Coast, where I developed and sold three practices in 2005. Not long after, I co-founded The Vet...

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