December E-Bulletin

President's Message:

Happy Holidays fellow VetPartners Members! 

Our year is winding down and before we know it we will be gathering in Las Vegas for our Annual Meeting.  Looking back on 2022 it seems like a year of rapid changes, attempts to find our feet after so much uncertainty and a concerted effort to build a path forward with a framework that clarifies our purpose and supports our members in ways that brings maximum value to membership.

The Board of Directors has been committed to making our association better and worked to train our association management company to support our committees, sponsors and members. The transition at the very beginning of the year from Jim to Meagan was certainly challenging.  We found that many of the systems and processes existed in our former Administrator’s head.  She shared them with Jim, our first assigned Admin, but they were lost when he quit, leaving Meagan to scramble for information. The struggle was real. But we made it through and are working on better documentation of our systems and streamlining those that need it.

Covid took our rapidly growing numbers in the opposite direction.  In 2018 and 2019 we had to cut off attendance at our meetings because we maxed out room capacity.  Then the pandemic hit and we went virtual for our first meeting in lock down.  The challenges for this board came with deciding when to come back to in person meetings.  We made the decision to be in person, only to be faced with a new variant shortly after.  Still our members attended because we had missed gathering and sharing ideas and most of all, our friends. This past September we were back in full force with a great Mid-Year meeting full of valuable content and members excited to be learning and connecting together.

Read the Full President's Message Here 

• Shirley Lockhart spoke at the 3 Rivers Veterinary Symposium, November 12 and 13. Sponsored by the PVMA – Pennsylvania Veterinary Medical Association. Her topics included the following:
• • Hiring for Success
  • Entrepreneurial Mindset
  • Using Key Performance Indicators to Make Sound Financial Decisions
  • Having that Difficult Conversation
  • Is the Veterinary Industry Recession Proof and the Economy

• Wendy Hauser, DVM, Peak Veterinary Consulting will be presenting “Leveraging Leadership: How Leaders Can Create Confident, Empowered Teams” at the AVMA Veterinary Leadership Conference in Chicago, IL on Thursday, January 5, 2023.

• Keith Vanhoy will be speaking at the Missouri Veterinary Medical Association conference on January 26^th. 

• Michael Hargrove will be speaking at the following:

  WVC 2023 to be held February 19 – 22, 2023 (Sunday — Wednesday), at the Mandalay Bay Resort & Casino, Las Vegas, Nevada. She will be discussing the following topics:

  • Two Hours: Co-Presenting with Robert Sanchez, CEO of Digital Empathy
  • “Differentiation is Your Missing Ingredient” and “Marketing & Communicating your Differentiators”
  • “Practice Value: Corporate vs. Private Buyer – Why are Values Different?”
  • “Management Benchmarks: Guidelines, Goals or Garbage?”

• Clayton MacKay has been acclaimed to the council of the College of Veterinarians of Ontario for the next three years. The CVO, a public interest body, is the regulatory group responsible for veterinarians in Ontario. 42 years ago, He was the President of the Ontario Veterinary Association that was both the regulatory body and the advocacy group for Ontario. Advocacy today is handled by the Ontario Veterinary Medical Association (OVMA).

• Jennifer Mauer, the VP of Business Development for VetCompanion would like to share that they have onboarded their first hospital chain, BetterVet, a national mobile veterinary care system. They have also finalized a partnership with the veterinary library at the University of Pennsylvania. . She would also like to share a video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9IFaPA4DcJk if you are interested in learning about VetCompanion.

• Mira Johnson's article Sticky Situations has been published in Today's Veterinary Business. The odds are that your practice is or was a victim of internal theft or fraud. To help prevent it, you must recognize the warning signs. Read more here

Welcome to our New Members!

• Jharid Pratt