Wrangling Dogs ✔️Wrangling Humans ❌

One tech keeps forgetting to relay important notes about patients to you or the front desk staff.

Or, a receptionist continuously double books appointments and forces others to do damage control.

Whatever it is, one bad seed in your staff can throw off communication, processes, and relationships throughout your practice.

You need to address issues with staff before these problems snowball into bigger and bigger issues and eventually affect your ability to provide quality care to patients.

I understand it’s not your strong suit.

You didn’t become a veterinarian because you’re good at wrangling humans.

Which means you can’t go off the cuff when having difficult conversations.

Improvising will cause you to miss important points and risk an unproductive, potentially even more damaging conversation.

Use my 7 tips to carefully prepare for difficult conversations with employees:

• Gather the facts.

• Prepare documentation (dates, times, occurrence, etc.)

• Prepare a personalized improvement plan for that employee to bring to the conversation.

• Decide what your desired outcome of the conversation is by listing goals and objectives.

• Plan out the conversation carefully. What constructive criticism will you offer, and what examples of employee actions will you use?

• Practice the conversation in private—use a mirror!

• Role-play the conversation with a trusted manager, medical director, or partner.

The productivity and functioning of your practice rely on a trusted staff. 

You build that trust by communicating with them, even when the conversation is a hard one to have. 

My veterinarian resource library has guides, job descriptions, and more to support you in managing your practice to the best of your ability.