SPEAKER_00 0:04

Welcome to the Veterinary Culture Lab, where science meets real-world application. I'm Andy Davison.

SPEAKER_01 0:12

And I'm Josh Weisman. Together, we'll show you an evidence-based blueprint for renovating culture in your veterinary team. One episode at a time.

SPEAKER_00 0:22

VetMed is not lacking passion, purpose, or people who care deeply. So why does thriving feel so hard? In this episode, we explore the science of meaningful work and why veterinary medicine may already have the ingredients it needs to build something amazing. Hey Josh. How how's it going on this fine day?

SPEAKER_01 0:47

Oh, not too bad. I'm a little tired, actually.

SPEAKER_00 0:50

Oh, why not?

SPEAKER_01 0:53

If you had to guess what time Greta and I typically go to sleep, what would you guess?

SPEAKER_00 0:57

I mean, I think you probably know, but um, I'm I'm gonna guess because I probably know. And I'm gonna go with 8:30.

SPEAKER_01 1:05

It's you're not that far off. Typically the lights are out, the TV's off around nine. Um, and we're going to bed. So Tuesday, I was flying home from Raleigh, North Carolina. And I had to wake up at 6 a.m., roughly 6 a.m., a little bit before um Raleigh time to catch my flight, which is 4 a.m. here in Colorado. And then got on the flight, came home, did a little bit of work, and then super exciting. Uh Greta and I and her friend Mandy went to the Colorado Avalanche um playoff game.

SPEAKER_00 1:41

So we went to Willie, that's hockey? Okay.

SPEAKER_01 1:45

Yeah, yeah. Um, which is awesome. If you ever have a chance, um, even if you're not really into sports, just like hockey playoff games are like a whole other level of like energy.

SPEAKER_00 1:54

I grew up in Detroit, so I do understand hockey playoff mania.

SPEAKER_01 1:59

Okay, great, great. Yep, I guess. This game, so for whatever reason, the game started at 8 p.m., which is already like uh past your bedtime. Do you do you know who we are? Um, but whatever. It's it's playoffs, it's it's hockey, it's fun, going with a friend, like it'll be good, right? So we get there, and then um, because of TV situations, the the game prior, which I think was maybe Boston Buffalo, anyway, what whatever game was on ESPN before the ABS game went long. So the ABS game didn't actually start at eight, it started at almost 820. And then about halfway through the game, like the craziest thing I've ever seen at a live sporting event, so it's it's hockey, right? So there's like all these glass walls and stuff around, and there's like these big glass walls behind the the team benches, and then there's like fans right on the other side of the glass. And like the thing you do when you sit in the glass and hockey is you like bang on the wall and you harass people on this set. So this dude is like banging on this wall, and the glass just shatters. You could look this up online, like seriously. Maybe we can even share like in the show notes a link to this. It's crazy. This dude is like bam, bam, and all of a sudden it just shatters like on the coaches and on uh the players for for the LA Kings, which meant that they had to stop the game, clean up all the glass, and replace that section of glass wall. So now the game that was supposed to start at eight, which is already practically my bedtime, and then started 20 minutes late because the game before it on TV went long, has now delayed another 20 minutes.

SPEAKER_00 3:35

Uh-huh.

SPEAKER_01 3:36

And then it was tied at the end of the third period. So they went into over. I don't think Grand and I got home till like almost one in the morning. And then I like woke up and did work on Wednesday. I'm tired, man. I'm tired.

SPEAKER_00 3:52

Yeah, I can I can see why. I can see why. I'm also impressed it only took them 20 minutes to clean up glass and replace a glass like panel.

SPEAKER_01 4:02

I have never seen like so many people in like all black outfits and shoes, not like skates, run out onto the ice rink and run over there and sweep stuff up and clean things up and then bring out this giant paint of glass. It was really cool to watch. I mean, they were very impressive. They did some sure some good work pretty quickly, but yeah, it was wild. That was uh that was a heck of a game. Avs won, by the way.

SPEAKER_00 4:26

I was gonna ask who won the game.

SPEAKER_01 4:27

Yeah, yeah, the Avs won. So at least it was worth it in the end.

unknown 4:30

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 4:31

For real. For real.

SPEAKER_01 4:32

How are you?

SPEAKER_00 4:33

I'm fantastic. I just got back from riding Marshall. I had a wonderful jump lesson. He is becoming quite the quite the young man. I'm so proud of him. And uh, I'm learning so much in riding him. I I just love him. He's such a blast and he's such a he's such a kind soul, right? Like he's only, well, five and a half, six, and he's like, okay, mom, we got this. Like, let's go. I got you. And that's really a nice feeling, especially with a young horse that you've got like a buddy that is gonna not expect you to be perfect, but is gonna kind of learn and do and go along with you. And uh, it's it's just great. He's so much fun. Yep.

SPEAKER_01 5:13

That's awesome.

SPEAKER_00 5:14

Good horse lessons always make me happy. So yeah. Always.

SPEAKER_01 5:17

Oh, absolutely, as you should be. He's uh he's a sweet guy. I miss that big old dork. I do have one more thing to share with you, actually. I'm just remembering. So um a mutual friend of ours, you'll you'll know who I'm talking about when I tell you the story. Um, just recently found out that uh he got a job in the south of France, and he will be moving to said country very shortly. Yeah, which is super, super exciting, right?

SPEAKER_00 5:42

Yay.

SPEAKER_01 5:43

Um, yeah. So, of course, like, you know, as he's preparing for this job, he's like telling me all these things about, you know, where he's gonna work and what it's gonna be like in France and this and that. And he told me something that I thought was really interesting. Did you know that the first French fries actually were not cooked in France?

SPEAKER_00 5:57

I did not know where where where on earth were they cooked, Josh.

SPEAKER_01 6:01

Oh, they were cooked in Greece.

SPEAKER_00 6:02

That's a good one. That's a good one. Yep.

SPEAKER_01 6:05

He like, no joke, in his travels, he found this. I'm holding it up to the screen. Those of you listening won't be able to see this, but he found a dad jokes um like card set and somewhere in Europe. He was traveling in Europe and he found this. And he's like, Oh, I need to get that and bring that back to Josh. And he did.

SPEAKER_00 6:22

That joke just because dad jokes are universal. Everyone universally rolls their eyes when someone tells a dad joke.

SPEAKER_01 6:29

It's true. It's true.

SPEAKER_00 6:31

That's so funny. It's a good one. That's that's I don't know, that's kind of one of your better ones. Oh, thanks. I mean, anything involving French fries, right?

SPEAKER_01 6:39

100%.

SPEAKER_00 6:41

Oh, cool, cool. All right, I'd love to shift gears because I have something that I kind of want to share with you and the listeners. It's a bit of an experience that has been sitting with me for kind of a long time now. And the more I reflect on it, the more I realize that this experience is a lot of how my view of well-being in veterinary medicine was shaped. Now, this moment comes from a time when I managed a large technician team in an academic hospital. And you know, Josh, when I say large, I mean large. We had over 20 technicians on this team, different shifts, different personalities, different experience levels, all trying to work together in a 24-hour hospital that never stopped moving. It was fast, complex, and a lot of times it was a lot. And I remember one particular stretch of time where everything felt heavier than usual. Not one specific incident, not one bad day, but this slow creeping sense that people were tired, disconnected, frustrated. You could feel it in the way that people communicated or didn't communicate. Short answers, less laughter, more just getting through the shift type of energy. And I remember standing there one night in the middle of it all and thinking to myself, well, yeah, this is just that med. This is what it looks like. It's hard, it's exhausting, and it wears you down. And if I'm being really honest, at the time I didn't question that thought at all. I totally accepted it. And here's the part that I'm not really super comfortable to admit because I realized that I was actually leading from that belief, not consciously or intentionally, but subtly, right? Like the way that I approached conversations, the way that I thought about solutions, and definitely the way that I talked about work with my team. It became less about why this work is meaningful and what makes this work meaningful, and more about how do I help my team survive this. And listen, there's absolutely a place for that. There really is, because the work that we do in VetMed is sometimes really hard. But what I didn't realize in that moment is that I had unknowingly narrowed that story. I had taken a profession that's incredibly complex and one that I've chosen because it's meaningful, right? And capable of making a real difference in the world. And I reduced it to something that people had to just endure. Now, here's what makes this moment stick with me because that experience, right, at that hospital with that team, it was not all bad, not even close. Because in the middle of the chaos of that same hospital, in the middle of those busy shifts, there were also moments where Shelby would take an extra minute to groom her equine patient because she wanted to make sure that the patient was comfortable. That the second shift crew, they would rally around a really tough case and walk out feeling proud, even if the outcome wasn't perfect. Or Tracy, Tracy would take the time to teach, to mentor, and support, even though she was a little bit tired. There was connection, there was purpose and there was impact. All of it happening in the exact same environment that I had labeled as that mad is just hard. And that's the moment that's really been shaping my thinking lately. Because I've been thinking to myself, how can both of these things be true at the same time? How can this profession feel so heavy, but also be so meaningful? And then I started to notice something else because this mindset, right? This language, this thought process is showing up in other places too, not just in my own experience, but in the way that we talk about veterinary medicine as a whole. We are really good at naming the hard parts. We're really good at talking about burnout and stress. We talk a lot about compassion fatigue, long hours, staffing shortages. And yeah, those things are real. They matter and they deserve attention. But I start to wonder have we gotten so good at telling the this is hard story that we've completely forgotten to tell the other half? The part that says this work is meaningful and this work matters, that this work has the potential to contribute to something bigger than ourselves. Because if we only tell one side of the story, then something starts to shift, not just in how we feel, but in how we lead, how we communicate, how we design our workplaces. We start organizing everything around survival, just getting through the shift, making it through the weekend, helping people cope. And here's the question that really jumps out for me. What if well-being is not just about managing stress? But what if it's about being able to productively engage with something that is deeply meaningful? Because when I think about the actual work that we do in veterinary medicine, we solve complex problems. We use highly specialized skills. We speak for animals that cannot speak for themselves. And we support people in emotional vulnerable moments, all while building relationships and learning constantly. I mean, this isn't just work. This is impact. This is purpose. This is the kind of thing that people in other fields spend their entire lives trying to find. So on one hand, yeah, the work can be a lot sometimes. And on the other, this work is also full of meaning, connection, and growth. So the way I see it, it's not the question of is vetmed hard? We already know the answer to that. The question I'm more interested in is how are we experiencing it? And maybe even more importantly, how are we structuring that experience for the people within our teams, our hospitals, and our practices? Because I kind of think that veterinary medicine is not something that we're meant to simply survive. Maybe if it's supported the right way, the work itself is actually something that can contribute to our thriving. Now, I know that I'm not the only one to think this. In fact, the possibility of thriving in and through the work that we do every day is exactly what Flourish is built on. So that makes me curious, Josh. When you think about your own experiences in VetMed, do you think that we've intentionally overindexed this this is hard mentality and narrative? And if so, where do you think it comes from? Like where did we learn to see it this way?

SPEAKER_01 13:49

Yeah, that's a great question. Um, what an interesting experience and what a cool reflection to be able to go back on to look back on how you were leading those teams and uh maybe unwittingly or unknowingly uh over-indexing on the this is hard stuff. Um I I think yes, 100% that we do that. And I think now more than ever we do that. Um, I think for a long time in the veterinary space, no one ever talked about the hard stuff. Uh we, for whatever reason, we suppressed it or avoided it. And then, I don't know, probably 20-ish years ago or so, it seems like um the valve opened and people started talking about things like, you know, probably in the the around the time of Sophia Yin and when she took her life, uh, we started talking about things like suicide and burnout and compassion fatigue and all this kind of stuff. And that's great because we were destigmatizing these conversations, which allows us to do something about it. Um, but since then, it seems like we have grown that into a conversation about you know, vetmed is broken and damaged and all bad. And if you come here, you can basically plan on experiencing burnout, psychological distress, dis depression, and you may want to take your life. Welcome to veterinary medicine. Like I feel like that's kind of what we do. Um, whether we recognize it or not, that's certainly the message that I think a lot of people are receiving. Uh, you know, I would be willing to bet that if you went and spoke to college-age kids who are considering applying to veterinary school and you asked them what kind of experience do you expect to have as a practicing veterinarian or practicing technician, I think that they would say, well, you know, from what I'm hearing, it's probably going to be really hard and really stressful, and I'm going to be overworked and underpaid, and I got to protect myself from depression and things like that. And I don't I don't think that's a good message to be sending because that's not the reality of our profession. It's a both and situation. Uh where I think it comes from, Andy, is that um I I mean, I think it's probably uh multifactorial and way more complex than I'm gonna make it sound right now. I think that there's things that I'm definitely gonna miss out on here. But I think one of them is just like our our normal healthy human response to really grab on to threats, real or perceived, uh, you know, that negativity bias and the power that it has in our brain. And once we start talking about all of the challenges and all of the stressors and all of the problems and all of the obstacles, it's very easy to perseverate on those and point out all the bad things. I think some of it is also just the normal human mindset. If I ask you to start thinking about fruit, you're gonna start thinking about fruit and you're not gonna be thinking about vegetables. You know, like that's that's just how the brain is built. What we're primed to think about is where our very limited conscious attention goes. And if the conversations are around the problems and the challenges and the barriers to well-being in vetmed, then that that's what we're gonna see and notice and talk about. So I'm sure that some of it is that. Um, you know, and I'm sure that there's there's other factors as well. It's for better or worse, um, we have a human tendency to want to pay more attention to the villain than the hero. And so it's a lot easier to uh get attention on social media when you talk about how shitty your workplace is and how toxic your boss is, and it's a lot less likely that you're gonna get that attention when you start posting about how wonderful your workplace is and how great the people you work with are. So I think some of it's that. And then I also think that we're in a state in society where um, just generally speaking, most of us feel a sense of disconnection. And to steal from our our friend Zach Mercuria, we're in a bit of a mattering deficit. Uh, we don't really feel as if we fit in the world in meaningful ways. And so we're striving for some sort of evidence of our connection to others and our place in the world. And one of the easiest ways to do that is to seek validation. And one of the easiest ways to seek validation is to talk about your pain and suffering and get people to offer some compassion around that. And so I think all of those things and probably other factors, that was a very long response to your very simple question.

SPEAKER_00 18:04

Sorry. No, I love it because I'm listening to you talk and all of the what the little cliche phrases are coming to mind, right? Misery loves company, squeaky wheel gets the oil, like that whole thing. And I think that what it kind of highlights for me is that this is a creation or a result, I think is probably a better word. This is a result of us being human. This is a human thing. It's not that that Med is full of ho-hum people that are always looking for the negative. It's that we're human and that's a lot of how our brain is set up. And because of that, we've been kind of good at unintentionally creating a bit of that imbalance where we focus on what's going wrong, what isn't good, the fact that everybody in VetMed is gonna get burned out, and maybe you should second guess your career choice. And I think that there's a lot of humanisms that come into that. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 19:04

Yeah. No, I think you're totally right. I think back to like when COVID first hit, right? At the very first everybody was kind of uh in lockdown and not really going out. And veterinary practices saw like um visits completely plummet to the point where a lot of privately owned practices, at least, and maybe even some corporate ones, there was conversation around like how long are we going to be able to stay open before we're gonna run out of money and we're gonna have to shut down. And then it was like this complete pendulum swing to the other side, and boom, all of a sudden everybody was bringing in their pets. And so we saw this massive influx of visits come in in a time where many of our practices couldn't actually let people in the doors. And so that created its own challenges and stressors. We started to hear, for good reason, because it it was true, we started to hear an uptick of like these bad client experiences, impatient clients, unreasonable clients, demanding clients, being very expressive about their discontent around those things, right? We started to hear a lot of those stories. I remember probably late 2020, maybe early 2021, starting to like survey people. So it would be in an audience, a virtual audience, sometimes in person, you know, in late 21. Um, and then sometimes just like straw polls online. And I would ask a series of questions. And one of the questions I would say is like, uh, you know, which one of these would you select? The number of difficult client interactions has decreased over the last year. The number of difficult client interactions has remained the same over the last year, or they have increased and almost to a T, not a hundred percent, but well over 80% of people selected option C. We are seeing way more nasty client interactions than we ever have. Great. Okay. Now, which statement would you select? With that being said, which of these statements would you select? If I take a view of all of the client interactions that I have on a typical day, would I say that most of them are not pleasant client interactions? Several of them, like some of them more than in the past, are bad. Or most of the clients interactions that I have are actually quite pleasant or good. And again, the same roughly 80% picked option C. So what we have here is like you can have a thousand client interactions, and 995 of them are downright pleasant, if not really good. But five of them are terrible. And last year out of a thousand, only two of them were terrible. To us, as any human being, any normal human being would react this way. Oh my God, the sky is falling. Everybody is a jerk. Why are all people so like that's what our brains do? So, yes, I I totally agree with you. I think that that's this is just a normal human response to yes, stressful work, uh, and work that has probably in some ways become more stressful over the last five years than the five years prior.

SPEAKER_00 21:55

Absolutely. That that imbalance, right? I I it It's so true. You have a thousand people, two are terrible. Which two do you remember? Which two do you talk about? Which two do you go home and complain about? Right. The two terrible ones. Not the two that were the awesome ones. You remember the two out of a thousand that didn't go well. And that's that's a human thing. And that carries over into vetmed. And it makes all the sense in the world as to why we would be so focused and it would be so easy to create that imbalance where we've done a really good job of preparing people for the challenges of veterinary medicine, but maybe not an equally good job at helping them understand the potential within veterinary medicine, right? That's actually what led me to bring this paper to the lab today, because this paper explores a question that feels very aligned with this conversation. The authors were not concerned with how do we cope with veterinary medicine, but rather they wanted to know how does veterinary medicine actually contribute to our well-being? And I want to be clear here this paper does not ignore stress or burnout. It absolutely acknowledges those realities, but it does it through a bit of a different lens. It looks at the profession through the science of positive psychology. And it asks, what are the elements that this work has that can help people not just manage and survive it, but actually thrive within it? And I love this perspective because it doesn't try to replace the this is hard narrative. It says, yes, this work is demanding. And it is also full of meaning, growth, connection, and impact. So let's walk through this paper a bit because I think it gives us a really helpful framework for understanding why both of those things can actually be true at the same time. Now, the paper is titled The Life of Meaning: a model of the positive contributions to well-being from veterinary work. It was published in the Journal of Veterinary Medical Education back in 2025. Now, it's written by someone named Martin Cake and his colleagues. Martin Cake. Is that the best name ever? I mean, could we just take one minute to appreciate the amazingness of having the last name of Cake? I would love that. Cake.

SPEAKER_01 24:24

I'll bet I'll bet he's a sweetheart.

SPEAKER_00 24:26

Uh he he'd have to be. Everyone would expect that.

SPEAKER_01 24:30

I would expect that. Also, I want a piece of cake. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 24:34

Right? I know. And I'm like, damn it, now I need cake. Any excuse. Okay. In all seriousness, though, this paper really does deliver on that promise. Because at its core, it's asking, why is veterinary work meaningful? And how does that meaning actually contribute to our well-being? And what I appreciate right out of the gate is that the authors challenge something I think that many of us have experienced. They point out that a lot of well-being education in veterinary medicine focuses on things like stress management, coping skills, preventing burnout, which are important. They also raise this concern that if we only focus there, we may unintentionally start to frame the profession itself as something that drains our well-being. And that's a pretty big deal. Because if that becomes the dominant narrative, we start to approach the work as something that we have to protect ourselves from instead of something that can actually contribute to our well-being. So this is where the paper introduces a really important concept. And yes, it's a big word, but stick with me. It's eudaimonic well-being. Now, this is different from the idea of well-being just as feeling good or being happy or avoiding stress. Instead, it defines well-being as living a life that is meaningful, purposeful, and growth-oriented. So it includes things like developing your skills, contributing to something bigger than yourself, building meaningful relationships and engaging in work that matters. And when you hear that definition, it sounds an awful lot like veterinary medicine, right? So the authors take that a step further and they ask what specifically about veterinary medicine contributes to this kind of well-being? And what they find is actually pretty consistent across their research. They highlight things like intellectual challenge, variety in our work, helping animals, supporting clients, relationships with other colleagues, and opportunities that we have for constant growth and learning. And one of the more interesting insights here is that things like financial reward are actually not primary drivers of satisfaction. It's much more about meaning, connection, and growth. So we start to see that the foundation for well-being is not something separate from work. It's actually embedded within the work itself. Then this paper pulls all of this together into a model. And without getting too deep into the theory, it basically maps veterinary work into some core drivers of well-being. Things like engagement, being challenged, using your skills, getting into the zone, right? Meaning, helping animals, helping people, contributing to something bigger than yourself. Relationships, connection with your colleagues, your team, your clients, and accomplishment, solving cases, learning, growing, developing mastery over time. Now, when I read this, I grinned from ear to ear. Because if you've been listening to us for a while, you've hopefully listened to our very first episode. And you'll remember that Dr. Seligman's model for human thriving includes all of these things. Hello, Perma. So both Dr. Seligman and these authors agree that when those elements are present, they contribute to a deeper sense of well-being. It's not just, yeah, I had a good day, but rather the work that I'm doing matters. Now, this, Josh, is where it gets really interesting because the authors also acknowledge something that we already know to be true, that veterinary medicine is stressful. In fact, most veterinarians report both high levels of stress and high levels of job satisfaction at the same time. So here we are, right back in that tension of what we were talking about earlier. How can something feel so exhausting and yet deeply fulfilling? And the Kate Cruise answer that they don't cancel each other out, but rather both exist at the same time. So I think the big takeaway here is that yes, veterinary medicine has the potential to be a powerful source of well-being. But that potential depends on how the work is experienced. Because if the environment makes it difficult to connect with others, use your skills, continue growing, feel supported, and experience that meaning in the work, then even deeply meaningful work can start to feel draining. But when those elements are supported, that same work can become a source of energy, purpose, and yeah, even thriving. So for me, the paper does not answer the question is vetmed hard? Come on, we already know that it is. What it does is it shifts the conversation to what is it about this work that can help us thrive? And maybe more importantly, how can we do more of that? So, Josh, there's a lot in here because ultimately this paper is making a pretty strong claim. It's essentially saying that Vet Med, as we experience it right now, already contains many of the ingredients that can support our well-being. And as we were prepping for this episode, I learned something really exciting. This isn't the first time that you've read this paper. In fact, this paper was kind of foundational for you and Flourish. So, given that a few years have gone by since you first read it, I would love to hear more. Where do you stand with all of this? What still rings true after all these years?

SPEAKER_01 30:19

Um, yeah, all of it. It's really cool for me to think this paper was published in 2015. So 11 years ago now. Um, and I remember when I first came across it, it was um in my master's program, and I was looking for well-being work specifically in the veterinary space, and it was there, there wasn't a lot. In fact, it might have been this paper. Um, Martin Cake was involved in he, I mean, he's been involved in a lot of research. I can't remember if it was exactly this paper or another one, but he he did kind of a systematic review of the literature to find like stuff focused on well-being and really um identified that like exactly what you said, that like a lot of the research that was uh sort of under the umbrella of quote well-being really was ill-being research in veterinary medicine, not well-being research. And so there really wasn't a lot. Um, since then, in the last 11 years, there's been a slow but steady growth in the library of work specifically focused on well-being, some of which um we've been involved in, uh, which is great. I still firmly stand on the ground that Cake and his colleagues were trying to stake out here. If all we do is focus on the problems within veterinary medicine, all we will see are problems in veterinary medicine. But the reality is that difficult work is also meaningful work. And if we can find a way systemically to help see that, then the difficulty will be worth it to the human beings involved in it. And we just have to, I think you just have to do a better job. I don't know that we've gotten a lot better at it in the last decade since this paper came out, but I'm very hopeful that we will continue to to improve in these areas.

SPEAKER_00 32:03

Well, and I think that's why conversations like this are so important that the recognition that we might need to like shift the focus of these conversations completely and go in a different direction and stop asking how do we protect people from this work, but rather ask questions like, how do we create environments that have the capacity to strengthen and stretch and sustain people in this work? Because that's more focused on the type of well-being that can build us up, right? And can really matter.

SPEAKER_01 32:42

Yeah, no, I totally totally agree. This paper really impacted the way that I um think about how I express these things to people. It was it was really coming across this paper and then some of the, you know, obviously some of Seligman's work and and all of that that got me thinking and the metaphor that you've heard me weave a million times for people, this uh idea of well-being as a garden. Uh, and so if you think about veterinary well-being as the garden, um, you know, a garden has dirt and soil, the nutrients within the soil, the things you're trying to grow, uh, the sunlight, all those kinds of things. I think that that a lot of this like well-being as ill-being prevention focus is really about weed management in a garden. It's like it's saying, hey, there are things growing here that we don't like, they don't smell good, they don't look good, they don't feel good, we need to get rid of those things. That's what weed management is in a garden. And weed management is an essential part of gardening. You can't actually keep a garden long-term healthy and well if you're not managing the weeds. I think the problem is that we focus so much on the weed management that we forget about all the other parts of keeping a healthy garden. And if all we ever do is weed management, first of all, that is not an endeavor that can ever be achieved. Like it's not possible to remove all the stressors and challenges from veterinary work. You will never pull all the weeds. We can't do that. Does it mean we should ignore the weeds? No, if we ignore the weeds, they they can become noxious and take over, and then we have a weed garden and not the actual garden we want. So we have to do weed management, we just have to approach it in a thoughtful and nuanced way and realize that there are some weed management we just can't continue doing. But even if we could, let's just imagine for a moment that we we could successfully do that. We could get rid of all the weeds. Great. What's left? Patch of dirt.

SPEAKER_00 34:33

A real pretty patch of dirt.

SPEAKER_01 34:35

Yeah, exactly, right? A weedless patch of dirt. Like, even if we could eliminate all the stressors and challenges and barriers and difficulties of veterinary medicine, all we would do is create a stress-free profession. But a stress-free profession is not the same as a thriving profession. It's not the same as growing a garden. Well-being requires both weed management and cultivation. It requires us to take fertile seeds, the people of VetMed, and put them into nutrient-rich soil. These are the workplace environments that we work in, and make sure that we are maintaining those nutrients because they're going to get used up over time, right? A plant will eventually extract all the nitrogen and phosphorus from the soil, and we have to add more. That's what we do with fertilizer. And then we also have to water these things. We have to make sure that it has the appropriate amount of sunlight and that, you know, we're planting different things at the right season for them. And yes, we're going to be doing weed management along the way, but we have to do both of these things. And if we don't do both of these things, we're never going to grow the beautiful fruits and veggies and flowers that we want to grow in our gardens. That's, I think, essentially what Cake is saying. And so that's sort of my big takeaway in the last 11 years, nothing about that has changed.

SPEAKER_00 35:48

Yeah. So that balance is kind of coming back into the conversation, right? The importance of balancing your weed management with your cultivation of the beans and the peppers and the tomatoes and you know, whatever else is growing in your garden. I'm totally a vegetable garden person. I couldn't grow flowers if you like, there's no way. Veggies, maybe, maybe. Um, so we're gonna go there. But don't don't ignore either of them because if you do that, neither of them are gonna thrive. That it's really like a balance.

SPEAKER_01 36:23

Yeah, yes, and I'm gonna push back on the word balance a bit because I think that balance evokes equality. Okay, people think of balance as like I have equal weight on both sides and therefore it is balanced. Sure. And I don't think well-being, using this garden metaphor, is about balance in in that like traditional sense. Um it's it's about being thoughtful on how we balance things. Uh, and so what I mean by that, Annie, is like, yes, when we have a garden, we need to do weed management. You're gonna go out to the garden and periodically pull some weeds out, right? But every single day you're watering that garden. And and maybe even with more frequency than uh the weed management, you're gonna be adding fertilizer. Every single day that garden needs sunlight on it. Whenever the things come up that could potentially threaten it, we want to be proactive about it, right? Like if there's gonna be a freeze and we've planned the things a little bit early, you might want to cover those things up so that those veggies don't die when the hard freeze comes or when the snow falls. These are all things that we're doing on the cultivation side that probably happen with a bit more frequency and intentionality than the weed management. So, what I'm saying is that we have to do weed management. There's got to be stress prevention. We have to have like good structures in place to uh do what we can to mitigate, or if we possibly can prevent occupational burnout. Absolutely. And showing people the evidence of their contributions is not something that happens once a year. That's not cultivation. You don't go to your garden and water it once in April and then expect to go back in September and find that it's produced fruit.

SPEAKER_00 37:57

Yeah, it's a constant effort. Yes, it's a constant effort to manage the things that you want to grow in your garden.

SPEAKER_01 38:06

100%.

SPEAKER_00 38:07

Yeah, that's great. That's a beautiful picture, a beautiful metaphor, a way to think of it. I love that. And now I want salad with my cake. So there we are. Okay, so this is the part where we get to shift and think about what we can actually do with this. Because this is not just an interesting idea. If this paper is right, which I feel like you and I think it kind of is, the goal here is not to just add something entirely new. It's actually to make better use of what's already there. And I think there's a couple of really practical ways that we can do that. To me, one way is that we can start getting better at making meaning visible in the day-to-day work. Because one of the things we talked about earlier is that the meaning is already there. It's in your patient care, it's in your client relationships, it's in problem solving, it's in your teamwork, right? In a busy clinic, those moments, they come and go quickly. And if nobody slows down long enough to acknowledge them, they just disappear into the noise of the day, especially if that's what our brains are already used to doing. So start noticing and calling out those moments. And no, it does not have to be some big, formal, time-consuming thing. It can absolutely be 10 seconds in the middle of the shift, just naming what you saw and why it mattered. Hey, Sam, I noticed that you took an extra minute to make sure that Doc's fly mask wasn't rubbing on that spot under his jaw. And I know that that's going to make him more comfortable while he's here for Q4 iMeds for the next two weeks. It can be a quick end-of-the-day question like, what went well today? I love this question because it intentionally looks to highlight strengths. And hey, if you're up for a more powerful lift, maybe consider a board or a Slack channel that says something like, today we helped blank. And encourage people, yourself included, to fill in that blank every day. All of these ideas, they're meant to intentionally shift our attention from what's wrong to what matters. No, we're not ignoring the problems, right? We're not ignoring the weeds. We are just putting focus and making effort to intentionally pay attention to the veggies, to the peppers, to the tomatoes, to the cabbage, to the lettuce in your garden. Now, the second super cool way to build on this is slightly different because this one's about something just a little bit more personal. I have a feeling, Josh, that you'll agree with me when I say that not everybody experiences meaning in the same way, even within the same clinic. One person might find meaning in building relationships with clients, or somebody else might find it when they solve a really complex case. And somebody else on the team might light up when they're teaching or mentoring or supporting a new hire. So to me, the question becomes do we actually know what makes work meaningful for the people on our team? Because if we don't, then we are just assuming and guessing. So to me, one really practical way is to get curious and start asking, which may sound obvious, but it's not always something that we do consistently. Getting curious can be as simple as a question like, hey Josh, when do you feel most engaged or energized during the day here? Or even what are the moments at work that remind you why you chose this profession in the first place? You could work those questions into your next one-on-one, into your next team meeting. Because when we start to understand those answers, we begin to do something really, really powerful, especially as leaders. We are able to create opportunities for meaningful moments to happen. I mean, how cool would it be to learn that Chase gets really excited and lights up when he's able to mentor and teach new hires and then be able to give him the chance to do just that? Because now we are not just hoping that people experience meaning, we are intentionally creating more of it. But I know there's a ton more to this, right? A bunch of other ideas. And Josh, having spent so much time thinking about this from both the science side and the real world side, I would love to hear from you. What are some realistic ways that teams might bring this stuff and put it into action in their clinics and hospitals?

SPEAKER_01 42:36

Oh, I have about 74,000 different ideas here, but I don't think we have enough time for that. Um, I'm gonna share something with you as I was listening to you. This was a recent thing that I heard about a hospital that does this, and they've done this for years. They consistently do it every single day, and they've done it for years. And um, to to watch like the hospital team like light up about this thing was really cool. They do an end-of-day or an end-of-shift huddle that they call plus delta.

SPEAKER_00 43:04

Ooh, okay.

SPEAKER_01 43:05

Yeah. Uh, so plus delta, it's very quick. It's not meant to be like super long conversation. He said it takes roughly five to ten minutes, and they've really mastered it. Plus delta is about the plus is um what went well today, what's worth celebrating. And, you know, they just they bring up uh whatever kind of things there are, but every day they do this. And then the delta is what did we learn? And what did we learn could be like what's something that didn't go well and we need to do differently next time, what's some sort of barrier obstacle we came up across, or what's a problem that we solved that everybody should hear about so that they don't run in the same problem before, or whatever. But that's it, plus delta. So uh what what's worth celebrating from today and what did we learn? And I think that's a a really, really great way to weave meaning in through a ritual. That's the thing that I think is really important is um turning these things into rituals. Like Making sure that it's not just a thing like, oh, you know, practice manager. Yeah, you know what? I really, I really need to catch people doing stuff right more often. I mean, yeah, you do, but how will you ensure that actually happens? That's what rituals help us do. And when these rituals can involve the entire team or the entire practice or an entire department or whatever it might be, um, and they can be stuck to. That's the other thing. Rituals become rituals because they are habitual, because they're sacrosanct, because they actually do them. So ensuring that you stick with it long enough for it to start to become sticky and impactful, I think it's really important. So that that's just a couple of thoughts.

SPEAKER_00 44:40

Well, and involving other people in that ritual, right? Like making it a group project is more likely to make it stick. And it's more likely that people are gonna remember, oh, wait a minute, it's the end of the day. We need to go through our what went well and what did we learn question. You'll have people that are excited about it, like this particular team, that is probably holding that leader accountable for asking them, oh, hey, don't forget, we gotta ask, we gotta ask that question because I have something I want to contribute to that. And so you've got that that ritual sort of accountability through your team as well. I love that.

SPEAKER_01 45:16

Yes. And in this team, they actually aren't holding a single individual accountable to facilitate it, they all just do it.

SPEAKER_00 45:24

Even though it's a good idea.

SPEAKER_01 45:24

So it's it's be it's become that habitual in their organization that um it just gets run. It doesn't matter who's there or who's not there. They don't wait for a manager to do it, it's just part of what they do. That's a true ritual.

SPEAKER_00 45:38

Heck yeah, it is. Yep. Yep, that's really cool. I mean, I'm excited about that. I'm not even part of the team, and I'm like, I want to know.

SPEAKER_01 45:45

Yeah, right.

unknown 45:46

Very well.

SPEAKER_01 45:46

What's the plus delta today?

SPEAKER_00 45:48

Yeah. Plus delta. I like that. Delta like change, right?

SPEAKER_01 45:52

Yes, exactly. There we go.

SPEAKER_00 45:54

Yeah. All right, cool, cool. Glad glad I got there. Well, all right. As we wrap this up, I keep coming back to this idea because, like I said, the paper, it doesn't tell us that vetmed is easy. It doesn't ignore the stress, the complexity, or the very real challenges that tend to come with this work. But what it did do is expand the conversation. It reminded us that this profession is not just something that takes from us, but it's also something that has the potential to give in really meaningful ways. And I think the real takeaway here is that we don't need to go out and find meaning somewhere else, that we have what we need. And if we can get better at seeing it, supporting it, and creating the conditions where people can actually experience it, then thriving in vetmed can stop feeling like this abstract, far-off idea and start feeling a lot more possible. Now, speaking of far-off and abstract ideas, I happen to know someone who is full of them. Can you can you take a wild guess as to who that is?

SPEAKER_01 47:05

I'm guessing this person resides somewhere in the southeast of the United States of America.

SPEAKER_00 47:10

Yeah, a particular peninsula. Yep, called Florida. This week's Florida Man is it's it's good, but I'm gonna ask you to stick with me on this one because it takes it takes a little bit, and there there will be a quiz at the end. There is a follow-up question that I have for you.

SPEAKER_01 47:29

Okay, I'm ready.

SPEAKER_00 47:30

Florida man says intruder entered his home, cleaned everything, and left behind a toilet paper rose. Now, reading further down, this particular Florida man reported that somebody broke into his home, stole nothing, cleaned the bedrooms, cleaned the bathrooms, they even put the kids' toys away, and they left toilet paper roses on in the bathroom. My follow-up question, and I still don't know if I know the answer, which one's the Florida man? Like the one that broke in and cleaned the house, or the one that reported this happening? Like, who's the Florida man in this situation? It's crazy.

SPEAKER_01 48:19

I maybe both.

SPEAKER_00 48:22

I it yeah, I think that's the only answer. That they both they both are champion Florida men.

SPEAKER_01 48:28

I need somebody to break into my house this week. I need that exact person to break into my house this week.

SPEAKER_00 48:35

Like, right. Oh, I got a job for you, Florida man. No kidding.

SPEAKER_01 48:40

That is amazing. That is amazing.

SPEAKER_00 48:42

Yep, yeah. And they left toilet paper rose like a hotel. Yes. Florida man is always thinking about kindness.

SPEAKER_01 48:51

Apparently. That's good. That's good.

SPEAKER_00 48:55

Right, right. Well, thanks so much to all of our listeners out there for spending time with us in the lab. Of course, we'll share the link for the paper and anything else that we mentioned today in the show notes. And if if you enjoy your time in the lab with us, be sure to follow the show, drop us a review, and share this episode with a friend or a colleague. And we will see you next time in the Veterinary Culture Lab. Thanks for hanging out with us in the Veterinary Culture Lab, powered by the science of workplace well-being, and brought to you by Flourish Veterinary Consulting. If today's episode sparked an idea, made you smile, or got you thinking, hey, I should totally try that. Let us know. What do you think? Be sure to subscribe, share, and remember a thriving veterinary culture is possible, and you don't have to build it alone.