Professional Issues
Common professional pitfalls
This section of the website addresses the more objective external issues such as employment, client complaints, and financial mismanagement which can crop up from time to time in any practice.
Employment
Employment issues are really important in this profession. The number of calls to the Vet Helpline on this topic far exceed any other. In spite of rigorous training, high-level intelligence and having a real vocation, there is still plenty of evidence that many veterinary professionals are unhappy in their work. Issues such as the frequent lack of written contracts, a high stress and often critical working environment and the lack of soft skills such as negotiation and conflict management can lead to a great deal of distress.
These pages detail some of the common employment issues affecting the profession and link to many sources of help, advice and support covering redundancy and unfair dismissal, bullying, discrimination (yes, it does take place), working conditions and issues of maternity and paternity leave. See especially the section on managing conflict at work.
Complaints & the RCVS
Our profession is monitored legally and professionally by the RCVS. There are many regulations to understand, ethical standards and codes of practice to be adhered to. On top of this, we deal with highly emotional situations around animal illness and death. Even if we manage to conduct our professional lives to consistently high standards, inevitably, the emotional component of the situations we encounter may lead to client complaints. It's really important to understand the impact of these and how to handle them in the best possible way.
These pages describe the role of the Royal College, what it does and how it deals with complaints. There are links to a large amount of important and useful information and also information on how you might act if you believe a colleague to be acting in a seriously unprofessional manner.
Legal Issues
Apart from the professional issues that might properly come under the remit of the RCVS, we live in a culture which is bounded by a legal system. Sometimes we get into disputes which can only be mediated by law. The legal issues page will give you links to help and advice on veterinary law, family law, personal injury, consumer law, neighbour disputes and wills and probate.
Vets & Debt
And then there's money. The section on Vets & Debt deals with this. We look at the concept of living in a debt-based culture – the necessity to borrow money, the management of debt – the concept of bad debt and many of the ways in which veterinary professionals may need to manage debt, from student debt through to buying a partnership.
The links in these pages give you a clear concept of good and bad debt and link to a great deal of advice and information to help you get a grip. Again, the take-home message is that no debt issue is insoluble.
Please see the Personal Issues section of the website where some of the more subjective and internal issues are covered.