6.8 Leadership Skills for Working with Staff and Clients

You may feel comfortable contacting O/A clients, providing alternative therapies, etc. However, the groups you work with may feel differently or not be on the same page. You may already offer O/A services and work with O/A clients, or you may want to add them to your practice after taking this course. Wherever you are in this journey, you and your practice will likely experience change. This may be by offering entirely new services, adapting existing client informational handouts to include O/A, or educating staff on O/A requirements. However, while change can be a very positive thing, change is commonly resisted by staff and clients. Common reasons for this are fear, timing, loss of control, lack of reward, and prior negative experiences with change. The following leadership tips and discussion of leadership styles will help you navigate change with your staff and clients.

Successfully managing and leading a veterinary practice requires emotional intelligence. Emotional intelligence is the ability to identify and manage ourselves and our emotional and is a skill that can be developed and improved upon over time.  It relates to how a person can successfully navigate intrapersonal emotions and behaviors. The awareness, management, and regulation of empathy, motivation, and social skills influence understanding and communication of oneself and others. Leaders with higher emotional intelligence, meaning a higher aptitude for learning and incorporating these described elements, are more likely to have successful outcomes with their teams and in their relationships. In addition, these skills can also help in working through change. This change could be getting your staff on board with offering services to O/A clients or working with an O/A farmer who wants to add a vaccine protocol to their standard operating procedures. To work on emotional intelligence, a person must consider self-awareness, self-management, social awareness, and social skills. A leader’s growth in these areas is important because they influence the workplace and social environments. These environments are the foundation for a team or relationship to navigate, adapt, and grow. The personal capabilities mentioned in this section are expanded upon in Goleman’s texts and linked at the end of this chapter.

Emotional intelligence is typically broken down into four core competencies:

• Self-awareness
• Self-management
• Social awareness
• Relationship management

According to psychologists and researchers, the workplace and social environment are impacted by six key factors:

1. Flexibility—that is, how free people feel to innovate when met with challenges
2. Sense of responsibility to the business/client
3. Level of standards that people set
4. Sense of accuracy about performance feedback and aptness of rewards
5. Clarity people have about mission and values
6. Level of commitment to a common purpose

The emotional intelligence and leadership style of an entity’s leader influence these factors and the social environment of the team and its relationships. In other words, leadership styles impact the workplace environment. Why is this particularly important for you? As someone reading this, you are at some stage of considering O/A services in your practice and will likely need to lead others in doing so. These other individuals or groups may be your staff or your clients. Regardless, the factors highlighted above affect the productivity and satisfaction of all involved.

Let’s delve into leadership styles that incorporate these factors. As we go through them, think about how you can apply these styles in your practice and with your clients to improve outcomes. For this chapter, we will use Goleman’s six leadership styles. He describes the styles and situations in which one may be preferred. He also reports that leaders with multiple leadership styles are more likely to have successful outcomes. The degree to which an emotional intelligence competency or key environmental factor is used varies between the styles. Employing multiple styles is expected to lead to a more successful practice.

Remember that one style is not good or bad, but depending on the situation, a specific style may result in more effective outcomes. More in-depth information on these styles and effective leadership strategies can be found at:

• Simon Sinek: How Great Leaders Inspire Action