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Foreword

It is a great pleasure and honour to be invited to write a Foreword for this new and important book on Veterinary leadership. Veterinary leadership is a distinct and important topic within our continuing professional development but has received little attention until recently. This is despite the fact I suspect many of us will have experienced both the positives and negatives that those who lead us can bring to our working lives, impacting not only on the care of our patients and their owners but on the “feel” of our practices and the whole team’s sense of wellbeing – never has this been more important than now.

Leadership can sometimes be characterised purely in the context of organisational leaders with job titles to match, or even more restrictively as “hero leaders” confidently making all the decisions. And yet the truth of leadership, especially in a complex clinical environment, is so much more than that. As vets and nurses, we are all involved with leading others at some point, whether it is leading a client through a difficult decision related to their much loved companion, leading a practice team or providing broader leadership in the profession. The ability to do this, and importantly to enjoy doing this, starts with leading ourselves and Chapter 4 provides a great summary of this area.

I have known Clive for many years and cannot think of anyone better to have written this book. His roles as a clinician leader within his speciality of internal medicine and as an organisational leader developing one of the largest referral hospitals in the UK gives him ample experience of leadership at many levels. Ultimately leadership is all about people and his skills as a coach and mentor are well honed. This has resulted in a book which is incredibly accessible for all members of the veterinary team, laced with examples that take the understanding of leadership from academic theory and apply it sensitively and with context to our world.

I know I have enjoyed reading it and I am sure you will to

Amanda Boag MA VetMB DECVECC DACVECC DACVIM FHEA FRCVS

Chief Medical Officer, IVCEvidensia

Scotland August 2021