A BETTER WORLD FOR PETS: How Banfield Focused on Fulfilling its Purpose in 2017
Almost one year ago, I transitioned into the role of president of Banfield Pet Hospital. My goal was to strengthen and accelerate our efforts in making a difference in the lives of people and pets across the U.S. and in Puerto Rico. Having previously served as Banfield’s chief operating officer, I already knew Banfield’s associates make an incredible impact in our hospitals and in the communities we serve, and that together, we would rise to whatever challenges we faced.
From helping those affected by disaster to leading veterinary care forward, I’d like to share some of the inspiring moments and achievements our associates helped make possible this year. I continue to be humbled by the compassion, skill and resourcefulness of my colleagues who do whatever it takes to provide quality care when and where it’s needed most.
It’s been a rewarding journey, and I’m eager to continue it alongside the Banfield associates who are dedicated to fulfilling our shared purpose: A BETTER WORLD FOR PETS.
Preserving the Well-Being of Banfield Associates
Being a great place to work means recruiting and retaining great talent. We want qualified, passionate people to dream about coming to work here, and it is our goal to create an environment where every associate can fulfill their potential.
Since its founding, Banfield has committed to supporting the well-being of our associates, and that commitment has evolved significantly over the years as we and our industry develop a better understanding of the big-picture and day-to-day challenges that impact physical, emotional and financial health. This year marked an even greater investment for Banfield in programs and resources focused on the well-being of the entire veterinary community. We are actively seeking to combat compassion fatigue among veterinary teams that regularly confront and work to ease the suffering of pets – but often experience emotional trauma as a result. We are in the process of expanding our continuing education curriculum to better equip veterinarians inside and outside of Banfield with resources to recognize and respond to the signs of compassion fatigue, both for themselves and their colleagues.
We also launched industry-leading internal programs aimed at reducing the staggering amount of student debt that most veterinarians carry after investing in their education, including free advisory tools and our own Veterinary Student Debt Relief Pilot Program, designed to give our doctors options that begin to help them relieve this significant burden.
And following an unprecedented year of natural disasters that had direct and sometimes devastating effects on our associates, we updated our policy on paying associates following a disaster-related hospital closure. Previously, Banfield policy ensured that when a hospital closed temporarily due to unforeseen circumstances, associates would be paid for up to five days of the closure – this year, we updated the policy to include 10 days of pay. But when we heard about the destruction in Puerto Rico, we knew even 10 days wouldn’t give us enough time to reopen the four Banfield hospitals on the island. We also knew those associates were undoubtedly facing a number of personal challenges after the hurricane, so we continued to pay every single Banfield associate in Puerto Rico until business operations were restored.
Through programs and policies like these, we continue to increase our commitment to our associates, and to feel that commitment reflected back at us. I am excited to share that this year, we made significant strides with turnover challenges, which are now at historic lows, expanding our shared ability to serve our clients and their pets in 42 states, Washington, D.C. and Puerto Rico.
Expanding Access to Quality Veterinary Care
Just as important as the well-being of Banfield associates, is the well-being support and critical care we offer to people and pets through our hospitals across the U.S. This August, I had the opportunity to join Banfield associates in Franklin, Tennessee, for the opening of our 1000th hospital.
This was more than a numerical milestone for our practice. It was the embodiment of the commitment Banfield has made to ensuring high-quality veterinary care is available to more pets in more parts of the country. Every time we open a new hospital, we offer Shelter Services – free veterinary care to local shelter pets – to get them the care they need and remove barriers to adoption.
After the grand opening, the Franklin hospital team came together over five days to provide free care to the hospital’s first patients: 35 dogs and cats from five area shelters that were waiting for forever homes, with services totaling nearly $25,000 in value.
I love that we honor our new hospitals through this program and enable our veterinary teams to positively impact the health and well-being of pets in a local community before we even open our doors.
Focusing on Leadership in the Veterinary Industry
As the world’s largest general veterinary practice, Banfield strives to maintain a leadership team that brings powerful experience and insights to our approach. We made several strategic hires this year to ensure Banfield’s senior leadership team is equipped to drive and execute our vision. To highlight this year’s new additions who have made Banfield’s leadership team even stronger: Stephanie Neuvirth now leads our People & Organization team, Jim Ashby joined as the practice as chief operating officer, Alison Hiatt is our newest chief marketing officer, Jesper Frederisken came on board as chief information officer, and Andrew Scipio del Campo is our lead general counsel.
Banfield also seeks to connect thought leaders across the veterinary profession. For the past 16 years, we have hosted an annual Pet Healthcare Industry Summit (PHIS), which brings industry leaders together to share ideas, experiences and perspectives; collaborate on solutions to challenges facing the industry; and envision together what innovations and opportunities lie ahead – and how we can accomplish them together. This year, as part of the sessions, PHIS attendees collaborated on how the industry can learn from and apply lessons from human health.
Transforming the Future of Pet Health
One of the benefits of Banfield’s size and scale is that our combined experience and access to the largest proprietary electronic medical database, PetWare, enables us to identify and share insights on trends in pet health. For the past several years, we have produced a report that provides insights into those trends, as well as advice for veterinarians and pet owners relating to those findings. Our chief medical officer, Dr. Daniel Aja, wrote about this year’s State of Pet Health Report earlier this year, which centered on the staggering overweight-pet trends we’ve witnessed over the past 10 years.
In partnership with the North American Veterinary Community (NAVC) we also produced the first annual Veterinary Emerging Topics (VET) Report, which not only identified antimicrobial disease resistance (AMR) as one of the most critical issues in veterinary practice, but also reiterated the guidelines for antibiotic prescription and use for common microbial infections in companion animals.
Similarly, we continue to work tirelessly to equip veterinary teams with the tools, training and information they need to deliver quality medical care. We are broadening the reach of our approach to medical quality advancement – check out articles from our vice president of medical quality, Dr. Karen Faunt.
An Award-Winning Approach to Caring for People and Pets
Recently, we had the honor of accepting an award on behalf of Banfield from the Vancouver Business Journal, which named our practice the healthiest large employer in Southwest Washington based on our nationwide associate well-being initiatives. This recognition speaks volumes about the work environment we strive to create for our associates and the holistic efforts we make to support their health and well-being, whether mind, body, financial, career or community.
This award recognizes that health has a number of dimensions, including physical, emotional and mental well-being. Throughout the year, I had several opportunities to meet with various segments of the veterinary community, from leaders in the pet health care industry, to associates at hospitals across our network, to veterinary students on the verge of entering practice. While the purpose and outcomes of these interactions widely varied, they all validated how important it is for Banfield to continue investing heavily in the well-being of our associates, no matter where they work or the stage of their career.
We also make Banfield a great place to work by connecting our associates and resources to communities and organizations in need. Because of our approach to volunteerism and corporate citizenship, Banfield was named among Points of Light’s 2017 “Civic 50,” which honors the 50 most community-minded companies in the U.S.
Giving Our Time, Talent and Resources to Help People and Pets
Our passion comes from caring for people and pets around us. In our hospitals, that means providing reliable quality veterinary services to pets – but it doesn’t stop there. We also emphasize care for our communities. We eagerly participate in the Mars Volunteer Program (MVP), an effort of our parent company, Mars Inc., to engage brands like Banfield in service to local communities.
This year, Banfield set an aggressive goal of helping 100,000 pets and people through our volunteer efforts. I’m humbled to say our associates embraced that goal wholeheartedly – we didn’t just meet it, we exceeded it with more than 145,000 people and pets helped in 2017. The preventive care clinic I participated in on September 11 to honor and support vulnerable veterans and their pets was just one such example. From vaccinations to heartworm testing to flea and tick prevention, our associates did it all for the beloved companions of American patriots. I was touched and honored to be a part of the effort to ensure these women and men who sacrificed all for our country were able to ensure the pets they love and depend on for companionship received the veterinary care they needed.
Supporting Communities Recovering from Disaster
As a veterinary practice, we have direct line of sight into the needs of the people and pets in our communities, and we feel an immense responsibility to put our talents and resources to work to address those needs. We launched Banfield’s charitable arm, the Banfield Foundation, just over two years ago with the shared belief that every pet deserves access to veterinary care, regardless of their circumstances. The foundation expands Banfield’s ability to offer assistance to people and pets facing challenging times – and 2017 brought those challenges into stark focus.
As I touched on above, hurricane season stands out as a sobering example of the kinds of challenges that not only have far-reaching and devastating effects on communities, but can also leave them vulnerable long after a natural disaster has passed. Earlier this month, you may have read Banfield Foundation executive director Kim Van Syoc’s article on the work the foundation has been doing in Puerto Rico since Hurricanes Irma and Maria. But even before then, Banfield associates and our foundation answered a similar call for support in multiple states in the aftermaths of Hurricanes Harvey, Irma and Maria.
Our response to the needs of people and pets in and around Houston after Harvey, and the speed with which we were able to deploy so many critical resources, left a lasting impression on me. In a matter of weeks, Banfield associates volunteered hundreds of hours to help care for pets displaced by the flooding, and the foundation issued tens of thousands of dollars in grants to local pet welfare organizations providing care to pets in need. Through the Banfield Better Together Fund™, we were also able to support associates in the area who were personally affected by disaster in Texas and Florida by granting nearly $80,000.
When the combined impacts of Hurricanes Irma and Maria left Puerto Rico in desperate need of support, Banfield and the foundation sprang into action again. We immediately provided Banfield Better Together Fund grants, and as I noted above, extended our associate pay policy during this stressful time for them. To help people and pets on the island, we worked to reopen our hospitals and provide free veterinary care in service of our purpose. Since our first Puerto Rico hospital reopened, we treated more than 7,100 pets and provided nearly 7,4000 hours of service valued at almost $650,000 – at no cost to pet owners.
In all, our disaster relief efforts following the hurricanes ultimately impacted nearly 30,000 pets in need, delivering more than $360,000 in grants to animal welfare and disaster-relief organizations and providing vaccines, medications and other supplies valued at over $36,000.
Continuing to Fulfill Our Purpose in 2018
What has become even clearer to me over the past 12 months is that we do better the more we listen to – and the more swiftly and decisively we act on what we hear from – our associates and the profession. We continue to hear and respond to the feedback and challenges expressed by our associates, the needs of local communities and pets in hardship, and veterinary professionals across the industry who are also leading the way to create the future of veterinary care. And we continue to serve and support each other, our clients and our communities, bringing us all closer to fulfilling our shared purpose.
Thank you, Banfield associates, clients and communities, for the opportunity to share this journey with you. I am confident we have the people and the resources to meet the evolving needs of our communities and to advance our vision for veterinary care and for the industry as a whole. I could not be more eager to embrace the challenges and opportunities 2018 will bring!
