Your job ad promises a supportive team. But what could a vet or nurse find online that gives them a reason to believe you?

For a new grad comparing jobs, “experienced vets available for mentoring” leaves plenty unanswered. Who helps when the clinic gets busy? Can they ask a question without feeling silly? What happens when their mentor leaves?

Episode 294 is the 11th episode in the 16-part REAL•CULTURE•STORY series. This ...

“Great lifestyle location” might help a vet or nurse imagine their weekends. But what could they look forward to on the days they’re working at your clinic?

Your team’s ordinary working day could contain something someone else would love to have in theirs. If that detail never makes it into your Culture Stories, someone considering your job ad may never discover it.

In episode 293 of Veterinary Voices—th...

What your team takes for granted could be why someone applies. Something that feels completely routine inside your clinic may be exactly what a vet or nurse wants to know about before deciding whether to apply.

“Opportunities to develop your interests” leaves a lot to the reader’s imagination. A Culture Story showing how one nurse’s interest became a regular part of her working week gives them something meani...

If you removed your clinic’s name and logo from your job ad, would your own team recognise themselves—or could the same words belong to almost any vet clinic?

Vets and nurses want to understand what it would feel like to spend their working week with your people. Phrases such as “close-knit team” and “supportive and collaborative environment” don’t give them that answer. Your team’s re...

Your clinic says it values learning. Then a new grad asks a senior vet for help and gets a sigh, an eye roll and: “Didn’t they teach you that at vet school?”

What management does next shows that new grad—and everyone watching—which standards your clinic genuinely protects and which behaviours it’s prepared to let slide.

Episode 290 is the seventh episode in the 16-part REAL•CULTURE•STORY series. Th...

Almost every veterinary clinic says, “We work as a team.” But that tells vets and nurses almost diddly squat about how the team actually works.

What they need to understand is what happens when someone asks for help, disagrees, challenges a decision or finds themselves left holding the fort.

Episode 289 is the sixth episode in the 16-part REAL•CULTURE•STORY series. This week, Julie South explores U for UNDERSTANDING: how ...

A vet or nurse may begin researching your clinic months before you advertise a vacancy. They’re not necessarily ready to apply—but they may already be deciding whether yours is a clinic worth remembering.

If the answers they need are scattered across job ads, client-facing webpages and old social posts, they may simply move on before finding a reason to keep your clinic on their watchlist.

In episode five of the REAL•CULT...

A client begins shouting at someone on reception. A colleague steps between them, and the clinic leader backs the team by respectfully ending the client–clinic relationship. 

The value on the wall may say “respect”—but what happens in that moment reveals whether the clinic truly lives it. 

In episode four of the REAL•CULTURE•STORY series, Julie South unpacks the L — Lived Values.

Previously in t...

Your Job Ad Says "Supportive Team." But Who Are They?

A new grad dreading her first large bitch spay asks a senior vet to be on hand. The senior vet watches quietly, steps in only when it gets tricky, then trusts her to finish the surgery herself. Nobody wrote that moment into a job ad. But it's exactly the kind of proof that turns "supportive team" from a claim into something a vet or nurse can believe. In episode three of...

"The Cake Problem": Why Your Best Recruitment Evidence Is the Stuff You Never Think to Mention

Every Thursday, one vet bakes a cake for the Large Animal team meeting. Nobody asked her to. It's not in her job description. And it's exactly the kind of thing that never makes it into a job ad — even though it's the realest proof of "great team culture" a clinic will ever have.

In episode two of the REAL+CULTURE+STORY series, Julie ...

The R in REAL+CULTURE+STORY: Why "Great Team" Job Ads Don't Work

One letter. One question every vet clinic job ad needs to answer: is what you're claiming real, or is it just window dressing?

In episode one of a new series, Julie South starts unpacking the REAL+CULTURE+STORY Framework — the 16-letter framework behind every Culture Story Centre her team builds — one letter at a time.

Episode notes

This episode covers:

• Why...

What Every "Vet Clinic Job Ad" Elephant Has In Common

Eight weeks. Seven elephants. One pattern.

In the series finale of The Elephant In The Room, Julie South brings it all together — and names the single thing every elephant in this series had in common. Plus something you absolutely need to know before the next series begins.

Episode notes

This episode recaps all seven elephants from the series:

• The clinic with a re...

Everyone in veterinary has an opinion about corporate versus independent ownership. Strong ones, in both directions.

But almost nobody says which one they are in the job ad.

In the seventh episode of The Elephant In The Room, Julie South looks at the question that sits in the back of every vet and nurse's mind when they're reading a job ad — and gives you one practical check that takes about thirty seconds.

Episode notes

Research...

Some vets and nurses leave the profession far too soon. You probably know of at least one yourself.

In this sixth episode of The Elephant In The Room series, Julie South looks at what happens when a new grad arrives at a clinic and the support that was promised turns out to look very different in practice — and asks one question that every new grad and every clinic owner should be able to answer.

Episode notes

Many vet clinics a...

What's the single most important thing vets and nurses need to see in a job ad?

Research says it's pay. By a country mile.

And yet most vet clinic job ads say the same two words: competitive remuneration. In the fifth episode of The Elephant In The Room series, Julie South looks at why clinics won't put salary ranges in their ads — and why that decision is costing them more applications than they realise.

Episode notes

In 2023, V...

If you're responsible for hiring at your vet clinic, do you have dread words? Words you know you have to include in the job ad, but the moment you type them you can already feel the applications not coming?

This episode is about two of those words: after-hours.

In the fourth episode of The Elephant In The Room, Julie South looks at why "shared across the team" tells a vet or nurse almost nothing — and why the clinics that have ...

The skills shortage is real. But it's not why your ad isn't working - the elephant in the room - ep. 278

Two clinics. Same town. Same skills shortage. One's been advertising since-forever. The other has been running a different kind of recruitment programme — and has had multiple suitable applicants within weeks.

Same shortage. Completely different outcomes. In the third episode of The Elephant In The Room, Julie South talks ab...

If you've ever looked at your job ad dashboard and wondered why the views are high and the applications aren't — this episode is about one of the reasons. And it's likely not the one Seek (or other job boards) will tell you about.

In the second episode of The Elephant In The Room, Julie South looks at the gap between believing a job ad and trusting it enough to act on it — and why spending more for more exposure doesn't ...

There's a clinic not too far from you right now that everyone in the profession knows about.

The vets know. The nurses know. The locums know. You can see it in the turnover — always hiring, always starting over. And nobody says publicly why.

In the first episode of a new series — The Elephant In The Room — Julie South talks about the reputation that travels through private chats and late-night conference conversatio...