A Road to Nowhere Is Hard to Build. And Harder to Follow.

If you don’t know where you’re going, how does your team?

So, you’re a practice owner or a practice manager. Now what? You open your doors, see patients, answer phones, put out fires. Same old, same old. But then what?

What’s it all for? Why are you doing it all? What’s the end goal? What’s the vision?

If you think a practice without vision is fine as long as it’s paying the bills, covering payroll, letting you buy a new car every five years or splurge on a fancy set of golf clubs, you’re in for a surprise.

Vision = goals

Vision = purpose Vision = meaning

When you have a direction, you have a why. You have purpose. Your team has purpose. It’s not just about having a job. They can get one at the local supermarket or McDonald’s, and let’s be real, they’ll get paid about the same or more, with way less responsibility.

The workforce doesn’t just want purpose. They demand it.

A road to nowhere is hard to build. And harder to follow.

If your team believes in the purpose and believes their role has meaning, they will stay. They’ll want to be part of something great. You’ll have longer team retention. And don’t forget, training new team members costs money. According to Gallup, it costs small businesses 18% of a person’s salary just to train someone new. That doesn’t even include the opportunity costs, your teams time, overtime, your team’s energy, or the disruption to workflow.

Your team needs purpose. We all need purpose.

In veterinary medicine, “vision” can sound like fluff. We’re a profession grounded in science, medicine, and proven data. But a clear and purposeful vision is one of the most practical tools a veterinary owner or manager can have.

It answers three essential questions

Where is the practice going

Why does this matter

and how are we going to get there

When your vision is strong, every decision, every lever you pull, and every person you bring on board helps guide you toward that bigger picture. It’s not just about doing more. It’s about intentional moves that directly impact the greater goal. The vision.

Most practices don’t suffer from a lack of effort. They suffer from a lack of clarity.

Without vision, your priorities shift every week. You say yes to things you shouldn’t. You react instead of lead. And your team, even the good ones, start to drift. They work, but it becomes task-focused, not mission-driven.

You’ll start to notice little things like:

You’ll receive less feedback or silence when you ask questions

Team seem unsure why changes are being made

Buy-in is harder to get

You’re managing behavior instead of empowering decision-making

You feel like you're pulling people along instead of taking them with you

It’s exhausting. And it’s avoidable.

Your vision doesn’t live in your head. It doesn’t live on a napkin. And it’s not some fuzzy concept floating out on the horizon while you sip your morning coffee and look out the window.

It has to be written

It has to be developed

It has to be actionable

It has to be communicated clearly and consistently

When your team knows where you’re going, they don’t just complete tasks. They take ownership. They’re aligned. They lead. They use initiative. They collaborate.

And suddenly, you’re not carrying the practice on your back. You’re building something together.

If you’re reading this and thinking, “We don’t really have a vision,” well, slap yourself on the back of your head and make one. Just make sure that concept of the future drives what you do in the present.

Don’t know where to start? Email me, or visit https://ivmsolutions.org/home#assessments and take the survey.

In vet med, we’re used to running. Emergencies. Backlogs. Short-staffed days. But at some point, we have to pause and ask, where are we going? What are we doing all for? You know what that’s called? Purpose, and purpose = vision.

Because if you don’t know where you’re going, the road you’re building might not take you anywhere you actually want to be.

Start with “Why”