Hello, it's Anthony Chadwick from the webinar Vett welcoming you to another episode of Vet Chat, which is the UK's leading veterinary podcast. We're very fortunate today to have Lisa King, who's the head of HR at IBC Evidencia, and Sarah Heath, who's the head of sustainability, and wanted to really talk a little bit about your positive paw print report that you did. Really exciting.
We've also already got a podcast. On the on the channel, also with Alistair Cliff and yourself, Sarah He, talking about the planet and pets, but we're gonna change it around a little bit and talk about people. People are, when, when people, when people say to me, what's the most important part of your business?
It's always the team, isn't it? It's a, it's a massive, it's a, it's a massive part of what we do and really interested to see what you're doing, Lisa, in that whole area of colleague wellbeing and and initiatives around mental health. You know, we know, obviously I'm a vet myself that there are issues around welfare and around stress within the profession, and that obviously cascades down to everything else we do.
. I suppose in the end it's about creating a great place to work in as well, isn't it? So tell me a little bit about what you're doing at the moment to to make IBC Evidencia practises a a great place to, to work in. Yeah, firstly, it's a pleasure to be here.
Thank you for inviting us, Anthony. And, and just a tiny bit of background on me, I'm group HR director for IBC Evidencia. And my remit really covers the whole people agenda for the group, with the exception of, of the academy, the learning and development arm, which is run by our Chief Medical Officer.
I, I, I, I guess really, I, I need to take you on a bit of a journey on well-being, as you rightly said, Anthony, . You know, there's, there's more stress than ever in, in, in the profession at the moment. And I guess when I joined two years ago, just before our new chief executive, Steve, we both knew and, and became very aware very quickly of the challenges and made a big commitment to invest in, in mental well-being initially.
And, and I guess where it comes under the sustainability banner, it, It's obvious, you know, our team, our people are the lifeblood of this business. You know, they provide essential and outstanding care to millions of animals every year, and they're really the beating heart. So protecting and promoting the health and well-being of our teams is our priority.
So what did we do? Well, back in, in early 2020, we, we did a survey to all our UK employees, and the results were, were really interesting, and we ran it, we partnered with MHFA, who are a leading UK workforce mental health charity provider. And, and, and the results of that survey gave us the underpin of our strategy, really, which is focused on three areas destigmatizing mental health.
You know, you just alluded to, it needs to be a good place to work. Well, the research told us that people didn't feel able to talk about their worries and concerns. So, Getting a culture where people are able to talk about it was very much the first step.
And I think we've made a lot of progress in this area. We run symposiums now where vets, nurses, receptionists, anyone really from the clinical team comes on and talks about what they've done or what they, how they've handled the situation and really opened up and the feedback we've had has been phenomenal. The second area is signposting, which surprised me that people just don't know where to get help.
We're a very big group, you know, 34,000 employees now, I think, and counting across 18 countries, I think. And people don't know where to get help, even though we think we provide it. So we're doing a much better job of signposting.
And, and many of our listeners today will know of that life, a phenomenal charity, who we've just made a significant donation to. They, they support veterinary professionals across the UK, and they provide mental health support actually through, a, award-winning provider March on Stress, and, and our donation this year will help them develop resources online, . You know, to provide accessible guidance on topics from burnout through to compassion, fatigue.
So we're, you know, we're proud and pleased that we've stepped forward to, to, to help them really in the invaluable work they do. And, you know, and they've told us about the You know, worrying statistic that, that, you know, mental well-being is on the rise. It was always a challenge for the profession and it, it, it's got worse in recent times.
So signposting is key for us. And then the third element of the strategy is around training. And what we've done is we, you know, we've really committed to training because the survey told us that a lot of our clinical leaders didn't feel.
Equipped really to, to support people. And so what we've done is we've rolled out, and we offer training to all our leaders in practise to, to give them training, with mental health first aid. And again, the, the feedback has been incredible, really.
It's, it's sometimes a challenge to, to engage with our clinicians and our clinical teams to do training that isn't professionally led, clinically led, but, but they've said some of this training has been more valuable than ever, both for their own. Mental well-being, but also in, in, in recognising the signs in others, not necessarily to help, but to signpost or, or, or have the conversation. So this, this really sort of is, Mirrors what we've done, you know, we obviously clinical CPD really, really important, but it was when we partnered with the Royal College of Veterinary Surgeons around their Mind Matters initiative.
We did an eight week course on mindfulness which was training people how to be more mindful, how to live in the present moment, how to worry less. That training has probably been the most significant thing we've done in the last 12 years. If you look at the comments that we got back from people.
Yeah, that's you know just being able to say, I've gone on holiday and I've relaxed. I'm not being as angry when I'm in the practise, I'm not shouting at people because this is all part of culture as well, isn't it, being civil within the practise, that you're not going to be going into the business dreading, oh, is so and so gonna have a bad day today. And you know, leadership is, it's so important that you know, myself as, as leading my company that.
The the the management, the leadership team sets that example, doesn't it? Absolutely. And, and look, Anthony, you know, it's not to say that all of this is the answer.
It, it's a start. It's, it's recognising the challenge. It's, it showing people where they can get help, but ultimately, as you said, people want, have to feel they want to come into work.
It's a good place to work and, and. There's lots of other things that we're, we're doing as a group, you know, that, that don't specifically come from HR like the care fund that Ali Cliff talked to on the last webinar, you know, being able to support our clinicians with a fund that can help treat an animal that otherwise wouldn't have been able to has had an enormous impact. On the well-being of the vets.
The data tells us that, community grants, which Sarah will talk to, we're hoping we'll have similar, outcomes. But there's lots of other factors to take into account the shortage of staff. We need to do more, more work on rotas to, to help our, our clinics to give work life balance.
So, You know, multiple factors impact wellbeing. We're on a journey, but we're totally committed to doing everything we can to support our staff. And I think it's, it's about walking your talk, isn't it?
It's very easy to say we, you know, we care about the team, etc. Etc. But you know, I was really impressed with Alice the last time when.
He was talking about these grants that he gives to every practitioner, which you've just alluded to, you know, and nurse. The fact, sometimes one of the things that used to break my heart was when we had a pet that we perhaps could do something for, but the money was tight and we had to then compromise, which was why I was always in my own practise pushing insurance because then you could just offer what, you know, you considered to be the best. But I, I know that's had a one a huge effect on the pets, but obviously we as vets and nurses are animal lovers.
So when we feel we can do something like that, which is, you know, completely altruistic, I think that has a massive effect on the wellbeing of the person, because if we're doing something nice for people on the whole, that makes us feel better about ourselves, doesn't it? Of course. And that's why you come into the profession and, and we recognise that and that's.
That's where I am proud of, of the sustainability, the positive paw print agenda that we have. They're not in isolation. They're all coming together.
Various strands will support, people really, so yeah, and I think sustainability is really interesting because we use the word. I mean, I, I'm very much into saying regeneration because in some places we have to regenerate, it's not just about sustaining. Yes, I, I can see that.
But the sustainability word often we're a bit fixated on it being about the environment, but actually to have a sustainable business you have to have people who want to stay and work with you and and this is why it's, it's so important within that people category as well, isn't it? Absolutely. And, and, you know, the, the scale of IBC evidence, you know, you know, really does afford us the opportunity to try and support the profession.
Lisa, I'd just like to thank you, you know, on behalf of the veterinary profession for that donation you made to VetLife. I'm gonna shout out the number because obviously people may be listening to this who, who either, you know, it's a UK, charity obviously, but it is, yes, please do. Yeah, 0303 0402551.
Really amazing charity voluntarily staffed by by vets who will chat to people if, you know, if you're struggling with something, it's completely confidential. And I suppose sometimes having that independent source, you know, we all kind of want to sometimes look strong and don't go in to speak to our managers, so. As much as we want to destigmatize it, there will be people who are very private who would rather go outside of the business to talk about issues about for their own personal mental health, wouldn't there?
Absolutely, and, and we do, you know, obviously in the UK we provide counselling, externally for any clinic where they feel there's a need to. To, to urgently get help, but, they do take us up on it, but the majority prefer to go to that life for the reasons you've said and, and we're proud to work with them and the work they do is, is, is phenomenal really. .
My other thing, I've just been very fortunate. I've spent a week away, seeing my friend in Spain and, and did a big long walk and did lots of walking in nature, . It, I, I love that idea of starting to develop bee friendly practises, you know, I'm very much into biodiversity.
I was at COP 26 and we can, if you like, be a bit dominated by the carbon story, but actually sustainability, biodiversity is as important, you know, the effects that bees have on our, on our, plants, on our crops is, is massive. Tell us a little bit, Sarah, about the bee friendly practise. What's that all about and what are you planning to do there?
So yeah, we, we've been working in partnership with the British Veterinary Bee Association, and we've been giving our practises the opportunity to become bee friendly practises. We centrally funded the 1st 25% of those, and then we're actively encouraging a wider range of practises to sign up. It's quite simple as an initiative, but it's really very, very important in terms of raising awareness, I think, which is really critical in this area.
So the practises receive a pack with wildflower seeds, with, with lots of information on, on, on beef or on the, the issue and how to, how to promote beef friendly practises. And then they get, awareness posters that they can actually put up, so very much communicating the, the message out to their clients. We're conscious we are very much at the centre of so many communities.
And so many pet owners and animal owners are coming into our practises that there's there's a real opportunity for us to be spreading some very important messages around around the environment, around all sorts of other things. So whether that's animal welfare as well. But actually, this is an area where, where we have a we have an audience and we can actually spread that message and encourage our clients to, to sign up to, To be, to be friendly, initiatives as well.
So it's been, it's been really exciting one. It's one that our practises have been really, really keen to support. And what we're looking to do now is to expand that into, into other countries.
So, so our team in the Netherlands are looking at it, our team in Sweden are looking at it, probably taking a slightly different shape or form, but actually very much taking the, taking the view that we will. We want to promote wildlife around our around our clinic settings, whether that's through, bee friendly planting, butterfly printing friendly planting, insect hotels, all of those sorts of initiatives, but actually very much being aware of biodiversity. And obviously, our farm practise, this is part of their, their, their, their daily life in terms of the, the advice and conversations they're having with farmers.
No, it's really interesting. We, we planted a, a wildflower meadow at the Liverpool Science Park where our office is, and it's just so nice to go down, look at the plants, suddenly see bees in the centre of Liverpool, butterflies. I even saw a grasshopper last year.
So all sorts of creatures, come out, and of course, also in my local area around Bootle, . You know, not, not the, the wealthiest area in the world. A lot of planting going on there, and of course that helps to raise mental health, because if you're living in a beautiful place, you're going into work where there's, you know, colour and everything, then it, it's a, it's a massive help to mental health as well, isn't it, both Lisa and Sarah.
Exactly. I, I was just gonna say if we can encourage our teams to create and help them to create. Nice relaxing environments at the, you know, around the practise site where they can go and sit and have a coffee when they get a break and it's a, it's a pleasant place to sit and just get some fresh air and get some sunshine hopefully.
Then, then that's, that's all gonna contribute to their, to their well-being and mental health. We're, we're a very wide profession, Lisa, and I, I've been really impressed with. Some of the work that you're doing around scholarships to increase diversity, and I think it's really, really important.
We, we did something with the Royal College last year at our, our virtual congress around the Mind Matters initiative symposium. And I won't go into all the details, but I was quite shocked also that not only were we white, but sometimes we're not as welcoming as we should be. To people coming from other, traditions, talk to us a little bit about what you're trying to do to, to change that mindset as well.
No, Anthony, so I agree with your observations. I think back when Steve and I joined, as I alluded to earlier in 2020, I think we were both really surprised that At the lack of ethnic diversity, not something we were used to, and we agreed with the executive, we wanted to do something for the profession and Amanda Boger, our chief medical officer, took it on to, to get it launched. We set up a, an ethnic diversity scholarship with ethnic vets and nurses across our, our group, and we set about promoting the scheme.
And we've brought in, in fact, they're now in place, the first year, 13 vets and 3 nurses, and we want to target 15 vets and 15 nurses, by 2025. And, you know, it's one of the most awe inspiring, pieces of work I've done in reading those applications, The, the resilience, the determination of, of the students that applied for the scholarship was just, you know, really was inspiring what they have been through and what they are, are trying to do to become a vet, and we're delighted, it was really difficult to narrow it down the board, but, you know, we're really looking forward to seeing how they Progress. And I, I think we're the first, veterinary employer to, to do something like this.
And, and, hopefully the other, the other groups will, will join forces and, and, and do good in this area. It's a very small start, but, you know, we're, we're absolutely committed, to driving inclusion and paving the way for more positive change, and to that end, Some of the feedback we got was, and, and rightly so was we were catching them as they were about to go to university, but, but the challenges start much younger in education, and we need to, show schools, and, and, and groups in that school, what, what is possible, where often they might not get. The exposure they need at a young age.
And I think recently, in fact, I know that Amanda's been partnering with animal aspirations and the Union of Bristol to produce a video for schools, which, with the aim of reaching out to children from different backgrounds, introducing them to the veterinary profession and exposing them to The versatility and the benefits of, of such a career. So I hope that gives you a flavour, you know, it, it's a very early start, but it's something we're, you know, we're proud to be associated with and, and I hope that we're leaders of change and and the size of our group allow us to be able to do things like this. So hopefully that gives you a flavour and the listeners.
Lisa, I think it's great. I mean, the old Chinese proverb, the journey of 1000 miles starts with a single step, and I think it's so important that we do look at, you know, obviously small starts, but you have to start somewhere, so thank you so much. It's one of our value words in inclusivity.
And bringing those people in is, is great. Is there work to be done, you know, across the IBC Evidencia team and across the profession to make sure that we're actually welcoming people when they do come in? Absolutely, and, and we've talked to, you know, to our people and, and heard some, you know.
Some of their troops and some of what they've experienced, some good and, and some not so good. And, and it's about educating, and, you know, a number of these students, that we've reached out to have talked to, you know, they want to see a face similar to theirs. That really helps.
So we're hoping that will be a step for change, but yes, that, that, there's a lot more that, that we can do as a group in, in educating, And not just ethnic diversity, you know, we're, we're trying to, make strides on, on gender diversity, you know, significant demographic within the profession, as we know, a female. you know, we've made a commitment that by 2025, half, half, you know, 50% of all senior roles will be by women and, and, you know, we're, we're looking at, We're looking at initiatives that, that can help us on that journey. So lots to be done, but good starts, but they, you know, we need to turn them into actions and, and we fully intend to do so.
Fantastic Lisa. You know, again, that those small starts, I, I, I want to talk a little bit about the, the whole idea of plan it again, moving to net zero. But first, before we perhaps start on net zero, which is one of my little hobby horses at the moment, because I'm not sure if I'm in the right area with this, if I'm, if I'm going against the flow in my thoughts of, of where I see us as a company, but.
Perhaps starting with zero waste to landfill, that's a really, ambitious target, if you don't mind me saying, Sarah. And of course I know that, as always, the Scandinavians are leading the way, so I believe Sweden is already within your group, zero to waste to landfill. Talk to me a little bit about how do you actually do that and, and I know you've got targets for other countries like the UK and and your other countries, but what is Sweden doing that's so good, and what are you learning from Sweden that you'll bring into the other countries?
Well, I mean, as you say, Antony, I mean that we have the opportunity, the great thing of, of being a group operating in many different countries is that we can really take experiences and learn one market from can learn from another. This, it, it, we're learning it's, it's about having the right, waste management contracts. Obviously, the nature of, the group has, has, has often been that, that, that the individual, veterinary practises may have their own approaches to managing waste, for example, or.
Or energy. What we're seeing in terms of our, our planet strategy is there's a real opportunity in some areas to actually bring that together, across a country, to have one waste management contract, for example, one electricity contract, then we can negotiate, a really good supportive contract from the waste management firm that will enable us to recycle. All of our key waste streams, we need to obviously audit what our waste streams are first, identify where the highest volume waste, is, look at, at, at providing the right bins, the right signage.
It's pretty basic in terms of waste and also energy, you know, we need to have the signage up so that our teams are aware of what, what they need to do, what needs to go in which bins so that we can ensure that it's recycled. And then and then we actually then need to work with our suppliers to actually, minimise waste source as well. So in terms of Sweden, they've made really good progress in, in terms of, ensuring that, ensuring that waste is diverted from landfill.
We've now got a really good. Waste management contract in the UK with the vast majority of us, our sites on that contract, and where we have a target to be zero waste to landfill by 2025. My feeling we're making very good progress.
I think we should be at that, well ahead of target, which is really, really good. And what we need to do is to, is to start identifying the other waste streams that we can bring in. So looking at, looking at more challenging areas.
So, for example, recycling, pharmaceutical bottles, and that kind of thing. Look at, but this is very much working in partnership with our, with our suppliers and also talking to the suppliers about how we can cut excess packaging, how we can, Just re-engineer products so that they are easier to recycle. So, so having products made out of 11 material rather than a composite mix, which makes it therefore harder to recycle.
So it's a complex area, but, we are committed to making progress and in all of our I I was talking to teams from our top 5 markets yesterday, we're all in the process of reviewing waste management, identifying where the key, the key impact areas are, . And and and rolling out those those waste management systems to make it very easy for our clinic teams to actually recycle, which I know we know is something that they really want to do. They're passionate about this area.
I read an article, 8% of clinical plastic goes to, recycling. So obviously 92% doesn't. When you say zero waste to landfill, is some of that then incinerated and is there a way of capturing that energy?
What, what, how does plastic get dealt with, like, like clinical plastic? So obviously in our industry, we have to be very, very careful about clinical waste, that does have to go for incineration. There are, there are a lot of controls and rules and regulations over how we have to deal with our waste safety.
We're obviously ensuring that we want to follow those rules, very tightly. Yes, some of that waste will go for incineration and, and that is used to generate electricity. So, so we can capture that.
What we need to do is to then capture that within our own calculations of our climate impact, which is a complex, complex exercise. But, but that's something that we will, we will certainly be, be looking to capture as we, as we calculate sort of our overall group climate emissions. The more sort of circular environments that we can create the better that, you know, it is getting recycled or or or made energy out of.
The, the final one is this moving to net zero. I, I'll, I'll tell you my experience first, sir, and then tell me if it, if it's a fair way of doing things, you know, we're obviously a much smaller company, we're office based, we're using servers and so on to to store our webinars. And we worked with a company to work out what our carbon footprint was.
We're obviously doing things like renewable energy, we're using sensors in work for lights and so on. Obviously trying our best with recycling and so on. But obviously we do create carbon, and so my attitude was then let let's go for carbon neutrality.
We're obviously also, I hope, saving carbon because our clients do webinars instead of maybe going to an evening meeting or whatever. So We've then bought carbon credits, we're at the moment supporting women refugees in Chad with solar stoves, and we're looking at preventing deforestation in the Amazon by protecting areas. Obviously all of these have to be well vetted because it's very easy to give money away and I think there's a worry with people like the oil industry that they just carry on doing what they've done, but then buy a few credits from something that isn't well vetted.
How, how do you see that? I, I definitely see carbon credits as a way forward in the short term, because if we're saying 2030 and 2050 are magic dates. Let's just try and go carbon neutral immediately, even if that means we're buying a lot of credits.
Because that will at least help us to save parts of the planet and obviously also potentially with reafforestation schemes. Does that, you know, obviously you're, you've done so much in sustainability, is that a reasonable approach and, and how are you approaching it at IVC Evidencia? I, I think it's, it, it's a complex area and it's obviously a really evolving area because technology is, is, is evolving in terms of how we can, how we can sort of eliminate our emissions.
We've, done something very similar to the exercise that you did, but, perhaps on a larger scale, we've just gone through an exercise of calculating our carbon emissions across the group, across all 18 countries. And we've, it's been fascinating and really, really useful in terms of helping us to really pinpoint where our emissions are coming from, and then to, to start implementing some really targeted activities to, to, to eliminate those emissions. And then that, once what we're trying to do is to, is to develop, is to see how far we can go through our own, direct.
Action, which we believe should be, should be, you know, is our responsibility. And then we look at offset as part of that. So, I mean, we've got, we've got projects going at the moment to look at our existing building estate, as you can imagine, that's a very, very diverse building estate.
And we go from, from, practises in Victorian buildings to state of the art modern modern hospitals with very different. Energy footprints. But we are introducing everything from LED lighting to building management systems.
And actually, we're really excited about the savings, but we should be able to achieve. It looked like it looks like we should have the potential to save, save, you know, a good 20, 25% of emissions in just a standard practise. And then there'll be opportunities to do more as we as we invest in, in new and interesting technologies as they're coming on board.
We then looking at electric vehicles. We need to look at our vehicle fleet. We then need to look at the new buildings, our greenfield site developments.
We need to look at things like anaesthesia gases, which, which we know the industry is working on, and we're very much wanting to partner with the industry on that. And then a key area we're looking at changing the source of our electricity to renewable energy. We've already got our top 5 markets, buying.
Electricity from renewable sources. We've got a target to get to 85% of electricity renewable sources by 2023. And we should be on track to meet that.
But of course, going back to what you were saying about offset, that will get us a certain part of the way. We know that our, our veterinary teams are really, really passionate about, about the climate, about sustainability and about achieving net zero. So we will be looking at at offsetting opportunities as part of this.
It, it's gonna be a case of developing that strategy and that plan. And, and, and, and, and setting our target date, which is something we're looking to do over the, over the next 6 months. It's a complicated exercise, but the, the key thing around any offset project will be that it's, it's obviously fully verified in terms of having a real impact in terms of mitigating climate impact.
And, and we would really like to support projects. Which will be really, really engaging for our teams. So, so as you get the, the example that, that you had of actually, you know, really helping, acting as a development opportunity for, for, for, for poorer communities or communities where they don't have good electricity, there's a, there's a real opportunity there, and I think we'd love to be involved in those sorts of projects, but we need to choose them very, very carefully.
Really fascinating, perhaps at the end, you know, obviously people will be listening to this and saying it's all very well, you know, it's IBC Evidencia, you know, we're a smaller business, it's really difficult to do. But actually within all of these things, I was speaking to my bank yesterday about sustainability, I think I'm becoming a pest. But anyway, that's OK, and they were actually talking about.
The fact that it actually makes good business sense, obviously bringing Lisa in as well, you know. I think there was a, a feeling in the past that, you know, to be green was expensive, whereas the actual cost, particularly now with energy, the way that energy is spiralling, there's a real opportunity to save, to save money and, you know, similarly, Lisa, with, with your things around mental health, if you can help people to stay in your business longer, you know. You're doing it for the right reasons, but actually all of these things, if you give, you always, I've found in my life, get back at just as much if not more.
What, what, what are your thoughts, maybe as a final thought on that Lisa around sustainability as, you know, it doesn't need to be expensive for businesses to, to be involved in sustainability of people, sustainability of the planet. Absolutely, Antony. And I think, you know, the three pillars all come together.
They're not separate in initiatives. They are, you know, our business priorities. And, and like you said, they make good commercial sense, of course.
They're the right thing to do as well. And, you know, we're totally committed to them. So, I, I, I, I totally agree.
You can't work in isolation, they all need to intertwine and join together and, And we are on a journey. We've got a long way to go, but, in the time it's been up and running, we are, we are gaining momentum, but lots to do. But to your point, you know, our, our people need to be happy at work, and there's many facets of that.
But, but well-being is right there at the top, without a doubt. And we've only touched on mental today. Of course, there's much more to go at, physical.
Health, emotional, nutritional, you know, financial, what, what, you know, the list goes on and we haven't talked about Europe either. We've, we've, we've got to embed this across our whole group platform, which we're, we're committed to doing. Lisa, sir, it's been great having you on.
I, I'm really loving the fact that such a big group is interested, you know, in sustainability and the environment, and its people. Thank you for, for all the work that you're doing, and it's, it's great to also have people from outside the profession. I think we can gain so much from the experience of people from outside the profession, because sometimes if we look at it.
In the same way that we've always looked at it, we'll get the same results that we've always got, so having people coming in with such a wealth of experience that you bring, I, I believe it's an exciting time and I'm looking forward to checking up maybe next year and seeing what progress is being made. Well, we've, we've committed that we're gonna be publishing our report every year, so, so we will absolutely be delivering that, that, that report on progress. So letting you know how we're doing against our targets.
Great, we'll get you on a podcast then. Thanks very much. Yeah, thank you for your time, Anthony.
Appreciate it. Thank you very much. Bye bye, bye bye.
