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Are you feeling overwhelmed by the sheer number of jobs available for vets at the moment? Every clinic in Australia seems to be desperate for more vets. How do you pick the right clinic for you?

1.     Create a profile of your ideal job and employer.

• First think about your current and previous jobs – and decide what you might like to avoid in your next job, and what might be missing in your current job.
• What is most satisfying in your current job.
• You may have a preferred geographical area – but remember to be open to jobs outside this area too. Your perfect job might be just a little farther away or in a suburb that you’ve not yet considered.
• What kind of workplace culture are you after? Vet Clinics are getting better at personalising their advertising, and giving an idea of their culture and mission.
• Do you want to work for a large company group? Benefits can include the opportunity for in house education, networking, work opportunities or transfers with other practices within the group, and a range of more corporate perks and benefits. Or is a smaller, more unique practice with hands on input from one or more Owner Vets more your style?

2.     Use your connections to research clinics

Don’t be afraid to interview the Clinic – ask to have a chat with current staff, including the vet nurses. Spend a few trial days at the Clinic if possible

3.     Register with Kookaburra Vet Employment

Let Kookaburra Vets help you narrow down suitable jobs – if you can give us a geographical area and type of practice that you are looking for, then we can send you personalised email alerts with newly listed job information. So if you’re looking for a job in Gippsland, we won’t send you job information for a clinic on the Gold Coast. Avoiding information overload helps you to focus on the best jobs for you.

Kookaburra also sends personalised texts with locum job alerts. We supply full clinic details – so you can decide whether to apply or not.

You can register here: https://www.kookaburravets.com/Australia/VregOz1.asp

4.     Bookmark the m.kookaburravets.com site

Every job on the main Kookaburra Vet Employment website is also listed here – but this one is easy to read on a mobile phone, it is database driven so you can apply filters, and the new jobs listed today will always be at the top of the list. It makes it easy to just keep an eye on new vacancies.

m.kookaburravets.com

Author:
Wendy Nathan
Kookaburra Veterinary Employment

This information includes the views and opinions of Kookaburra Veterinary Employment and is of a general nature only. Factual information is believed to be correct at the time of writing, however, should not be relied upon and any person should confirm details with the relevant authorities and through their own research prior to acting on any of the suggestions in this article.

One thing that came up recently in the office was the discussion around AI and its possible uses for everyday life. Amazon’s recent release of their “Just Walk Out” AI stores performance and subsequent cancelling of the pick up and go experience brings to mind the question – “What can AI actually do?”

Machine learning and continual development of AI could bring better efficiency, diagnostic tools and research results within the industry. With the implementation of AI in clinics, we could see reduced workload of admin tasks, freeing up of nurse & support staff for more time to focus on patient care and customer service, as well as AI assisting vets to achieve improved patient health outcomes.

How could using AI in your clinic help with diagnosing medical cases?
Utilizing an AI’s ability to analyse vast amounts of data (e.g., patients medical history, available genetic data, known treatment responses etc..) it could help reduce the chance of an adverse reaction and assist Veterinarians with making informed decisions to achieve the most effective treatment/patient care solutions and diagnosis.

There has also been advancements with AI systems being able to assist with interpreting and analysis of medical imaging, CSIRO published a good article on the human medicine side recently.

What about the creative side of things, like advert writing or graphics for media use?
Most will have heard of or experienced by now, ChatGPT, and its ability to punch out cover letters, resumes and assignments. There is AI out there that is specifically being designed and developed for Ad Copy, Image and Video creation too. These could be a great tool for those clinics low on free time to get a written draft organised to edit for a more personalised advertisement, update & create social media banners or even generate images and organise a template for patient information handouts/printouts.

A Kookaburra tip – always check the work generated by AI, especially the free versions of AI. They might seem like a good tool but they are free for a reason. We have come across adverts with missing or completely irrelevant information for the clinic (e.g., info for different suburbs, blank sections or <insert name here> fields).

The tools being developed may still have a bit of a way to go, but the AI field is making steady progress with improvements and ironing out of bugs. Have you noticed improvements in AI-powered chatbots handling basic online inquiries lately?

From scheduling appointments and providing basic information for pet owners to analysing patient data and providing detailed suggested treatment plans, how far would you look at integrating AI in your clinic? Do you think we will see automated AI assistant surgery machines in the future? I think it’s fair to say we won’t see ChatGPT perform surgery tasks, but maybe an AI will eventually come along that could.

To sum it up, in the Veterinary industry, there are many applications and instances where AI could be used to enhance, streamline or even automate completely within clinics. Just how much we want handled by AI and how long it will take to get the AI functionality required is the question.

Interested in trying out some current AI models or seeing what is out there? Check out below!

OpenAI – ChatGPT (Test version) – https://chat.openai.com/

OpenAI – Sora (Text to Video) – https://openai.com/sora, YouTube example https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HK6y8DAPN_0

Microsoft Copilot – https://copilot.microsoft.com/

Adobe Firefly (Image AI) – https://www.adobe.com/au/products/firefly.html

Google Gemini – https://gemini.google.com/  / https://ai.google/

If you’re interested in what other AI are being developed you can check out this community – https://huggingface.co/, there is a free chat version as well (limited to 2 prompts as a guest) – https://huggingface.co/chat/

Author:

John Maude
Kookaburra Veterinary Employment

This information includes the views and opinions of Kookaburra Veterinary Employment and is of a general nature only. Factual information is believed to be correct at the time of writing, however, should not be relied upon and any person should confirm details with the relevant authorities and through their own research prior to acting on any of the suggestions in this article.

With the AVA Annual Conference coming up, it’s a good time to release some current figures to update the trends that Kookaburra Veterinary Employment is seeing in Australia, for the “State of the Market” panel discussion.

Vets

Of the current 735 open vet vacancies, 131 have been continuously advertised for more than 8 months.

In the last 3 months (February, March, April 2023), 1125 jobs have been advertised.

• 27% of these have been filled by Kookaburra,
• 2% have been filled by other advertising, or through personal contact
• 9% have been removed because the clinic either gave up looking or restructured their clinic staff to cope – although some clinics are now reporting having a reduced workload, following the post-covid boom
• 62% are still available.

As of 30th April 2023, 52 clinics had been advertising continuously for longer than 2 years without filling their vacancy

Vet Nurses

In March 2020 we had 236 vet nurse jobs listed.
In April 2021 we had 337 vet nurse jobs listed.
As of May 9^th 2023, we have 316 vet nurse jobs listed.

Discussion

Kookaburra has noted the following factors

• An increase in the numbers of vets required to cover the workload in individual practices
• An increase in the numbers of new clinics opening – both corporate, and privately owned. 10 years ago Kookaburra had roughly 2100 clinics listed in Australia – we now have over 2600.
• Many of the practice owners and managers that we talk to on a daily basis are highly stressed by the workforce shortage, and many are also resigned to having great difficulty hiring suitable new staff

Kookaburra circulated a Salary survey in the winter of 2022 and one of the questions we asked was about future plans (see chart below).
26% of vets (63 vets ) who responded to the Kookaburra Vets Salary Survey 2022 said they were planning on leaving general practice by 5 years’ time, either retiring, leaving the profession entirely, taking a break, or moving into another area of the veterinary industry.
In the 2019 survey, 24% of responding vets (142 vets) were planning on leaving general practice by 5 years’ time. That’s a lot of vets leaving general practice – and it doesn’t seem to be slowing down at all.

(copy of the full Salary Survey 2022 report available here: https://www.vetsuppliersdirectory.com.au/salary-survey-2022/ )

Author:
Wendy Nathan
Kookaburra Veterinary Employment

This information includes the views and opinions of Kookaburra Veterinary Employment and is of a general nature only. Factual information is believed to be correct at the time of writing, however, should not be relied upon and any person should confirm details with the relevant authorities and through their own research prior to acting on any of the suggestions in this article.