Financial Friday - March 4, 2016
The mission of www.ismypracticehealthy.com is to lead our readers on an educational journey, presenting weekly veterinary business knowledge using brief, easily understandable, impactful management education that will, by years end, lead our readers to a place where they understand and use their financial statements to improve profitability.
In the process of developing the ismypracticehealty.com concept, our research demonstrated that many veterinarians are uncomfortable in a financial discussion. Our research also told us that a key aspect of financial discussions with which veterinarians are outside their comfort zone is the language of finance. I often, semi joking, say that admissions committees to colleges of veterinary medicine have been remarkably consistent in selecting applicants who are uncomfortable with money.
A financial discussion is usually peppered with jargon and acronyms, the language of finance. As veterinarians, we are experts in the language of veterinary medicine, jargon and acronyms included. We are comfortable in ‘our’ language but since we have had little or no training in the language of finance we are significantly less at ease in that conversation.
Our goal is for our readers to look at a practice as a patient, looking at its vital signs and lab work routinely to have an indication of the health of the practice.
My personal mission statement is “Make a Difference.” I look forward to the difference, at the end of the year, in the comfort our readers feel when they open their financials.
