Mandisa Greene on leadership in Emergency Critical Care and beyond

Vets Now Medical Director, Mandisa Greene is renowned for her work on diversity, championing vets in general practice and speaking in schools as a role model for young people interested in joining the vet profession.

Mandisa was recently interviewed on veterinarywoman.co.uk and where she explained more about her career story and leadership within ECC medicine and beyond.

 

Mandisa, please could you give us an overview of your career story so far?

I graduated from the Royal (Dick) Vet School in Edinburgh in 2008 and was so keen to get going, I started working the very next day. After a few months part-time, I took a full-time role in a mixed practice in Staffordshire which was where I realised I liked out-of-hours.

When I came back to work after my first child, I decided to focus on OOH as I’ve always tried to follow my bliss, do what made me happy.

I loved feeling I was making a difference and continued doing that on a locum basis for a few years.

In addition, I took on a role lecturing at Harper Adams University as well as having a career at the RCVS from 2014. I was on several committees, became junior Vice President in 2019 and then President until 2021, alongside my locum work. Then, looking for a new challenge, I became Medical Director at Vets Now in 2022.

What is the appeal of working in ECC? And what are the challenges?

You get to learn so much and it’s great for growth and development, both personally and in your career. You’re dealing with urgent cases, and you learn how to control your emotions in your approach to people and patients. There are no scheduled appointments in ECC, and you can see anything from something fairly simple to a catastrophic blue light emergency.

So, part of the appeal is becoming that person who can deal with any emergency. And in a female-dominated profession, there is also the appeal of it working around the family. If you have young children, this is the ideal job as you can be with them when they need you. I guess the unknown can be a challenge for some, as can full time hours.

A strong team and the support of colleagues is clearly very important. How can everyone contribute to build a supportive culture amongst veterinary teams?

Talking about challenges we face in a constructive way and without fear of judgment is very important. Part of being human is making errors and we should talk about that in an open environment so we can all learn.

I’m hugely proud of our culture at Vets Now where we look at such issues collectively and there’s a Just culture. I also think it’s important for us all to be accountable for the energy we bring.

When we come into a night shift and are dealing with people who are naturally very emotional, we need to meet them with compassion and empathy. We should bring that to our team, too, and everyone can set that tone.

Mandisa Greene
A familiar challenge for women in the profession is balancing family life with veterinary practice. How did you manage this and how can others find ways that work for them?

I had a lot of help, and I don’t shy away from asking for help if I need it. My husband is hugely supportive, and we moved to be closer to my mum who helps look after the children. My siblings have children around the same age, and we worked out a system to help one another. My colleagues also offered a lot of support when I was going back to work. There are lots of wonderful, kind people out there and the important thing is to ask and take the support they offer.

 

You can also read Mandisa’s interview in full  on Veterinary Woman here.