Throughout our work, we’ve discovered that workforce challenges are prominent. The issues faced by our profession cover a range of areas, including:

• Health and wellbeing
• Diversity, equality and fair treatment
• Workload and flexibility
• Reward and recognition
• Personal and career development
• Management and HR process
• Workplace culture

It is vital that the UK veterinary profession retains a thriving, engaged and sustainable workforce. For this to happen, it is essential that, as a profession, we take steps to recognise and address the workforce issues we’re facing.

What's our view? 

Every member of the profession has a role to play in creating and maintaining good workplaces, no matter their role or chosen sector, and regardless of whether they are an employer or an employee.

We’ve set out our vision for how a good veterinary workplace should look, highlighting the core principles and key resources every workplace should have. We’ve included 64 practical recommendations for employers, employees and the wider profession to follow, and 36 encouraging case studies to show how they could be achieved. Our comprehensive list of useful links also provides additional support for anyone working to make improve their workplace.

It is important to remember that every workplace is different, and workplaces do not necessarily need to fulfil every recommendation to be considered ‘good’. However, all good workplaces should fulfil the following core values:

• support and facilitate veterinary professionals in upholding their respective oaths;
• develop, establish and track good physical and mental wellbeing and be supportive of the needs of all team members;
• provide fair and equal pay and benefits for all team members, relevant to their respective roles;
• be fair and equitable for all members of the team, with no tolerance of prejudice, discrimination, bullying or harassment;
• have clear career pathways that are an attractive, accessible and attainable professional route for those positioned across all socio-economic demographics;
• support, recognise and reward personal and professional development (both clinical and non-clinical) which is aligned with the business;
• have appropriate recruitment processes and structures to support the retention of skilled team members, including regular mentoring and appraisal throughout their career;
• have employers and employees who are aware of what is expected of them and share responsibility to fulfil those expectations; and
• acknowledge the importance of a positive working culture, with the organisation’s own culture and values being well understood.

We are calling on all members of the profession, across all sectors of veterinary work, to commit to our vision for a good veterinary workplace.

To help our members work through the position, we’ve developed the BVA good veterinary workplaces voluntary code. This comes in the form of a poster to display at work to show you’ve committed to be a good workplace. We’ve also produced a workbook, with space to write notes on what your workplaces does well, what can be improved, and your next steps for creating a good workplace.