Episode #31 – Catherine Haskins

Welcome to The People of Animal Health Podcast. The host of our podcast is Stacy Pursell. Stacy is the leading executive recruiter for the animal health industry in the veterinary profession. She’s the founder of Therio Partners and The VET Recruiter. Stacy has placed more professionals in key positions within the animal health industry and the veterinary profession than any executive search professional. Along the way, Stacy has built relationships with some outstanding people who are doing incredible things to make a difference. The people of Animal Health Podcast features industry leaders and trailblazers who have made a significant impact or are making an impact in the animal industry or the veterinary profession. Stacy chats with them to learn more about their lives, their careers, and the unique and interesting things that they have done to contribute to the animal health industry or veterinary profession. She’s here to share their stories with you. Now here’s the host of our podcast, Stacy Pursell.

Hello, everyone and welcome to The People of Animal Health Podcast. Today, we are taking our podcast show on the road. We are here at the Veterinary Innovation Summit in Kansas City, and on today’s show we are talking with Catherine Haskins, and we are so excited to have Catherine here. Catherine is a seasoned veterinary industry insider with more than 25 years of communications experience. Catherine is the founder of The Bridge Club, a critical conversation company tackling the most pressing issues in the field. She’s the recipient of multiple honors, and Catherine uses her infectious energy to develop impactful initiatives to elevate veterinary medicine globally through the ICON Awards, Bright Minds and the Giveback Benefit. Catherine also aids startups, not-for-profits and large companies in navigating the changing world of stakeholder engagement through Haskins Consulting. Catherine and her family’s lives are ruled by Lily, their 14-year-old dog in Palatine, Illinois. Catherine, welcome onto The People of Animal Health Podcast. And how are you today?

I’m awesome. This has been an amazing conference. I’m so glad you guys are here to be able to also take your show on the road because this is the place to meet and greet with the best people in the profession.

Oh, it is. I’m super excited to be here and so glad that you’re here on our show, Catherine, and I know that you’ve had a very interesting career. You’re involved in so many different things. I would love to start off at the bottom in the very beginning of your career. What was your life like growing up and where did you grow up?

I’m the youngest of three kids. My oldest sister is six years older than me. I have a brother who’s three years older. I grew up in Iowa, though I was born in South Bend, Indiana. I am the daughter of two nurses and my career started off in a very interesting way. I started off after I went to college at the University of Northern Iowa, go Panthers, that I ended up getting my first job in funeral service, so my career did not have anything to do with animal health when I first began years ago.

How did you get into the funeral service? And then I’m curious about that transition from that field to animal health.

You go where the job is, right? When I graduated, my parents lived in Springfield, Illinois, and there was a company there called The Order of the Golden Rule, and it was a funeral service company that helped the top, I believe it was like 300 funeral homes across the United States and Canada, providing marketing services, things of that nature. Mom and dad lived there, so therefore I went to be able to get a job because I could live at home, it was fantastic.

Then soon after, I was given an opportunity to work for another funeral company in Florida. At this time, I was in Illinois, went to Florida, did a short stint after I left funeral service and to travel, so actually have worked at the Zimmermann Agency that gave me all this experience in travel and tourism. But when I moved to Kansas City with my husband after having my daughter that I got a job, and it’s actually a very funny story because my very first day on the job with FleishmanHillard, they took me into a meeting. I at this point, don’t remember the name of the company the meeting was with, but they kept saying a word and a horrible word that I was like, I don’t know what this is. I should probably know what this word is. I shouldn’t say it’s horrible, but it’s a word. They kept saying equine.

I didn’t know what the word equine was, and I had to raise my hand in this meeting and go, “I’m sorry, what’s equine?” Fast forward thinking, heavens, I do know the difference to this day, what an equine is, but my humble beginnings. They hired me in an agricultural division of the company. I told them I’ve never mowed a lawn and other than eating food, even though I’m from Iowa, this is what they have and they embraced me and I started working with Bayer Animal Health in the early, early days and was fortunate enough to work with some amazing individuals that then helped introduce me to the entire profession, and I’ve been in animal health ever since.

I love that story. That is hilarious. Equine and raising my hand. What does that mean? What a great story. Well, so you’ve been in the animal health industry now for how many years?

If I do the math right, I think I’m going on 20 plus in that arena.

In the 20 plus years you’ve been in the industry, what has been the most surprising thing to you during your career in animal health?

That’s really challenging. I think one of the things that I’m probably most excited about is that it is a family. That’s been very surprising to me. Most businesses, especially in the medical, you don’t get that same feeling, but I definitely get that in veterinary medicine. I think I am surprised that we don’t rely more on our human healthcare to understand how to advance things within animal health. That’s been a surprise to me, but the innovation is coming and we are going to be making a big difference for pet owners. We do move a bit slower than I thought we might, but that’s okay. I think slow is not a bad thing per se, if it’s thoughtful in the process and ultimately has great outcomes. But I think that we are really leaning in a great way on things that are important to this profession right now, mental health in particular, overall burdens that we’re putting on practices, et cetera, so I do think that this is a profession that does look at itself and is honest with itself when something needs to change.

Yeah, and how have you seen the industry change over the years since you’ve been involved?

Oh, gosh. Leadership, that’s been a big one. I think when I first started out, we still were heavily male-based. Obviously that shift has changed. We also didn’t have a lot of diversity, so I’m happy to see that. That has changed. I think the product portfolios haven’t changed as much as I would’ve liked them to see. I’ve seen people take, companies take whether it’s for a flea and tick product, and we’re diving in deeper to try to find one more claim that can be added. Whereas I know we’ve got big issues like cancer that we really need to be diving into as well. But the biggest, biggest change is the role of the pet parent. The pet parent is now the decider in all things. There was a movement years ago, and Stacy, you’ll remember this, when there was a conversation that was, Houston, we have a problem, and it had to do with wellness and it had to do with putting the veterinarian at the center of care. The reality is the pet owner truly is at the center of care. Learning how to embrace that, learning how to have conversations with pet owners that show the value of a veterinary care as well are really critical, and so that’s the biggest change I’ve seen is the role of the pet parent.

We’re here, like I said, in Kansas City at an Innovation Summit, and I love to know what does your crystal ball say about the future of the animal health industry and how are we going to innovate as we go into the future?

I don’t want to sound like a broken record with everybody else, but we’re here and we’re having amazing presentations that are really talking, leaning in on the human health side and what advancements are happening there with wearables that could actually help treat pets in a way, even potentially treat them at home. I do see AI playing a massive role in what’s moving forward for the profession, specifically in answering pet owners’ questions immediately in all the scheduling of appointments, the ability to really create a workflow within a practice that will be able to save time and energy. We all know the role of veterinary technicians is increasing, but I actually do see a point in time where there’ll be a practice where there may only be one veterinarian and 30 technicians, and that the technicians do the vast majority of what needs to happen with a pet and the veterinarian is there for the really more in-depth items.

Yeah. I was at a summit last week and there was a dentist there who specialized in pediatrics, and he said the veterinary industry is very much like the dental industry where you go and you see your hygienist for more of the time than you see your dentist and he talked about applications from dental industry into veterinary medicine, so I think you’re right about that.

I’d love to focus more on your career. We started out the conversation talking about how you got into the animal health industry and today, I’d love for you to share with the listeners about some of the projects that you’re up to and about some of the work that you’re doing in the animal health industry.

I am very much in love with this profession and I’m not a veterinarian or a technician, so I do want to make sure that the listeners do know that. My ability and communications has exposed me to all levels of this profession, and I just constantly fall deeper and deeper in love with this profession. As a result, I have one mission and one mission only, and that is to elevate this profession to the highest level it can be. It’s interesting when you start to think about all the companies that exist, not for-profits as well as for-profits, and every company includes that they’re wanting to advance veterinary medicine or they want to elevate veterinary medicine, but it always comes with either because they are selling products or because they’re driving new policies forward. There’s always something that gets in the way of that, and so we are right now the only company that is focused purely on elevating veterinary medicine, and we’re doing that through recognition.

Recognition is the number one way to be able to make changes by highlighting those that are doing incredible things, and our goal is to diversify recognition so that we have those individuals that are the up and comers are getting a place where their voice can be heard. That’s really critically important. That’s through our Bright Minds, which we now have both in the United States and in London, and we soon hopefully, will be moving that into Latin America, so I’m very excited about that.

We also recognize and honor those that have created a legacy that we should not forget and that we should be able to build off of in the future, and that is through our ICON event that is held in conjunction with the North American Veterinary Conference, VMX. I am excited to share very, very [inaudible 00:11:49] that who our 2024 ICON is going to be, Kara Burns, and she will be the first ever veterinary technician to be honored as a Bridge Club ICON, so I’m very excited for that and really very humbled that she’s accepted the honor, so incredible there.

But we’re also elevating veterinary medicine from a perspective that people wouldn’t necessarily expect, and that’s by helping other organizations get exposure to the profession to advance their message. We’re going to now, we’re formalizing it in the Giveback Benefit Program that is in partnership with WVC. This benefit will select a veterinary industry-specific charity, or not-for-profit and channel funds to them through an event. If we can raise awareness this year, the honoree is going to be the Veterinary Industry Giving Tree, and if we can collectively rally our people together to be able to help an organization, again, we’re going to uplift this profession overall.

Those are the kind of key things that I’m working on right now, and we’re constantly relooking at how we can engage with the profession and bring everyone up. We do that also, as you well know, Stacy, through conversations. We host really critical conversations once a month or so, and we bring people together to really discuss some of the uglier parts of the profession, but come forward with great solutions that will help move us forward even further.

Catherine, if members of our listening audience want to learn more about the work you’re doing at The Bridge Club and they’re online, where would they go to find The Bridge Club online?

This is so easy. It is www.thebridgeclub.com, and I guarantee you, we don’t play Bridge, though one day, I am looking for someone who would say, “Hey, as a breakout, let’s all learn how to play Bridge.” I think that would be really, really fun.

That would be fun, really fun. Well, I am curious what mentor has made the biggest impact on your career?

I actually have three mentors that I don’t know if they even know they’re my mentors, which is even more beautiful because they don’t realize that I’m absorbing absolutely everything that they say. The first one is John Payne. John Payne is the former CEO and chairman of the board for Compassion-First and he has started a new company. The reason why I look at John Payne is he’s given me really important advice when we were formulating The Bridge Club, and I didn’t know whether or not to make this a not-for-profit or a for profit and I flew out to go see him and he had a very honest and candid conversation with me. His quote, and I even said this at his event that we hosted for him many years ago was he said, “I’m a capitalist, Catherine, go make money.” I love that he had the wherewithal to be supportive and say, “Go do it and see what you’re able to make of it.”

I was there. I remember when he said that.

The other person is Leah Stevenson. She is the CEO for Think Partners, and she is a very dear friend of mine, but she said something to me that has continued to resonate with me and that is be kind to people and give it away because it will all come back. I believe that from the core of who I am, so I honestly mean when I say use and abuse me. If you see someone in my network that you need to be connected to, I am happy to help in any way, shape or form. If you’ve got a question that you don’t know who to talk to in the profession, I may not know what the answer, but I’ll find it for you. I really want to help this profession. I think that’s the only way that we can really do that.

Then the final person is an individual we’re going to honor tonight, and that is Mark Cushing, and Mark has always believed in my journey to build up The Bridge Club, and he and I have just had incredible conversations. He’s been very candid with me about where I’ve got areas for growth and development. I just absolutely adore Mark, and I appreciate all his feedback.

Oh, three great mentors, and I can see Leah saying that. She’s a very kind and generous person, and Mark Cushing, how exciting. I didn’t know we were going to honor him tonight, so that’s super exciting.

Oh yeah. Oh yeah. I’ll tell you more after we get off of this. But yeah, it’s going to be incredible.

Yeah, I look forward to it. Well, another question I have is, I know that we all face adversity. What’s been the biggest challenge or adversity that you’ve had to fight through during your career up to this point?

You had given me this question in advance and I had to really think about it, and then once it hit me, I was like, of course, that’s what exactly. Because I’ve done public relations and communication my whole life, people don’t think I’m as smart as I am. It’s been a big challenge to think, oh, you’re just a wordsmither. You’re just someone who’s going to make us sound good. Versus the ability to say, let’s dive into the business. Where’s the revenue problems? Where are we running with the deficits here? Really looking at a business and understanding where opportunities exist. That’s been one of my biggest challenges is not being taken fully seriously. Kind of add to it because I have a lot of energy and I get that, and I happen to be blonde on top of it, but that’s the one thing that’s just driven me nuts is that I’m not taken seriously because of my background in communications.

What do you do to overcome that?

Try to get into really serious conversations with regards to things that are challenging them, obstacles that they are facing, and if they’re open to hearing some ideas and thoughts. I guess the best compliment I ever got just recently happened that I can connect dots people don’t connect. Because I talk to people throughout this profession, I gain insights into where there are opportunities for people and when I’m on a call, I’m able to immediately go, you know who I just was on a call with, this is where we can connect you. There’s an opportunity there. Slowly, I think that’s coming to light because I am able to make opportunities for big companies that they didn’t realize, they thought they knew different elements of the profession, and really, that’s getting me more and more excited about it, but yeah, it’s been one of my biggest challenges.

You’re a great connector.

Well, thank you.

Catherine, what advice would you give the younger version of yourself if you were just starting out?

To listen. Listen a lot more. I think it’s real easy, and especially like a venue like this, you get to talk about yourself, but I think you learn so much more when you stop and actually hear what people are saying. I mean, actually hear them and what their challenges are, what their opportunities are or what insight that they’re giving to you. We’ve been all morning long listening to amazing speakers outside of veterinary medicine, and they have excited me so much about where we can go and what we can do, so I think if we listen more, we can do a lot more.

That’s good advice. Listen more. Well, what message or principle do you wish you could teach everyone here?

Well, mine’s a movie quote. Okay, so clearly I’ve been saying what people have said and things that I’ve remembered, but this one I’ve remembered ever since it came out. You’ll have to test the year. I’m not quite sure. Mr. Magorium’s Wonder Emporium, and he says in the movie, Dustin Hoffman, “Life is an occasion. Rise to it.” I truly do believe in this day and age, that every opportunity we get, every time that we can be in groups and every day we wake up, that it is an occasion and we need to do what we can.

You’ve certainly done that, and that leads me to my next question or what are some of the daily habits that you believe have allowed you to achieve all the success you’ve had throughout your career?

One of them is not so good, and that is I eat at my desk and you shouldn’t do that. But I have done that my entire career, and everyone always talks about this. Everyone always talks about not doing that. But I have a routine. I am fully shower, dressed, even through COVID, always dressed, makeup on, ready for work every day by eight o’clock, and I work straight through, running in to grab a sandwich if I have it, but routine has been my number one. Number two is lists. I love a good list. Oh gosh, do I love a list? I try to create tools that give me new lists as much as possible. I had a boss once say to me, “If you’re struggling to come up with ideas, change your perspective.” I try to keep my office, changing up my office a bit just to give it new perspective, new furniture design, things of that nature so that I always have a different perspective as well.

I love that, and we have that in common. I do the same thing. I’m ready to go by eight o’clock and I work through lunch every day and I eat lunch at my desk.

Yeah. We’re not really passing on a good skill there, so highly encourage people not to follow Stacy and Catherine.

So I have been told. Is there a key book that you’ve read that has impacted you the most?

Again, if we go with Lead With kindness, if we talk about the work that we’re trying to do of uplift the profession, it’s a childhood book and it’s The Giving Tree. Ironically enough, even though that’s one of the charities that we’re working with. It is a kind message, and it’s the reality of what happens with humankind. They go through challenges and they keep asking for more and more. Yet there are people out there that will really just step up for you, so it’s a good, again, rising to the occasion each day in life, but also trying to be there for everybody and connect with folks.

My parents read that book to me when I was a little kid, The Giving Tree.

It’s a great book. It’s a great book.

Well, you’ve got the mic, Catherine. What is one thing that you want to share with our listeners of The People of Animal Health Podcast before you drop the mic today?

I just want them to know they matter. So much is going on in this world, and every single person matters.

Well, thank you so much for being here. It was such a pleasure and an honor to have you here today, and I’m so glad we got to do this in person here at the Veterinary Innovation Summit in Kansas City.

I’m so excited too. Guys, listen to this one and make sure that you follow everything that Stacy’s doing. She’s amazing.

Oh, thank you so much, Catherine.