We recently connected with Lindsey Ganzer and have shared our conversation below.

Lindsey, appreciate you joining us today. Risking taking is a huge part of most people’s story but too often society overlooks those risks and only focuses on where you are today. Can you talk to us about a risk you’ve taken – it could be a big risk or a small one – but walk us through the backstory.

Open the hospital was the biggest risk I have ever taken in my life.

I have been an emergency veterinarian for 12 years, and worked as an associate at several practices in Georgia, Colorado, and various other states. For two of those hospitals, I was promoted to the ER director position. When one of those hospitals sold corporate, I saw a dramatic shift in the culture and focus within the hospital, lead by the new ownership. The focus was no longer about the pets and best medical practices, and instead became about the bottom line and turning a profit. Needless to say, that did not suit me or the other staff members. When most of us left that practice after just a few months, many of the associates and support staff came to me asking when I was going to open a place, so they could have somewhere to work that valued them as an employee, a person, and put the focus back on the medicine and pets, given that their job search lead to finding out that corporations were (and are still) buying up veterinary hospitals right and left, so finding a job outside of corporate medicine was nearly impossible. I felt a calling and a drive to step up and fight against that shift in veterinary medicine, and “Transform the Veterinary Experience”.

Because I am familiar with people and hospital management, but have zero experience in business management, I called on my long-time friend, Matt Hubbell, an accountant, to step into the role of co-owner and CFO. He saw the vision, heard the desperation from veterinary staff during interviews and conferences, and was all in. We then found Paul Rubley, Darren Sharp, and Alex Tracey (SRT Development), who have a similar vision and goal to support private businesses in Colorado Springs through the purchasing of commercial real-estate and building construction.

Most veterinary practices start as small, one to two exam room, strip-mall-type businesses, and, if they are lucky, eventually grow. Not us. We were all in with big dreams and goals. It took collateralizing every penny we had, everything we owned, begging friends and family to have faith in a dream, begging the bank to give us a MASSIVE loan, interviewing and hiring over 90 employees in a field where ER and Specialty Doctors and Technicians are scarce, and a 13,100 square-foot ground up build for a business that has never existed, whose goal was to do the opposite of what is considered “industry standard” with no idea if it was even going to work! There was no turning back for any of us.

The response from the veterinary community and the community of Colorado Springs was OVERWHELMING to say the least. Our vision and “David vs. Goliath” analogy with the current corporatization of veterinary medicine is a breath of fresh air for the veterinary world, and has been so desperately needed and welcomed! It has truly transformed the veterinary experience for both the employees and the patients/clients, and re-focused back on the people and medicine – AS IT SHOULD BE! The risk was HUGE, but the reward is something that cannot be measured. Saving lives and taking care of people does not have a price tag. It is worth the sacrifice, effort, and risk, and I would do it again, 1000x over.

As always, we appreciate you sharing your insights and we’ve got a few more questions for you, but before we get to all of that can you take a minute to introduce yourself and give our readers some of your back background and context?

I have wanted to be a veterinarian since I was 6 years old, and a vet came to my second grade class for career day. Every decision I have made from that point on was to achieve that goal – the jobs I took, the school I attended for college, the volunteer and service projects I did – all of it. During vet school, I fell in love with emergency medicine and knew that was exactly what I wanted to do.

North Springs Veterinary Referral Center is a 24-hour emergency and multi-specialty hospital located in Colorado Springs, off Interquest and Voyager, just south of the In-and-Out. We provide 24-hour emergency and critical care, and have Cardiology, Rehabilitation, Surgery, Internal Medicine, Exotics, and Radiology specialists. So basically, almost anything that is more advanced than your general practice veterinarian, we provide! We are privately owned (by myself, Dr. Lindsey Ganzer, and Matt Hubbell, CFO), which sets us apart from most veterinary hospitals which are corporately owned. We provide gold-standard care with top-of-the-line equipment, and have put the focus back on the pets, owners, and staff to “Transform the veterinary experience”, and embody our core values of transparency, empathy, integrity, innovation, unity, community, and positivity. We provide multiple financial options for owners to not compromise medical treatments because of costs, and even have cameras throughout our treatment area for owners to be able to watch their pets from home if they are in the hospital!

The story of the hospital I explained on the previous question (panel discussion) answers a lot here too!

Do you have any insights you can share related to maintaining high team morale?

The #1 job of management is to support the employees. Period.

The former management strategy of “top-down” management (I am in charge of you, so you have to do what I say), is antiquated and fails to instill and maintain a supportive culture of positivity, motivation, growth, and happiness. I prefer to think of management as the foundation of a building, there to support the above structure and provide a strong base that sets the precedence and expectation of the building.

By providing support, strength, and leading by example, the possibilities are endless. All employees want to be respected, appreciated, and supported for growth and development, no matter what business you are in. By being the foundation, you provide all of that, and morale and culture will follow.

Are there any books, videos, essays or other resources that have significantly impacted your management and entrepreneurial thinking and philosophy?

Two main books that I have based my management and business (and personal) philosophies are:

1) The Go Giver, by Bob Burg and John David Mann – a book about how achieving success starts with giving. This has shaped my management, my business, and my personal life, keeping the focus on giving back to my staff, the community, and within my relationships.

2) The 8 Paradoxes of Great Leadership, by Tim Elmore – a book outlining how uncommon leaders: 1: balance both confidence and humility, 2: leverage both their vision and their blind spots, 3: embrace both visibility and invisibility, 4: are both stubborn and open-minded, 5: are both deeply personal and inherently collective, 6: are both teachers and learners, 7: model both high standards and gracious forgiveness, 8: are both timely and timeless

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.northspringsvrc.com/
• Instagram: northsprings.vrc
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/northspringsvrc
• Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/company/north-springs-veterinary-referral-center/