As a veterinary professional, Heather is dedicated to supporting her colleagues in their veterinary wellness journeys. With more than a decade of experience in veterinary wellness, while pursuing her own wellness journey, Heather became certified as a yoga instructor, a meditation and mindfulness instructor, and holds advanced training and certifications in communication, leadership, and workshop facilitation. She teaches within the Professional Foundations Curriculum, lecturing and facilitating workshops in veterinary business, leadership, communication, and veterinary wellness as part of the DVM program at the Atlantic Veterinary College, in Charlottetown, PEI.
She is happy to assist Veterinarians, Veterinary Practices, or the Veterinary Industry in creating, facilitating and delivery of wellness or professional skills content for their groups. She will happily work with your group to develop a program specific for your audience. Several of her previous program offerings have included:
Overcoming Compassion Fatigue with Mindfulness (for veterinary professionals):
This 2.5-3 hour interactive presentation looks at stress in veterinary medicine and how it relates to the wellness crisis being experienced by veterinarians and veterinary paraprofessionals. The beginning of this session is an introduction to the wellness issues facing veterinarians. In addition to presenting the topic and defining the problem, we will brainstorm common challenges that the audience is facing. The presentation then leads into a discussion on the science of stress, and covers compassion fatigue, decision fatigue, and burnout. We will talk about the the differences between these forms of stress, and the common signs and symptoms associated. We will then explore the science and philosophy behind mindfulness and meditation as a way to combat stress and promote wellness. We will discuss the benefits of meditation and mindfulness, try various mindfulness exercises (with lots of time to practice), and finish with easy ways to incorporate mindfulness and meditation into our lives. This is a hands-on, session focused on adding tools to a veterinarian’s wellness toolkit to help veterinary professionals and veterinary team members thrive in today’s challenging practice environment.
Leading for a Career:
This 90 minute program for veterinary practice owners and veterinarians focuses on utilizing wellness practices and mindfulness in order to achieve career longevity in this highly stressful profession. Veterinarians, both practice owners and associates, are seen as leaders in the profession and yet being put in leadership positions can lead to significant personal stress. The veterinary profession is challenged by burnout, moral stress, compassion fatigue, and high suicide rates. This presentation is a primer in wellness strategies, focused on discussing these challenges and on strategies and tools to help maintain personal wellness. When wellness and balance are achieved in veterinary medicine, it promotes healthy teams, work-life balance, and the ability to be an effective leader. It also supports career longevity in a profession that can be difficult to maintain one’s endurance.
Career longevity and enjoyment are often found in understanding your “why” and following your path. Heather’s had the chance to experience this teaching students and serving communities in Canada’s North.
Layers of Personality:
This 4 hour facilitated workshop introduces veterinarians to the Strength Deployment Inventory (SDI), a tool for understanding personality and the relationship awareness theory. Similar to Myers-Briggs, DISC, or Insights personality tools, the SDI is useful for helping individuals become more aware of their own personality traits and the traits of others. What makes this tool substantially more unique is that it focuses on motivations, which drive our behavours. It is also simple to understand and “sticky.” Participants comment frequently on how easy it is to not only remember their own profiles but those of their team, in order to facilitate more effective communication and interaction. It is highly visual and honours differences among participants. The entire focus of the SDI is around the motivational value system and the conflict sequence as a way to understand how you are motivated and act when in things are going well and when you are in a conflict state. This powerful tool has been used in many industries. Heather has been teaching this tool for the past 3 years to students in the 2nd year DVM program, and the reviews of that class are always exceptional, with students commenting on how powerful the SDI is for providing insight on themselves and for working more effectively in teams. For practice owners or organizations, this invaluable tool can be used to promote a high-performing team environment, or can be used to help a team in conflict better understand why this may be occurring and how to more effectively work with each other.
Nature space yoga is also pleased to put together custom workshops, retreats or presentations for organizations around a variety of wellness topics (incorporating yoga, movement or breathing exercises if desired). Pricing for the above workshops and offerings varies depending on the requirements of the organization and the number of participants. Please contact Nature Space for pricing information.