Veterinary Voices

Front Desk, Full Team: Stacey Deacon on How Energy Vets Works Day to Day

Stacey Deacon didn’t train as a veterinary nurse.

She’s a dedicated receptionist — and part of a reception team that sits at the centre of how Energy Vets runs day to day.

In this final episode of the Energy Vets REAL+STORY series, Stacey shares what working on the front desk actually looks like inside a busy mixed practice in Taranaki.

The reception team works across both the Inglewood and Waitara clinics, coordinating appointments, managing client expectations, and supporting vets and nurses through busy periods — including seasonal peaks like farm scanning alongside small animal demand.

Stacey talks about the role reception plays in keeping the day running, how the team works together to manage urgent cases, and the constant balancing act of diaries, client needs, and clinical priorities.

She also describes the team environment — where there’s no hierarchy, and vets, nurses, reception, and management all step in to help when things get busy.

When asked what makes the difference at Energy Vets, Stacey points to the people — the way the team checks in on each other, works together, and supports one another through demanding days.

And when it comes to fit, she’s clear: someone positive, who works with the team and can see the bigger picture.

In This Episode

00:01 – Introduction to Stacey Deacon and the Energy Vets reception team
01:46 – Size of the reception team and working across two clinic locations
03:07 – The role of a dedicated veterinary receptionist
03:32 – How Stacey entered the veterinary industry
03:59 – What’s different about working at Energy Vets
04:34 – Busy periods: small animal demand and farm scanning season
05:30 – How the team supports each other day to day
06:02 – Reception’s role in managing diaries and urgent cases
07:16 – The type of person who fits at Energy Vets
08:18 – Energy Vets’ “best kept secret”
09:35 – Three words to describe the team
09:45 – What working at Energy Vets is like day to day
10:27 – Why Stacey joined Energy Vets
11:07 – Team environment vs expectations before joining
11:24 – No hierarchy: how vets support reception when it’s busy

Hiring Link

Energy Vets is currently looking for an experienced small animal veterinarian to join a genuinely team-oriented clinic.

Learn more here:  careers.vetclinicjobs.com/energyvets

Could Your Kind of People recognise Their Kind of Clinic?

A job ad may catch a vet’s or nurse’s eye. But it’s their own due diligence that determines whether they apply—or keep in touch.

Culture Story Centres turn real experiences from inside your team into credible, discoverable recruitment evidence, giving vets and nurses meaningful reasons to choose your clinic.

Explore Culture Story Centres for veterinary clinics

When veterinary clinics start looking at changing how they approach recruitment, certain phrases come up in conversation.

They’re usually said under pressure.

And they often stop things before they really get going.

In this episode of Veterinary Voices, Julie South continues the Where Vet Clinics Get Stuck series by looking at one of the most common:

“We don’t have time for this.”

For clinics already stretched — covering vacancies, juggling rosters, and trying to run recruitment campaigns that aren’t working — that response makes complete sense.

But what clinics picture when they say it… and what’s actually being asked of them… are not the same thing.

And that gap matters.

Stay to the end for two questions about where your clinic’s recruitment time is really going.

In This Episode

00:58 – “We don’t have time for this”
01:54 – What clinics think “this” means
03:14 – What it actually looks like
05:28 – Where time is really going
07:39 – Two questions to rethink time and effort

Could Your Kind of People recognise Their Kind of Clinic?

A job ad may catch a vet’s or nurse’s eye. But it’s their own due diligence that determines whether they apply—or keep in touch.

Culture Story Centres turn real experiences from inside your team into credible, discoverable recruitment evidence, giving vets and nurses meaningful reasons to choose your clinic.

Explore Culture Story Centres for veterinary clinics

Leadership, Succession, and Coming Home: Kylie Lindsay on Growing People at Energy Vets

Kylie Lindsay began her journey with Energy Vets answering after-hours phones. More than twenty years later, she’s Clinic Services Manager, shareholder, and now a director of the Taranaki practice.

In this second half of Julie South’s conversation with Kylie, the focus shifts to leadership and the kind of veterinarian Energy Vets is looking for as the clinic grows its companion animal team.

Kylie describes the senior vet role as someone who enjoys teaching, builds relationships across the whole practice — including large animal vets who rotate through the companion animal team — and can bring both clinical and business thinking to the role.

The conversation also explores how Energy Vets develops people over time. Kylie shares stories of nurses and vets who have left to work elsewhere — including Australia and overseas — and later returned to the clinic with new experience that benefits the whole team.

Kylie also talks about becoming a shareholder and director in the business — an opportunity the existing directors created by changing the clinic’s constitution so a non-vet could join the ownership group.

She reflects on how ideas from the frontline have shaped the clinic — including the team workshop that led to the name Energy Vets and the creation of a dedicated call-handling hub behind reception to improve client service.

In This Episode

00:04 – Introduction to part two of the conversation with Kylie Lindsay
01:25 – The kind of veterinarian Energy Vets is looking for in the senior role
03:27 – Life outside the clinic: family, horses, and becoming a grandmother
04:25 – Why people often return to Taranaki after time away
06:07 – Staff leaving for opportunities and later returning to the clinic
07:48 – How returning staff bring new experience back into the team
08:24 – Examples of nurses who left, developed their careers, and returned
10:34 – Kylie becoming a shareholder and director in the business
10:59 – What it means to be invited into ownership as a non-vet
12:24 – “Skin in the game” and the open-door culture at Energy Vets
13:33 – Developing a shareholding pathway for future leaders
14:56 – How leadership listens to ideas from the team
15:27 – The team workshop that led to the name Energy Vets
16:39 – Creating the reception call-handling hub
18:45 – How the hub works day to day across both clinics
20:33 – Julie’s closing reflections on Kylie’s journey and leadership

Hiring Link

EnergyVets is currently looking for an experienced small animal veterinarian ready to co-lead the companion animal team and mentor the next generation of vets.

Learn more here:
 careers.vetclinicjobs.com/energyvets

Could Your Kind of People recognise Their Kind of Clinic?

A job ad may catch a vet’s or nurse’s eye. But it’s their own due diligence that determines whether they apply—or keep in touch.

Culture Story Centres turn real experiences from inside your team into credible, discoverable recruitment evidence, giving vets and nurses meaningful reasons to choose your clinic.

Explore Culture Story Centres for veterinary clinics

Could Your Kind of People recognise Their Kind of Clinic?

A job ad may catch a vet’s or nurse’s eye. But it’s their own due diligence that determines whether they apply—or keep in touch.

Culture Story Centres turn real experiences from inside your team into credible, discoverable recruitment evidence, giving vets and nurses meaningful reasons to choose your clinic.

Explore Culture Story Centres for veterinary clinics

From Client to Clinic Leader: Kylie Lindsay on Energy Vets’ Growth and Team Culture

Kylie Lindsay didn’t originally join Energy Vets as a staff member — she joined as a client.

Growing up in rural Inglewood with horses and other animals, the clinic (then Inglewood Veterinary Services) cared for the animals on her family’s lifestyle block. One day, while a vet was visiting one of her horses, Kylie asked whether there might be any work available at the clinic.

Her timing was good. A role had just opened on the after-hours phone team.

More than twenty years later, Kylie is now Clinic Services Manager, overseeing reception, companion animal services, and stock across Energy Vets’ Inglewood and Waitara clinics in Taranaki on New Zealand’s North Island.

In this conversation with Julie South, Kylie reflects on the growth of the clinic over the past two decades, how teams rotate across both clinics so clients receive consistent service, and the professional development opportunities available across the whole team — including reception and support staff.

She also shares one of the clinic’s quieter success stories: the number of kennel hands who have gone on to train in the veterinary industry, with several returning to work at Energy Vets after completing their studies.

When asked to describe the team in three words, Kylie chooses: welcoming, supportive, and professional.

Next week, Kylie talks about the type of veterinarian who fits the EnergyVets team and her own journey from answering after-hours phones to becoming a shareholder and director in the business.

In This Episode

00:04 – Introduction to the REAL+STORY episode with Kylie Lindsay
01:33 – Kylie’s role and how long she has been with the clinic
02:02 – Joining the clinic after originally being a client
03:45 – Growing up in the Hutt Valley, Rotorua, and settling in Taranaki
04:34 – Raising children and schooling in rural Taranaki
08:19 – Sporting opportunities and life in the region
08:49 – Growth of the clinic since 2005
10:41 – Professional development and leadership training
12:34 – Rotating teams across the Inglewood and Waitara clinics
15:27 – How Kylie’s role evolved as the clinic grew
17:10 – Examples of team members stepping into leadership roles
19:16 – Energy Vets’ “best kept secret” — the culture
21:14 – Kennel hands entering the veterinary profession
22:57 – Former kennel hands returning to work at the clinic
23:31 – Three words Kylie uses to describe the team

Hiring Link

Energy Vets is currently looking for an experienced small animal veterinarian ready to co-lead the companion animal team.

Learn more here:
vetclinicjobs.com/energyvets

Could Your Kind of People recognise Their Kind of Clinic?

A job ad may catch a vet’s or nurse’s eye. But it’s their own due diligence that determines whether they apply—or keep in touch.

Culture Story Centres turn real experiences from inside your team into credible, discoverable recruitment evidence, giving vets and nurses meaningful reasons to choose your clinic.

Explore Culture Story Centres for veterinary clinics

When veterinary clinics begin recognising the reactive recruitment cycle, certain phrases often start appearing.

They sound practical — but they’re often the cycle defending itself.

In this episode of Veterinary Voices, Julie South begins a new series exploring the objections that surface when clinics start considering a different way to approach recruitment.

The first phrase she hears most often is:

“Julie, we need someone now — not in six months’ time.”

When a clinic has been covering a vacancy for months and the team is exhausted, the idea of building something that takes time can feel impossible.

But Julie explains why this objection often appears after clinics have already spent months — sometimes years — trying to fill the role through job advertising alone.

The urgency is real.

But the deeper problem is usually that recognition only begins when the vacancy appears — meaning every recruitment effort starts from unknown, under pressure.

Julie explains why even a short, well-built information bridge — a clear picture of who the clinic is and what it’s actually like to work there — can dramatically change what happens after someone reads a job ad.

Because before vets and nurses decide whether to apply, they will almost always search for the clinic behind the advert.

What they find in that moment either strengthens conviction — or quietly ends the process.

Stay to the end for a question about what “we need someone now” may already be costing your clinic.

In This Episode

01:22 – The objection Julie hears most often: “We need someone now”
04:37 – The Job Application Decision Gap and the Cultural Visibility Stress Test
05:30 – Building an information bridge between job ads and applications
09:52 – Two questions about what reactive recruitment may already be costing your clinic

Mentioned in This Episode

Cultural Visibility Stress Test

A short eight-question exercise designed to help clinics see whether the Job Application Decision Gap may be affecting their recruitment.

It takes about three minutes and is free to complete.

careers.vetclinicjobs.com

About Julie South

Julie South is the founder of VetClinicJobs and host of Veterinary Voices.

She works with forward-thinking veterinary clinics that want to move beyond reactive job advertising by building recruitment infrastructure that creates recognition before a vacancy appears.

When vets and nurses can see that a clinic is their kind of place, recruitment stops being a start-from-scratch exercise every time a role opens.

Could Your Kind of People recognise Their Kind of Clinic?

A job ad may catch a vet’s or nurse’s eye. But it’s their own due diligence that determines whether they apply—or keep in touch.

Culture Story Centres turn real experiences from inside your team into credible, discoverable recruitment evidence, giving vets and nurses meaningful reasons to choose your clinic.

Explore Culture Story Centres for veterinary clinics

Head Vet Nurse Nicky Smith on Team Support, Community, and Life in Taranaki

In this REAL+STORY episode of Veterinary Voices, Julie South speaks with Nicky Smith, Head Vet Nurse at Energy Vets in Taranaki.

Nicky has worked in veterinary clinics in New Zealand and overseas, including time living in Auckland and abroad. But when the time came to settle and raise her family, she made the deliberate decision to return to Taranaki — the place she calls home.

In this chat, Nicky shares with Julie what support inside a veterinary clinic actually looks like when things get busy. Emergencies walk through the door, schedules change instantly, and the whole team moves together to make sure patients receive the care they need.

She talks about how the nursing team mentors younger nurses, how new ideas are welcomed, and why humour, trust, and looking out for each other are essential in a profession that can be stressful and emotionally demanding.

The conversation also explores life outside the clinic — why Nicky chose to raise and educate her children in Taranaki, the strength of smaller communities, and how the region’s people rally around causes that matter.

Nicky is also the founder of the Cape Egmont Half Marathon, a community event she started after losing her father to cancer.

If you’re curious about what working inside a supportive veterinary team looks like day to day — or how community shapes life in regional practice — this episode offers a candid perspective from someone leading the nursing team on the ground.

In This Episode

00:05 – Introduction to the REAL+STORY series with Energy Vets
 01:24 – Nicky’s background and why she returned to Taranaki
 03:31 – What “supportive team culture” looks like in real clinic life
04:35 – How the nursing team develops and mentors younger nurses
05:45 – Returning to Taranaki after living in bigger cities
06:44 – Why Nicky chose to raise and educate her children in Taranaki
09:55 – Community life and founding the Cape Egmont Half Marathon
13:07 – Favourite piece of veterinary equipment: the Bear Hugger
13:51 – Three words Nicky uses to describe the team
14:00 – Energy Vets’ “best kept secret” as a workplace
14:44 – Working across two clinic locations
16:05 – How after-hours works in practice
17:14 – A memorable patient case: nursing a farm dog back to health
19:16 – How new ideas are introduced and adopted inside the clinic
20:47 – Patient handovers and communication inside the team
22:04 – The type of person who fits best at Energy Vets
24:20 – What it really means when the team “looks out for each other”

Hiring Link

If you’re an experienced small animal veterinarian exploring your next step, you can learn more about current opportunities at Energy Vets Taranaki here:

vetclinicjobs.com/energyvets

Links Mentioned

Cape Egmont Half Marathon
 

About Julie South

Julie South is the founder of VetClinicJobs and host of Veterinary Voices.

Through VetClinicJobs, she helps forward-thinking veterinary clinics show what working there is really like — so vets and nurses can recognise Their Kind of Clinic long before they apply.

Could Your Kind of People recognise Their Kind of Clinic?

A job ad may catch a vet’s or nurse’s eye. But it’s their own due diligence that determines whether they apply—or keep in touch.

Culture Story Centres turn real experiences from inside your team into credible, discoverable recruitment evidence, giving vets and nurses meaningful reasons to choose your clinic.

Explore Culture Story Centres for veterinary clinics

By month five of job advertising, most vet clinics and their teams are exhausted.

Posting everywhere didn’t work. Rewriting didn’t work. Spending more didn’t work.

But the vacancy hasn’t just stayed a vacancy — it’s started affecting the people who are still there.

In this episode of Veterinary Voices, Julie South explores what happens when a role has been open for four to six months and the pressure inside the clinic starts to build.

Teams have been covering the extra work. The goodwill that carried the first few months begins to wear thin. Quietly, people start weighing their options.

That’s when the conversation inside many clinics shifts.

Instead of searching for the right fit, the thinking becomes: we just need someone.

Julie unpacks why this “warm body” thinking feels responsible in the moment — but often creates a far more expensive problem when the wrong hire lands in an already exhausted team.

This episode also looks at why the five-month recruitment cycle doesn’t end when a role is filled. In many clinics, it simply resets — except the team begins the next cycle already depleted.

And Julie explains the alternative: building recognition before you need to advertise, through Culture Story Centre infrastructure that allows vets and nurses to get to know your clinic long before a vacancy appears.

Because clinics that build recognition first rarely reach month five in their advertising at all.

Stay to the end for two simple questions that reveal which type of clinic you want yours to be.

In This Episode

00:00:06 – Introduction and the five-month recruitment cycle
00:01:16 – When more advertising and spending still doesn’t work
00:01:55 – What happens when a vacancy drags on for months
00:02:43 – The shift in team morale when “temporary” becomes permanent
00:03:44 – Quiet decisions exhausted team members begin making
00:04:49 – The arrival of “warm body” hiring thinking
00:05:51 – How desperation reshapes recruitment briefs
00:06:43 – When the wrong hire lands in an already stretched team
00:07:37 – The Job Application Decision Gap explained
00:08:45 – Why the five-month cycle simply resets
00:09:52 – Building recognition before you need to advertise
00:11:01 – Clinics that fill roles in month one or two
00:12:19 – Two questions every clinic should ask itself

Mentioned in This Episode

Cultural Visibility Stress Test

A short eight-question exercise designed to help clinics see whether the Job Application Decision Gap might be affecting their recruitment.

It takes about three minutes and is free to complete.

careers.vetclinicjobs.com

About Julie South

Julie South is the founder of VetClinicJobs and host of Veterinary Voices.

She works with forward-thinking veterinary clinics that want to move beyond reactive job advertising by building recruitment infrastructure that creates recognition before a vacancy appears.

When vets and nurses can see that a clinic is their kind of place, recruitment stops being a start-from-scratch exercise every time a role opens.

Struggling to get results from your job advertisements?

Shining online as a good employer helps attract veterinary professionals who are a genuine cultural fit for your clinic.

The VetClinicJobs job board connects forward-thinking clinics with vets and nurses looking for the right team environment.

To post your next vacancy or learn more, contact Lizzie at VetClinicJobs.

Could Your Kind of People recognise Their Kind of Clinic?

A job ad may catch a vet’s or nurse’s eye. But it’s their own due diligence that determines whether they apply—or keep in touch.

Culture Story Centres turn real experiences from inside your team into credible, discoverable recruitment evidence, giving vets and nurses meaningful reasons to choose your clinic.

Explore Culture Story Centres for veterinary clinics

In this REAL+STORY episode, Julie South speaks with Dr Sieara Claytor, a 2025 graduate working in her very first full-time veterinary role at Energy Vets in Taranaki.

Sieara moved from the United States to study in Australia and has now started her career in rural New Zealand. Six months in, she’s already managing emergencies, assisting in surgeries beyond routine desexings, handling after-hours responsibilities, and working across two clinic branches.

Rather than focusing on “graduate programs” or formal structures, this conversation looks at what support actually feels like day to day — senior vets scrubbing in alongside her, nurses staying late when needed, multiple vets available when things get busy, and space to ask questions without hesitation.

Sieara also talks about adjusting to rural life, commuting without traffic lights, wildlife cases, pig-hunting injuries, and the reality of after-hours in a regional clinic.

If you’re a new graduate — or someone mentoring one — this episode gives a clear sense of what challenge-with-backup looks like in practice.

In This Episode

00:00 – Introduction to the REAL+STORY series with Energy Vets
01:05 – Sieara’s background and first impressions as a new grad
03:30 – Rural caseload: emergencies, variety, and learning fast
04:52 – What support in surgery actually looks like
06:43 – Realising you’re more capable than you thought
07:56 – Moving countries and adjusting to rural life
09:16 – How after-hours really works
11:32 – Differences between the two clinic branches
12:50 – The early-career lens on Energy Vets

Hiring Link

If you’re an experienced small animal vet exploring your next step, you can find out more about current opportunities at Energy Vets Taranaki 

About Julie South

Julie South is the founder of VetClinicJobs and host of Veterinary Voices.

She works with veterinary clinics that want to show what working there is really like — not just list job requirements. Through VetClinicJobs, she helps clinics make their culture clear and recognisable, so vets and nurses can tell whether a clinic is Their Kind of Clinic long before a vacancy appears.

Could Your Kind of People recognise Their Kind of Clinic?

A job ad may catch a vet’s or nurse’s eye. But it’s their own due diligence that determines whether they apply—or keep in touch.

Culture Story Centres turn real experiences from inside your team into credible, discoverable recruitment evidence, giving vets and nurses meaningful reasons to choose your clinic.

Explore Culture Story Centres for veterinary clinics

By month four of advertising, most vet clinics and their teams are exhausted.

Posting everywhere didn’t work.   Rewriting didn’t work.   Spending more didn’t work.

So you start trying random things.

A Facebook post.  Asking your team to share.  Updating your careers page.  Boosting something for $50… maybe $100.

Because something has to (read: needs to!) stick.

In this episode of Veterinary Voices, Julie South unpacks what really happens around week fourteen of the recruitment cycle—when clinics move into DIY mode and start layering scattered tactics on top of a system that’s already failing.

The problem isn’t effort.   It’s infrastructure.

Social posts disappear.  Website updates sit buried.  Shared job ads still look like unknown clinics making familiar claims.

These tactics create bursts of visibility—but they don’t build recognition.

This episode contrasts the clinic pushing water uphill with random activity… and the clinic that built permanent culture story centre infrastructure months earlier—so when they advertise, they’re not starting from scratch.

Stay to the end for one direct question about how many tactics you’ve tried that went nowhere.

In This Episode

00:00 – Introduction: Month four and the shift to random tactics
01:12 – Social posts, staff shares, website updates
02:19 – The “maybe something will stick” phase
03:58 – Why your website isn’t designed for recruitment recognition
04:44 – Why staff sharing helps—but can’t replace recognition
05:29 – Buried posts and disappearing visibility
06:20 – Using the wrong tools for the job
07:15 – The clinic with permanent culture story centre infrastructure
08:15 – Why month four doesn’t have to become month five
09:28 – The question about pushing water uphill

About Julie South

Julie South is the founder of VetClinicJobs and host of Veterinary Voices.

She works with forward-thinking veterinary clinics that want to move beyond reactive job advertising and random tactics by building permanent recruitment infrastructure—so when they need to hire, they’re not starting from cold.

Could Your Kind of People recognise Their Kind of Clinic?

A job ad may catch a vet’s or nurse’s eye. But it’s their own due diligence that determines whether they apply—or keep in touch.

Culture Story Centres turn real experiences from inside your team into credible, discoverable recruitment evidence, giving vets and nurses meaningful reasons to choose your clinic.

Explore Culture Story Centres for veterinary clinics