Whatever the veterinarian hospital role—kennel tech, CSR, technician or hospital administrator—Jessica Manning, CVPM, CCFP, SHRM-SCP, CVBL, has likely filled it. Short of a veterinarian who needs a license, she’s done it all.  

Currently, she is one of Thrive Pet Healthcare’s People Operations Business Partners and is lending her years of experience in the veterinarian field as a Compassion Fatigue Certified Professional to lead two new workshops for Thrive Pet Healthcare team members: Preventing Burnout and Understanding and Overcoming Burnout and Compassion Fatigue.  

Occupational burnout refers to a general exhaustion and lack of interest or motivation regarding one’s work. In a similar vein, compassion fatigue refers to the negative emotions that individuals feel from helping others at work.  

"Burnout is prevalent with every person, every industry. It is not just who you are and what you do, it's how you live your life. And everybody's susceptible to burnout,” said Jessica Manning. “You could be burnt out in your home life. You could be burnt out in your career; you could be burnt out in your hobbies. For me, horses are my big outlet. Whatever your outlet is, if you get so consumed in one thing that you forget to do the other, it's naturally going to consume you back." 

Jessica originally pursued her compassion fatigue certification as a hospital administrator after seeing firsthand how her colleagues were suffering with burnout. Along the way, she experienced an unexpected epiphany: she was burnt out, too. 

“I have this bubbly, super exuberant personality, but I realized just how incredibly burnt out I was becoming. I was giving everything I had to my teams, and I was the last one I thought about every day. People don’t always realize that burnout is what's causing them to not like parts of their job anymore. And so instead of leaving the industry entirely like a lot of people do, I was able to make a paradigm shift in my head.” 

This is a key focus of the Preventing Burnout training, which identifies five major paradigm shifts that can be applied to burnout as it relates to the reality of life in the veterinary industry – things like euthanasia, long hours and the stress of day-to-day hospital life. 

“There’s this idea that burnout is just inevitable if you work in this industry, and it really doesn’t have to be. I’m an example of that. You can really enjoy this – recognizing that burnout exists, but also taking steps to prevent it. And continuing to do that and make that active choice because it’s not one and done. It can come back.” 

The first step to overcoming burnout and compassion fatigue is to understand how it happens and recognize its impact. But even if you know you’re burnt out, how do you identify the paradigm shifts you need to make to improve things?  

Multiple factors can contribute to experiencing burnout and/or compassion fatigue, such as long hours, lack of resources, conflict with clients, ethical dilemmas, and stress from treating patients. If a veterinary professional is suffering from burnout or compassion fatigue, symptoms can vary from person to person and depend on what stage of life they are in. Those who are suffering from burnout may experience trouble sleeping, more frustration than usual at or outside of work, weight gain or loss, and decreased motivation to interact with colleagues and/or loved ones.  

It’s important to recognize the individual factors that are leading to an individual's burnout and/or compassion fatigue and how the condition is presenting itself. With this self-awareness, veterinary professionals can make an individualized plan with action items that will help set boundaries or have conversations to refocus and take back control. 

The veterinary profession is inherently selfless; pet healthcare professionals want to help provide care and support to every pet and pet family that walks through the hospital doors. But focusing only on how we’re going to help everyone else is exactly where burnout and compassion fatigue begin. When veterinary team members give their all to others, there’s nothing left to give back to themselves. 

For Jessica, it all comes back to the boundaries and mindfulness we put on ourselves in those moments and the idea that we can provide the best care for others when we are living and feeling our best. 

“The analogy I use is that firefighters don’t run into burning buildings without proper training first, because they wouldn’t be able to help very many people that way. So, while I can appreciate people wanting to run into these burning buildings and helping all these people, unless they’ve had the training and are able to protect themselves, they’re not going to be able to help as many people as they could.”  

Thrive Pet Healthcare is committed to providing tools to support our team members’ total wellbeing and creating a dialogue around mental health within the veterinary industry.

For more information about life at Thrive Pet Healthcare and the resources we offer to care for Thrivers in our network, visit our Careers page.