Kerrie Hedley on women in veterinary leadership

Today’s episode is a special collaboration for Smashing The Ceiling, as I’ve produced this conversation in partnership with Veterinary Woman, a platform to help and inspire women to develop the confidence to overcome challenges and follow their passions. They want to encourage women to be at the forefront of clinical practice, specialisation, professional bodies, corporates, education, research, industry, government - to have female leaders in every area of veterinary influence.

And so my special guest today is a women who embodies all the qualities that both Veterinary Woman and Smashing The Ceiling love to share with others.

Kerrie Hedley is now the chief operating officer of XL Vets, reaching executive level after only 4 years at the company. Kerrie graduated from the RVC in 2011 and started in equine practice in the North East. As you’ll hear, she developed a love of business quite early and has since completed both a certificate in Veterinary Business Management and an MBA during her career so far. Her MBA dissertation was on women in veterinary leadership, and we talk quite a lot about this later in the episode, particularly the facilitators and barriers to women progressing in the profession.

It was such a joy to talk to Kerrie - she is very humble about her progress but the reality she is that she has a big job and she is now using her position to lift up others women in the profession, which is really what it’s all about.