Episode 14 – Leveraging Technology to Transform Veterinary Practices

Subscribe via your favourite podcast platform: Spotify Apple Podcasts | Google Podcasts | Anchor Breaker | Pocket Casts | RadioPublic

In this week’s episode

  • Turning Frustrations into Solutions – Discover how identifying and addressing common practice pain points, like appointment scheduling challenges, can lead to major efficiency gains while improving client and staff satisfaction.
  • Consolidation vs. Modularity – Learn why balancing all-in-one solutions and modular systems is key to optimising practice management without sacrificing functionality or efficiency.
  • Thriving in Veterinary Tech Start-ups – Explore the importance of embracing innovation, staying open to new ideas, and finding mentorship to successfully navigate the evolving veterinary technology landscape.
  • Trends Shaping Veterinary Technology – Get insights into cross-industry trends, such as automation, AI, and data ownership changes, and how they can influence the future of veterinary practice management.

Additional Guest Spotlights

  • Olivia Oginska’s Best Recommendations:  Olivia recommends exploring the School of Life for invaluable lessons in emotional and practical skills, and suggests using voice messages to convey tone and intention, making communication more impactful and authentic.
  • Ryan Leech: Sneak peak into the next episode with Ryan Leech. They dive into the importance of granting permission to explore technology, urging leaders, universities, and regulatory bodies to create a culture where innovation thrives without fear of failure.

Show Notes

  • Out every other week on your favourite podcast platform.
  • Presented by Jack Peploe: Veterinary IT Expert, Certified Ethical Hacker, CEO of Veterinary IT Services and dog Dad to the adorable Puffin.
  • This week we welcome Joe Chickerillo, VP of Sales at CHCKUP. Joe has spent the last 15 years in various start-up SaaS companies, all with successful outcomes, and all with a focus on automation, scalability, and efficiency. Joe was born & raised on the South Side of Chicago and currently lives in the suburbs with his wife and their 1-year old chihuahua.
  • Joe recommends “The 5 Dysfunctions of a Team” by Patrick Lencioni.
  • Find out more about CHCKUP here!

Transcription

Jack Peploe:

Coming up on Modern Veterinary Practice,

Joe Chickerillo:

It’s such a game changer that once you have it, you can never go back to not having it. I always try and analogize it to like a GPS. Like, yes, you had MapQuest back in the nineties and that was revolutionary. You could download maps with the direct term I turn thing to wherever you want to go, but you go from that to having a GPS that turn by turn directions. That updates a real time with traffic. I mean, who would ever go back to the former? You know what I mean?

Jack Peploe:

Welcome to the Modern Veterinary Practice Podcast. I’m your host and veterinary IT expert, Jack Peploe. In this episode, I’m thrilled to welcome Joe Chickerillo, a seasoned technology leader with a unique background spanning veterinary and human dental tech. Joe has a wealth of experience in bringing disruptive solutions to market, and today we’ll delve into the role of technology in veterinary services. From the evolution of automation to the parallels between the veterinary and dental industries, we’ll explore how innovation is shaping the future of practice management and client care.

Joe Chickerillo:

Yeah, so my name’s Joe Chickerillo. I live in Chicago, Illinois here in the States. I’ve spent about the last 15 years in various software as a service companies, mostly startups, all of them with successful outcomes generally all with a focus on automation, scalability, and efficiency. Mostly actually in the human dental world, but more recently about the last year and a half in the veterinary space, love process, infrastructure and disruptive technology and stuff like that. Otherwise, in my free time, I’m married. I have a one-year-old chihuahua, actually a choi. I like fast cars, I like live music. Anything that you can consider long walks on the beach.

Jack Peploe:

That’s amazing. Well, look, I think there are just too many things I could actually speak to you Joe about, but obviously it’s great to have you on the Modern Veterinary Practice podcast. I’m going to try and hone in as much as possible because otherwise I’m going to get carried away with the fast cars and all the exciting things. But we’re still going to talk about exciting topic, not for everyone, but it is stuff that I think is really important and I think people will find extremely useful. But I really wanted to dive into your extensive experience with technology and specifically impact on veterinary services. Now with your background in bringing disruptive solutions to market, what do you see as the next frontier for technology in veterinary medicine?

Joe Chickerillo:

I think it all comes down to automation, and that could mean a bunch of different things. So obviously I’m part of this company Chckup, which does a bunch of different things on one Rope. It’s the online booking, it’s communications, it’s portal, and all the things that go into the client relationship thing. There’s a lot of companies that are doing really cool stuff with ai, and right now it’s kind of in its infancy stage. So I haven’t found any one company that seems to be kind of leading the forefront of that, but there’s a lot of really cool stuff that seems to be out there. So I think it all just comes down to automation, which ultimately, I’m not sure how it is over there, but here in the states there’s this huge hiring crisis. There’s this labour shortage, people are overworked, they’re overstressed. There’s all this stuff that I think automation will help change dramatically. Everybody will be able to ultimately spend more time doing what they want to do, which is actually helping to save more pets.

Jack Peploe:

You know what I mean? Yeah. I mean, it’d be really interesting to get your perspective. I mean, one thing that I’ve noticed is that we’ve sort of hopped onto the AI bandwagon very, very quickly, and in some cases we misuse the acronym of the term because actually a lot of what we really need right now is more around the automation side. Is that something you’ve noticed and especially over from your side of the pond?

Joe Chickerillo:

Yeah, and I think that, yes. So first of all, I agree with you, but I think that the reason that AI is becoming such a big thing is because it’s just becoming more accessible to everybody right now. So I think that there’s a strong tie in. I just think we haven’t quite figured out how to use it most appropriately with what we’re already trying to do from an automation perspective. We, for instance, have an AI component with our analytics where you can type in a question into the system, show me my top five long-term value clients of all time, or show me the last 10 people that book online or show me a list of all the people, all the dogs who have been diagnosed with X, Y, Z. That’s just specifically what you can use with ours, with our analytics. There’s other people that do where it’s a talk to text a, I forget the name of it, but scribe note or scribe that, or something like that where you can talk and it’ll actually take all your notes for you. I think that it’s just such a new technology that we haven’t quite dialed in what it’s going to do specifically for everybody really well versus what it’s going to do that might be kind of redundant or maybe over the, we don’t need AI for that particular piece.

Jack Peploe:

You know what I mean? Yeah. It’s kind of very much like a copilot. It’s something which we discussed on my previous episode actually, which was fascinating. It was actually with Cove, which is another similar to a scribe vet where it is that kind of copilot style thing. And do you feel that this is kind of the medium that a number of vendors are starting to take is to go down this copilot route? So you’ve got your core product, but you’ve got a copilot there to assist you with the day-to-day operation of the platform, allowing you to get quick access to key information?

Joe Chickerillo:

Yes and no. Yes, because I think it’s such a hot button topic right now that everybody’s trying to figure out some way to integrate it so they just can say that they’re using ai. On the flip side, I don’t think everybody needs to do that, right? Ours is very so specific, but the rest of it is just automated. It’s just process, right? So do I think that there’s going to be a lot of people doing that? Yes. Do I think everybody needs to be doing that? Not necessarily. However, to your other part of that question, I think it always has to be a copilot. AI is not replacing people, it’s just automating what they’re doing a little bit. It’s speeding it along. So you talk about doing AI x-rays for instance. You still need the doctor to be able to look at it and that, hey, this is how this actually functions in the context of the pet that we’re working with, how you got to explain it and this and that. But the AI helps you eliminate errors and speeds that process along.

Jack Peploe:

I mean, yeah. So I want to look at market needs. So based on your experience across the various tech sectors that you’ve worked in, and I know you mentioned dental as well, how do you identify the specific needs of, for example, veterinary practices that technology can address?

Joe Chickerillo:

So my background’s kind of unique in this regard because I’ve actually spent the last, again, last year and a half or so in the veterinary space. Prior to that, I was about 12 years in the human dental space. And what I found is there’s a tonne of parallels between veterinary medicine and dental medicine, like a striking amount of, it’s almost the exact same stuff happening. It’s just like five to six years later in the veterinary space. So if I’m being honest with my own experience, I just look at what’s happening in the dental space. I’m like, okay, this is what’s coming for vet. So there’s a lot of parallels in terms of just the way that things operate, the fact that dentists and veterinarians are so focused on helping the patients that a lot of times they’re not taught any sort of business training. So they may be their own practice owner right now, but they may not have ever been taught how to scale process, how to lower their overhead, how to do things that just make the business run better and make them better at doing their own job.

There’s other things like mental health struggles in both. They have both very high rates of mental health crisis and suicide. So that stress level is there on both sides. There’s also things like process wise, both of them, up until just now in the dental space, the company that I was at was the first one that brought online booking into the dental world at all, and now it is the number one most used third party service in all of dental, at least in the states. But that tool was such a game changer and everybody was really afraid of it, and that’s what I’m running into now in the vet space. Everybody’s like, oh, and there’s no way you could have online booking that actually works the way that we would need it to work. Our schedule is so unique, we do X, Y, and Z, and I’m like, no, no, no.

You cannot come up with a scenario that we can’t put in a rule set that will allow that to work. And that’s just such one of those things that it’s such a game changer that once you have it, you can never go back to not having it. I always try and analogize it to like a GPS. Like, yes, you had MapQuest back in the nineties and that was revolutionary. You could download maps with the direct turn by turn thing to wherever you want to go, but you go from that to having a GPS that’s turn by turn directions. That updates a real time with traffic. I mean, who would ever go back to the former? You know what I mean?

Jack Peploe:

A hundred percent. And I suppose I’ve got some more questions that I’m going to go off on a tangent here, but I’m just intrigued. How do you guys find integrating with PR PIMS systems, because obviously there are quite a few to choose from. Does that cause quite a barrier for you with regards to allowing your product to work efficiently?

Joe Chickerillo:

Yes and no. I’m a car guy, so I always think about things and analogies to cars, and it’d be like if you were somebody who made aftermarket parts for a car, maybe like a supercharger or I don’t know, whatever it is, you would by default go for the brands that are the most widely used or bought, right? Because that allows you the widest market share. So for us, we go for, again, the difference here being that we’re in the states, but we’ve got all of the top most popular pins we integrate with directly. So there’s eight out of about I, let’s say 30 or 40 or so. I mean, a lot of ’em are so obscure, they only have a handful of users. I mean, a few hundred we even vet in the UK to my knowledge is the biggest, actually I think it’s in Europe in general, not just the UK as pro. So we’re integrated with Pro as well. But yeah, it does present a barrier because the people that are looking to integrate with us, it’s 50 50 for either, they’re either the type of people that are already tech savvy enough that they’re looking for something else, and thus they are on a system that’s very open to third parties like us. So it’s great. We probably integrate already or they’re so tech savvy that they’re using kind of more of a niche system and then nobody integrates with it. It’s like a catch 22.

Jack Peploe:

You know what I mean? Yeah. So I mean talking about integrating technology into practice, what are the common reservations that veterinary practices have about adopting new technologies and how can these be effectively addressed? Just in general, not necessarily about Chckup, but just in general, what have you noticed?

Joe Chickerillo:

Resistance to change is the number one biggest one. Everybody’s afraid of changing anything. I would say that that’s the single biggest issue to overcome with any new technology, probably almost in any vertical I would imagine. It’s definitely in dental and it’s definitely in veterinary, it’s just resistance to change. There was a time in a past life I was involved in the automotive industry, and for the automotive industry, it was not as much resistance to change. It was just if I give you money, will you give me more money back? And if the answer was yes, then they would try anything. Whereas in the veterinary space, it’s more like, well, no, we’re already doing a million things. We’re already overworked, we’re already short staffed, throwing in anything new, even if it’s going to help us dramatically. The daunting idea of having a new thing that people have to be aware of and possibly learn how to use or monitor or it’s like that’s easily the biggest fear in my opinion.

Jack Peploe:

And how would you go about addressing that?

Joe Chickerillo:

Well, for us, it’s hard to speak without talking about my product directly, but I mean for us it’s just a matter of showing them physically how it works. Hey, you just put this on your website, people can go and fill out their information. It books the appointment automatically and all that. I try and use emotional examples, something that people connect with immediately. I go, you know how when you have somebody request an appointment online and then you have that awkward back and forth where you have to try and play phone tag and they’re never available, you try and text them, then don’t, the time they wanted wasn’t available. And then now it’s kind of awkward because asking ’em to pick a time, okay, pick one of these three, whatever, that nobody likes that the front desk doesn’t like that the patient or the client doesn’t like that.

So if this does the whole process for you automatically think about how much time you’re going to save with that one thing alone. I try and bring examples of like, okay, what is something that you personally know is a big pain point for you in the practice, even if you don’t recognise that there’s a solution? But man, this is the most annoying part of my day. It’s just that phone text. You know what I mean? I try and just give ’em some sort of a visceral example of like, oh yeah, I do hate that thing. And if this could remedy that, then that would be awesome.

Jack Peploe:

That’s very cool though. Very cool. And I mean, I want to sort of go back to the dental side and maybe not specifically dental, maybe there are other areas, but are you able to discuss a technology trend outside of veterinary medicine that you believe could significantly influence veterinary practice management?

Joe Chickerillo:

I mean, again, so most of my background is in the dental space. It’s always been around scalability and automation and efficiency. I mean, I would say that anything that we’re doing in the vet space right now and have, it’s all stuff that we’ve done in the dental space already just several years ago. And I think that it’s pretty much universally pickled to everybody because what you want to do is have systems that integrate more fully and more automatically. You want to try and keep as few solutions so that there’s less points of error, less possibility to have something break down in between point A and point B. And most veterinarians, and most dentists have multiple systems that are running their business for them. I think that that generally is true for most verticals right now. So anything that specifically can kind of consolidate and integrate in the most effective way. But as far as something like a different technology trend, I’m not sure that one comes to mind other than just again, the kind of this overarching sense of AI kind of coming into every different aspect of everything.

Jack Peploe:

Of everything. Again, going back to that point, because I’m really intrigued, there are two ways in which we can go. We can go very much down the mod route, which is where you segment out individual components which might be delivered through third party solutions, like for example, Chckup to enhance the PIMS, or you end up with a PIM solution that does it all. But the argument is do they do it very well because almost you are asking too much of them. Is it really a good idea to put all eggs in one basket? And especially considering, for example, with things like Web3 on the horizon where data ownership changes dramatically, and it could mean that we end up being more modular. What’s your opinion on that?

Joe Chickerillo:

I think that it’s good to consolidate under umbrellas, maybe not everything that a practice would need in one roof. So to your point, there are several different PIMS who kind of try and be the all-in-one. And I am not just full transparency, I’ve never used a veterinary practice management system myself, but what we hear from people, the reason that we hear from them if they’re using those systems is because those systems aren’t doing all those things. Well. That being said, I think that there’s something to be said for having a PIMS do a lot of things that a PIMS could and should do. I think that it’s good to have one umbrella like us that is the client communications or client success side of things. It’s the booking, it’s, it’s the reminders, it’s confirmations, it’s reviews, it’s a portal. It’s all that stuff, but it’s all relative to the client experience interacting with the practice.

And I think because we have a focus on that, even though it’s a broad focus, we do all these different aspects of it, it’s still one umbrella that it sits under in that same realm. We don’t want to touch phones, like white phones. That’s a whole other category, like the hardware that goes in a practice. We don’t have any interest in working with anything like that. You know what I mean? I think it’s good to be modular, but kind of with broad scope because if you have too many things, then you’re paying, first of all a bunch of different fees for something that maybe one person could do. And secondly, if one person’s good at one aspect and there’s a very closely related aspect, they probably could be very good at that too. But as long as you stay in your lane. So us not doing phones and not creating a PIMS, not trying to do communications in a phone, that type of, does that make sense?

Jack Peploe:

That’s awesome. So I’m now going to get you to change your hat, so not necessarily look from a client’s perspective. I want understand from your perspective on, and I think this will appeal to some of the audience, which is what advice would you give to startups entering the veterinary tech space, especially those looking to introduce novel solutions?

Joe Chickerillo:

I would say be probably two things. I’d say be open to new ideas first of all, because there are things that aren’t just considered a given, a standard or an expectation now that five years ago, it would’ve sounded crazy like ai, like GPS when it came out. You know what I mean? There’s just these moments. I don’t know if those qualified necessarily Gutenberg moment, but there are moments, there are things that come out where you’re just like, it seems crazy in the moment, but then two years later, everybody does that thing. So I would say probably be open to you to ideas and innovation and things like that. The other would be kind of just more general business sense, and this is a question that gets asked on a lot. I’ve been on a lot of podcasts, and this is sort of a question that a lot of podcasts asks, is what’s your favourite business piece of advice or business book that you’ve read or something like that.

And the one that I think is the biggest, most important and most underrated is having a mentor, finding a really good mentor who knows you, who knows what you’re trying to do, who can look at things from an outside perspective. I’ve been really, really lucky in my career where I’ve had a series of back-to-back mentors in different roles, and I mean, I don’t even know what I would do without having had that somebody to bounce ideas off of, ask advice from that’s not in the weeds, because when you’re doing a startup or you’re doing really anything in the business world, you’re the one that’s doing it. You’ve got your tendrils and everything. It’s really hard to step back. And even though people say that all the time, it’s easier said than done. Take a step back and look from the outside, which is great to have somebody who understands you and your proclivities and what you’re good at and what you’re not. And other just business sense type things of the world that you can go to and ask for advice or bounce ideas off.

Jack Peploe:

I mean, no, that’s credible advice. Well, Joe, I mean, I’ve looked at the time it’s following by. I really, really appreciate all your insight. It’s been fascinating looking at the intersection of technology in veterinary care and especially bringing the dental component. That was a really unique thing and really cool, but really appreciate you sharing your expertise and vision with us, offering a glimpse into what the future of the industry can look like. Now, before I do close this down, if people want to get in touch with you, how can they do it?

Joe Chickerillo:

Go to our website. That’s the best way. It’s got all our information. It’s got the ability to book an eight minute demo with us. The website is chckup.app, so not “.com”, “.app”. Also chckup is missing the E, so it’s CHCKUP .APP, but that’s got our contact info. It’s got the link to book a demo. It’s got info on us and everybody that we work with and all that type of stuff. Everything you need will

Jack Peploe:

Be on our website. Obviously everything will be on the show notes. But Joe, thank you so much. Really, really appreciate your time.

Joe Chickerillo:

Absolutely, man. Thanks for having me.

Jack Peploe:

Every week we ask professionals and experts to suggest a best business resource for our listeners. This week’s recommendation is from Olivia Oginska.

Olivia Oginska:

Two things that come to my mind here. One would be the School of Life. So it’s an organisation that teaches the soft skills as we call them, which are actually human skills. We don’t like the term soft, but they talk about the emotional aspects, very practical aspects of life. You can find them on YouTube, for example. So the school of life is really, really useful. And another thing, a little piece of advice and resource that I would love to encourage everyone to try, it might surprise you because it’s very simple, but it’s technology to learn how to not be embarrassed to send people voice messages. We know that emails can be very dry, and we know that because you and I and everyone there has different programming, we will read things differently and we’ll create stories about how we interpret an email, a dry message. When we send a voice message, we can convey so much more of our emotion through the voice, through the tone, through the words, through even a little pause or not. There are so many things that are important for our communication that we can convey in the voice message that we cannot find in the written messages. There is that richness of emotion, of intention, and that can lead to a better, more successful interpretation of our intent.

Jack Peploe:

Coming up next week, we welcome Ryan Leech of the Bird Bath podcast and a growth consultant with deep insights into the veterinary industry’s evolving landscape. In this episode, Ryan shares his perspective on the challenges and opportunities in adopting technology, the role of generational shifts in reshaping veterinary practices, and how consolidation is influencing the industry’s future. We delve into what it means to innovate with purpose and how embracing change can unlock new potential for veterinary professionals.

Ryan Leech:

And so I think that’s the big thing that we’re pushing against, is people needing to explore and try technologies. And my big thing, the thing I’m going to be talking about probably for the next, hopefully a couple of years, is the permission. I want everyone just to feel the permission to be able to explore technology, and I want the governing bodies and the regulatory bodies and the universities and the C-Suites to say, try it. Look at technology. You’re not going to get fired. We’re not going to fire you for saying you want to try an AI crew and practice. Not saying we’re going to adopt it, but we at least are willing to let you look at it.

Jack Peploe:

That’s it for this episode. All links and recommendations we talked about are in the show notes. Don’t forget to subscribe and share the podcast if you found it useful. In the meantime, thanks for listening and see you next time.

Don't forget to share this post!

Let's Talk about You

Not quite sure where to start? Don't worry we have you covered, contact us today to talk to a local specialist who can help pinpoint your requirements and how we can help.

SPEAK TO US ON 0808 196 2041