2.2 Complex Systems and Wicked Problems

Throughout this book, I will refer to complexity and the leadership challenges this brings. It seems fair to cover some definitions at this point to contextualise this approach.

Complexity science has shed light on human organisations and how and why they form and develop. It is useful to consider the distinctions between simple, complicated, complex, and chaotic systems.

2.3 What Is a Profession?

The early professions such as medicine and law arose as learned activities in the late Middle Ages and formal professions developed to allow a monopoly over a domain of practise (Adler et al. 2008). Generally speaking, professions are knowledge and/or skill‐based; entry is certified, e.g. by examination, and professional competencies must be maintained. This monopoly gives a right to charge for service and prohibits ‘lay’ persons from practising. With professional status comes an identity that develops before and after training, and a professional community to which we belong. Historically, professional membership has come with a high degree of trust and, generally, professions have been self‐regulating (this has, arguably, diluted as trust in the professions has diminished) and set their own standards of practise.

Morrell (2016) citing Lord Benson in a House of Lords debate in 1992, offers a list of the distinguishing characteristics of a profession:

• Ensures fair and open competition, directs the behaviour of its members, sets adequate standards of entry‐level education and continuing competence
  
• Sets ethical rules and professional standards that are higher than those established by the general law and are designed for the benefit of the public and not for private advantage.
  
• Has a membership that is independent in thought and outlook but subordinates its private interests in favour of support for the governing body and observes its rules and standards.
  
• Has disciplinary standards if its rules are not observed, or in the event of bad work.
  
• Provides leadership.
  
• At an institutional level, has an obligation to develop and disseminate a genuine body of knowledge and, at individual level, has the requirement to exercise judgement.

2.4 The History of the Veterinary Profession

Knowledge leadership in veterinary medicine can be traced centuries back, such as through the production of treatise in China c. 2500 BCE. Formally, the veterinary profession was begun through the leadership of Claude Bourgelat who founded Lyon Veterinary School and Alfort School in 1765. This was followed by establishment of the ‘London Veterinary College’ by Charles Vial de St. Bel (a graduate of Lyon) in 1791. The development of veterinary nursing as an independent profession in the United Kingdom continues with milestones such as with the first veterinary nurse to sit on Royal College of Veterinary Surgeons (RCVS) Council and, in 2012, development of a new Code of Professional Conduct including, for the first time, a declaration to be made by Registered Veterinary Nurses on professional registration.

Interactions between humans and animals are complex and multilayered (ranging from practical to psycho‐social to transpersonal) and are the subject of deep interest, study, and debate (Haraway 2008). Humans use, and relate to, animals in multiple ways, to provide food, security, research subjects, transport, assistance, objects of veneration and worship, companionship, and sources of profit. As companions, pets remind us to be joyful and mindful, they bring life (and death) into a home, take us out of ourselves and provide reasons for living. What a responsibility that places on veterinary professionals! On a prosaic level, we can see that the motivational drivers and ‘purpose’ of the veterinary professions have developed and diversified over time from care of farm animals, to care of military animals, through to support of animal health and production, welfare and use of animals in medical research, to leisure and pet care. The picture of the profession (including practice type, gender balance, ownership structures and governance) is continually changing with societal needs and expectations. The profession is embedded in society and serves many different functions, including being a source of ‘entertainment’ through books, TV shows, and even stadium tours (Figure 2.1).

Throughout the history of the veterinary professions, globally, there are examples of great achievements that have impacted human society, e.g. the eradication of Rinderpest. Achievements in other areas, e.g. food production (breeding, animal health), drug development, nutrition, and medical research can be readily identified. More recently, the veterinary profession’s role in global One Health is gaining prominence and recognition (Gibbs 2014; Natterson‐Horowitz 2015).

2.5 What Are the Veterinary Professions, and What Are They for?

To be a veterinary surgeon (veterinarian) or veterinary nurse (in the UK) is to be part of a profession and accept the authority and oversight of a professional regulator. In the United Kingdom, the regulator is the RCVS and the underlying legal status of the profession is the Veterinary Surgeons Act (1966). Much of this Act relates to how individuals are entered into, and maintained on, the Register of practitioners. What the registered professional can actually do is much less proscribed; the Act does say it is unlawful for anyone other than a veterinary surgeon to perform acts of veterinary surgery, whether or not they charge a fee (but the right to charge a fee for services is implicit). The RCVS also maintains a Register of Veterinary Nurses qualified to provide supporting nursing care to animals and, under veterinary direction, to undertake certain treatments and procedures that are also controlled by law under the Veterinary Surgeons Act 1966.

The RCVS Codes of Professional Conduct for Veterinary Surgeons and Veterinary Nurses puts ‘meat on the bones’ of professional responsibilities and, with supportive guidance, outlines what is expected of professionals. Furthermore, on admission to the veterinary register we declare that ‘ABOVE ALL, my constant endeavour will be to ensure the health and welfare of animals committed to my care.’

2.6 Uncertainties of Role and Identity

If you were to ask a cross‐section of the general public what the veterinary professions are ‘for’ you might expect a range of responses such as ‘looking after sick animals’, ‘vaccinating and neutering’, ‘diagnosing and treating disease in animals’. For veterinary professionals, the answers might be broader, more specific, more nuanced, and not, in every case, aligned with the view of the profession from wider society. I doubt, for example, that many non‐veterinary professionals would raise ‘protection of the food chain’, ‘farm animal productivity’, ‘racehorse performance’, ‘medical research’, ‘drug development’, or the many other areas in which veterinary professionals practise.

And this is where we run into paradox, contradiction, complexity, and ambiguity. Who, truly, do the veterinary professions serve? Our professional status gives us the right to cause harm to animals (‘acts of veterinary surgery’), which is modified (and contradicted) by the primacy of animal welfare as per the oath. We also have the right to charge a fee for our services and, thereby, serve our own needs. Yet, are we, truly, outside of society? Of course not. As the professions’ response to global threats show, human welfare (of both colleagues and society) takes precedent, above the declaration that we serve animal welfare ‘ABOVE ALL’. The profession serves the animals in its care, yes, but it does so with implicit (the social contract) and explicit, legal, permission of human society. Many people are not interested in really understanding the role of the veterinary professional; they are just grateful someone is there to take on the responsibilities on their behalf.

If caring organisations are developed to provide defences against anxieties on behalf of human society, then this raises interesting questions about what the veterinary professions are really ‘for’ at an unconscious level (Armstrong and Rustin 2014). The veterinary professions, generally accepted to be ‘caring’, take on a part of the management of the human‐animal interface on behalf of society at large, and function as a place to hold and contain the associated anxieties. This human–animal interface is itself a place of contradiction, paradox, and pain where the idealism of animals as joint rightful sharers of the space on this earth does not (for most of us) bear critical examination, and where the joys of animal companionship come with, emphasise, and maybe help us to face, the inevitability of human pain, ageing, and death (cheery, huh?). So, even at a basic level, to be a veterinary professional is to wrestle and manage with uncertainties of role and identity. These conflicts and paradoxes may be conscious or unconscious; perhaps this is the water in which we swim?