In veterinary practice, resilience is more than just a buzzword. It’s what keeps nursing teams going through busy days, emotional cases, and the ongoing challenges of recruitment and retention. While resilience is often spoken about in individual terms, team-level resilience – how people support and strengthen each other – plays an equally vital role.
So, how can practice managers and head veterinary nurses help build a veterinary nursing team that is not only clinically strong but also able to adapt, grow and thrive in a demanding profession?
Here are some practical strategies to consider:
Encourage reflective practice
One of the cornerstones of resilience is the ability to process experience, learn from it, and move forward. As such, reflection shouldn’t be reserved for annual appraisals or formal training. Encouraging routine, low-pressure opportunities to think critically about cases, decisions and challenges helps build confidence and adaptability. This could be as simple as incorporating “what went well, what could be improved” debriefs into your morning meetings, or allowing time for post-op discussions at the end of a shift.
Teams that reflect together tend to support each other better and cope more constructively with setbacks.
Prioritise psychological safety
For a team to be resilient, its members need to feel safe speaking up, asking for help, or acknowledging mistakes. Psychological safety is the foundation of open communication, and it doesn’t happen by accident.
Make it clear that no question is too basic, and that learning from error is not only acceptable but expected. Senior nurses and clinical supervisors can set the tone by modelling honesty, curiosity and a willingness to learn.
Creating this kind of environment helps team members feel valued and reduces the fear of judgement, which can be a major barrier to growth.
Make mentoring part of everyday practice
Resilient teams invest in each other. Mentoring, whether formal or informal, provides structure, support and a sense of progression. It also helps break down silos between experienced and newer team members.
Training Student Veterinary Nurses (SVNs) in practice can be one way to embed a culture of mentoring into the everyday. Supervising a student encourages the wider team to communicate clearly, revisit clinical reasoning and support learning across all levels – not just for the student. Even practices with limited case exposure may still be able to participate as an auxiliary Training Practice (aTP), supporting students while connecting with other practices to provide wider clinical experience. Find out more about becoming a TP or aTP.
Build development into the rota
CPD is essential, but resilience-building also requires everyday development. This could mean giving a junior team member time to run a nurse consult, or letting someone shadow a complex anaesthetic. These opportunities help veterinary nurses build competence and confidence in manageable steps.
When development time is built into the rota, it signals that learning is a priority, not an afterthought. It also helps reduce overwhelm, as people feel better equipped to take on new challenges. If you already support an SVN in practice, you’ll know how this culture of planned, progressive learning can benefit the wider team, not just the student.
Talk about the tough stuff
Veterinary nursing can be emotionally demanding. Patient loss, client expectations and compassion fatigue all take a toll. Resilient teams acknowledge this and create space for conversations–not to fix everything, but to validate and support each other.
Whether it’s a structured wellbeing check-in, access to mental health support, or just having someone available to talk to after a difficult case, open dialogue is one of the most effective buffers against burnout. Teams that normalise these conversations tend to bounce back faster and hold on to their people longer.
Use training to strengthen, not stretch, your team
Investing in your veterinary nursing team’s development doesn’t have to mean taking people away from the practice or piling extra pressure onto busy schedules. The right training can actually strengthen your team, giving them new skills, confidence, and resilience that feed straight back into everyday practice.
From leadership and management courses that build future head nurses and practice managers, to clinical supervisor training that empowers RVNs to mentor students, there are accessible ways to grow capability within your team. Short, accredited programmes or bite-size CPD sessions can also boost skills in areas like communication, coaching, or teaching, without overwhelming workloads.
For those ready to take a deeper dive, advanced veterinary nursing qualifications or top-up degrees open career pathways while also bringing fresh expertise into your practice. By choosing training that aligns with both individual goals and practice needs, you create a culture of development that strengthens the whole team without stretching it thin.
Building a resilient nursing team doesn’t happen overnight. It’s shaped by the everyday choices you make around communication, development and culture. From mentoring and reflection to structured support and shared learning, resilience grows best in teams where people feel safe, supported and part of something meaningful.