Leaving the Gate Open

Veterinary medicine does not have to remain confined by the same assumptions, services, and business models that have defined it for decades. Sometimes the greatest opportunities are found by leaving the familiar gate open and having the courage to explore what lies beyond it.

Drawing on his rural Wisconsin farm roots, more than 30 years of practice ownership, national veterinary leadership, and the evolution of Country Hills Pet Hospital into an innovative, award-winning, AAHA-accredited practice, Dr. Mark Thompson brings Blue Ocean thinking into the realities of veterinary medicine.

Leaving the Gate Open challenges veterinary leaders to move beyond competing within crowded markets and begin creating new value for clients, teams, patients, and communities. It connects operational efficiency with strategic imagination, showing that efficiency creates capacity, while innovation determines how that capacity can be used. Inside, you will learn how to:

• Challenge long-standing assumptions about how veterinary practices must operate.

• Recognize unmet needs among clients, employees, patients, and communities.

• Create new value instead of competing solely on price, convenience, or clinical services.

• Use the Eliminate-Reduce-Raise-Create framework to redesign services and workplace systems.

• Turn efficiency into opportunity by freeing people, time, and resources for innovation.

• Develop team-supported ideas that reflect your practice's strengths and purpose.

• Build thoughtful differentiation that is meaningful, sustainable, and difficult to imitate.

• Lead change with courage while preserving quality, compassion, and trust.

This is not a book about chasing every new idea or abandoning the principles that made a practice successful. It is about remaining open to better questions, overlooked possibilities, and new ways to serve. For practice owners, managers, veterinary professionals, and emerging leaders, Leaving the Gate Open offers both a strategic framework and a deeply personal leadership story. It is an invitation to stop asking how to succeed within the boundaries of today’s veterinary profession and begin imagining what veterinary medicine could become.