Vet Pay Scale (Was: Ride Management)

["guest@endurance.net" <guest@endurance.net>]

K S SWIGART katswig@earthlink.net


Steve Shaw said:

> First is what I want to call Vet Pay Scale: It is SO difficult to get
> vets for rides in the West that we should consider some innovative ways
> to encourage them to participate. I have more than a few ideas. Here is
> one of them...

> BTW Michele has been working for over a month contacting Vets to work
> the Fireworks Endurance Ride in Santa Cruz (she is not vetting it and we
> are not riding it, she just is trying to help management--Liz
> Maitoza....and Michele has yet to find a head vet or any others...)
> SOooo....

The last time I checked, there were no rules regarding what Ride Management
is allowed/required to offer vets in order to get them to come vet their
ride.  So, if ride managers in the west think that offering vets something
different will induce them to come, there is nothing to stop them from doing so.

So, the best way to test this out would be for Steve to talk with Michele and the 
Liz Maitoza to see if ride management is willing to give it a try, and if the vets 
that Michele has called (and how have, heretofore, turned her down) are willing to
accept this as compensation.  If they accept, then you know that it works (at least
for the vets that accept :)).

However, before deciding what to offer vets as compensation for vetting endurance 
rides, it would behoove ride management to figure out just WHY vets vet endurance
rides.  

My own experience is that many of the vets who vet endurance rides are doing it as a hobby.  

They vet endurance rides because that is one of the ways that they can participate in 
what they do as a hobby.  They do it because they think it is fun.  Most of them have to take
time out from their practice (and forego the income from their practice) to go camping
for the weekend.  This is, I realize, and oversimplification, but I mean to suggest that
few of the vets that I have seen at endurance rides are doing it for the money.  They are
getting some other form of compensation out of it.  So, if _I_ were trying to figure
out the best way to compensate vets for coming to endurance rides, I would try to figure
out WHY they were coming (understanding that they aren't doing it for the money, because
monitarily speaking they are better off staying at home and working).  So....I would be asking
myself what I could do to make an endurance ride a nice vacation for a ride vet?????

Don't get me wrong, one of the ways to make an endurance ride a nice vacation for a ride 
vet is to reduce the cost of the vacation...but there needs to be more than just that.  The
ride needs to be a nice vacation.

Unless, you want to give them enough money to compensate them for the loss of funds
that they are incurring just by being away from their practice.  If this is the case, 
then you need to pay them as much as they would be making if they were at home working.  

This would, of course, just contribute further to the trend I have noticed in the
"professionalization" of endurance riding.  If the trend continues, then it will be just 
another horse "sport" where all of the participants are there for business reasons:

Ride managers will expect to be paid a fair wage, ride vets will expect to be paid a fair
wage, and professional riders will expect to see some return out of all the money that 
they are paying for the entry.  This, of course, would leave the hobbyists out in the cold.

Currently, (mostly) the participants (riders, ride management, vets, "volunteers" etc.) at 
endurance rides are there because it is their idea of fun with the hope that we all can
keep the costs down for everybody who is participating (i.e. everybody can have fun without
it costing anybody too much money. 

So, if I were having trouble finding a vet for my ride, I would ask myself the question, 
"What can I do to make it more fun for the vets to come?"  rather than "How much am
I going to have to pay them to get them to come here and work?"

If the West region is having trouble finding vets to vet rides is it because these rides
aren't any fun for the vets, or is it because there are so many rides and not enough vets
who can spend that much time on their hobby?

If it is the first, then the solution is to figure out why vets aren't having fun.

If it is the second, then the solution is to try to recruit/train more vets and let them
learn that vetting and endurance ride is a nice vacation.

You are going to have to give them an awful lot of money (I would think) if you want to
get them to come and and just work--they can work at home.

kat
Orange County, Calif.

p.s.  I am not saying that vets should not be compensated for coming to vet endurance rides;
just suggesting that there ARE other forms of compensation besides money.  If you want
to compensate them with JUST money...it's gonna take lots of money.

Ride managers may be willing to lose a little money on hosting a party, ride vets are 
willing to lose a little money taking time out from their
practices, and riders are willing to lose a little money by taking time off and paying an
entry fee to help cover costs).  There is no reason to assume that the riders are the only
ones having any fun at endurance rides and therefore should be the ones to shoulder the
entire monetary burden.  If the riders are the only ones having any fun at an endurance
ride, then there is something wrong with that ride (so riders would do well to understand
that if they don't assist in making rides fun for the other people there, they are going
to have to start paying them a lot more to participate).