Meet Jeff Lermer, Pennard Vets independent EO trustee

Note: This article was first published in Pennard Pulse, Pennard Vets' internal magazine.

How I got involved with Pennard Vets

I was introduced to Caroline, Matt and Andy some time after they’d started the process of looking into the employee ownership model. 

I was instantly impressed by their attitude, very much because they regarded themselves as custodians of the practice for the next generation. 

It was a massively ethical stance and their morals were so strong to do what they decided was the right thing for the practice – I have massive respect for them for that, it was a tough old thing for them to do. 

So it was my privilege from there to help them through the process. It took quite a long time and it was rather complicated, simply because of the size of the practice.

The firm I represent, JLA, do specialise in setting up employee ownership trusts, so I could hold their hands through the process. 

My role as your third party trustee

Every EOT needs to have a third party trustee, and it’s a role I hold for a few different businesses – it’s always interesting!

There are real benefits to structuring in this way. 

My role isn’t to run the business. My role is to make sure that the right decisions are being made for the right reasons, and to look at things from the employees’ point of view. 

Some EOTs can come across situations where there are different ideas for what is right for the business coming from the former owners and the employee owners – the idea is that I sit from an impartial position, while giving information and guidance where I can using my experience. 

It works really well and I enjoy it. 

“The opportunity is there for you to represent a practice that you can completely buy into and influence.”

We meet quarterly to discuss how the practice is progressing and any challenges that may have arisen. 

It’s been lovely to be involved with the practice and I’ve visited each of our branches and been lucky enough to get a feel for how we operate, chatting with the team and getting to know the business. 

The practice has invested the time in me to make this work well. 

What the future holds

We’re going on a journey, and we’re still at the start of that journey. 

We’ve got a long way to go yet! It’s exciting to see the progress of the practice, like with the new hospital, which I hear is doing brilliantly well, and how we justifiably won the rising star award at the Employee Ownership Awards last year.

Employee owned businesses do really well when you have the right level of employee engagement. And we’re really focused on getting that right. 

That means we want everyone to feel involved and to know that they can have a say – and not just that, everyone’s say is listened to. There is a mechanism and a desire to make sure that everyone is listened to. 

So the opportunity is there for you to represent a practice that you can completely buy into and influence. If you have an idea to make the practice better, it’s in your best interest to share that. 

That warm engagement makes being an employee ownership trust wonderful.