The Colorful CE Story

Colorful CE is a sister company of Colourful CPD in the UK, which was set up by Brian Faulkner FRCVS in 2017.

Brian’s training career began when he gave (what became to be known as) his first Colourful Consultation talk on the spot as a last-minute substitute during a CPD (CE) event in 2011, when the scheduled speaker was stuck in traffic and unable to attend. This talk led to further talks and so it all began. At the time, Brian was running his own veterinary practice and working as a first opinion veterinarian. He had also just finished his Masters in Applied Positive Psychology.

Brian’s Masters’ dissertation studied the psychology behind how various stakeholders related to and within veterinary practice define “A good vet?” as well as “What criteria are they are using when making this evaluation?’. In short, when all of the data collected from interviews with all of the various stakeholders was distilled, it was apparent that in order to satisfy all of their various wants and needs, veterinarians, and by implication, the entire veterinary practice, need to know how to achieve four outcomes; clinical resolution, client satisfaction, financial resolution and colleague satisfaction. In other words, clinical skills alone are necessary but not sufficient to be ‘a good vet’.

Brian adapted these findings into a model of communication that combined the purposeful pursuit of his 4 ‘colourful outcomes’ with the psychology and the behaviours needed to achieve them during veterinary consultations. This model became known as The Colourful Consultation. In fact, the model was named by a practice manager who quipped that Brian’s talk which was entitled The Veterinary Consultation was too boring and she introduced it as The Colourful Consultation. Despite Brian’s efforts to shake it, the name stuck as people referred to him as ‘That Colourful Consultation’ guy! In 2016, Brian recorded his talks as webinars, which have now been watched in over 25 countries around the world. Some have even been translated into Spanish, Brazilian-Portuguese, Italian and Russian.

In 2015, whilst delivering his Colourful Consultation talk at a practice, one of the vets asked Brian whether he would ‘say a few words to the reception team’ to help strengthen the connection between the consulting vets and the front of house reception staff. Sticking with a theme, Brian called the talk The Colourful Receptionist. The Colourful Receptionist became the seed that evolved into the Accredited Veterinary Receptionist Award, which was launched in the UK in 2017 and is now the CertCSR delivered by Colorful CE today.

In due course Brian started receiving calls from abroad – Australia, USA, and Canada – all asking how the Accredited Veterinary Receptionist Award could be exported abroad. One such interested party was Christine Weaver, a specialist Vet Tech in Maryland. Brian and Christine set up Colorful CE in the USA and developed the CertCSR.

Colorful CE will evolve to deliver the range of courses catering to other roles in veterinary practice (such as communication skills for veterinarians, techs, as well as management courses) that its sister company Colourful CPD.com does in the UK and all around the world.