Career Center

Best Friends recently received a 2022 Top Workplaces USA award from Energage. Visit the Best Friends Animal Society page on the Energage Top Workplaces award winners’ site here to learn more. Not only do we take pride in cultivating a welcoming and supportive community and culture for our employees, but we also offer competitive benefits that make it easy to see why we were granted such an awesome award! Take a look for yourself! We offer competitive pay, medical, dental, vision, basic and supplemental life insurance, short and long-term disability, dependent care reimbursement, pet sitting reimbursement when traveling for work, flexible spending account, health savings account, generous paid time off, paid holidays, auto insurance discount, and legal and identity theft coverage. ?For added well-being support, we offer Pawternity Leave for employees to have time to care for their personal pets, mental health support, and an employee assistance program. We also offer a generous 401k savings plan. Do you want to love where you work? Look no further and apply online today!

Location: Kanab, Utah (relocation assistance available)

Hiring Range: This position's pay range is anticipated to be $120,000 to $165,000 annually, depending on experience. 

Are you looking to expand your professional journey? Do you thrive in having days that are never the same, with unique cases you get to see through to successful treatment and recovery? Is saving animal lives your passion, but upselling in private practice dampens your spirit? Take your compassion and excitement for healing to the next level  when you join the Best Friends team. You'd be working from the heart of our organization, the largest no-kill sanctuary for companion animals in the country! Come live among the beautiful red rock canyons and put your veterinary experience to work for up to 1,600 dogs, cats, bunnies, birds, horses, and other barnyard animals at our Sanctuary. As a Best Friends veterinarian, you'll be part of a professional medical team that performs lifesaving work, providing Best Friends animals, low-income client pets, and other select clients top-of-the-line medical care.

While staff veterinarians work as a team to provide for all veterinary needs across departments, there are multiple areas within which you can grow or apply your passions in the role. We’re seeking veterinarians who have professional interests that include:

• Shelter medicine – Dogtown and Cat World help save animals from under-resourced shelters across the region and the country. They provide care and treatment with the goal of finding a loving, adoptive home as efficiently as possible.
• Exotics – From Parrot Garden and Bunny House to Wild Friends with a full wildlife rehabilitation and education program, the Sanctuary cares for an incredible variety of species for adoption, release to the wild, or lifetime care when needed. 
• Large animals – Horse Haven is home to horses, but also goats, pigs, and the occasional donkey. With a new, state-of-the-art headquarters and veterinary clinic, Horse Haven is a world-class equine medicine experience. 
• High-volume, high-quality, spay and neuter surgeries – spay and neuter surgeries are critical in our work to Save Them All.
• Urgent care and general practice – Best Friends veterinary team responds to the routine and urgent needs of the animals in our care and others within the clinic facility, ensuring animals receive the care they need in this beautiful rural community. 

Our medical facilities include a 13,000-square-foot clinic facility with dedicated surgery and dental suites, state-of-the-art laboratory, x-ray suite, ultrasound room, and many more features to provide animals with all they need. And satellite clinics located within each sanctuary department allow you to spend your days working closely with the animal care teams and thousands of animals who pass through the Sanctuary on their way to a loving adopted home, with resources and technical support readily at hand. 

In addition, Kanab is in beautiful southern Utah – an outdoor enthusiast's paradise. We are surrounded by world-renowned parks and nature sites such as the North Rim of the Grand Canyon, Zion National Park, Bryce Canyon National Park, Antelope Canyon, Lake Powell, Horseshoe Bend, Coral Pink Sand Dunes, and many more. If you are looking for a spectacular work-life balance and want to live in the outdoor playground of southern Utah, contact us today!

You can check out the sanctuary in this short video, or better yet, visit us and see for yourself!

Summary: Best Friends staff veterinarians provide high quality veterinary care for Best Friends Animal Society program animals. This includes pets in our care as well as high-quality, high-volume spay and neuter surgeries and other surgeries and care for Best Friends public and partner lifesaving activities. 

Culture Statement: We value attitude over aptitude, and we treat Kindness as a discipline because it is paramount in our culture along with our other Guiding Principles. Culture is how we talk to and treat ourselves and one another, it’s how we generate and respond to change, it’s how we plan and make decisions, it’s how we do what we do. 

Essential Duties/Responsibilities: 

• Demonstrate kindness and the Golden Rule in our everyday actions by practicing inclusion and respect for every person for the value they bring to the table. Be a role model for the spirit of authenticity, kindness and positive influence with each other, our visitors, and volunteers as well as to the animals every day. This includes listening, being present, being supportive of others and demonstrating compassion and curiosity in conflict. 
• Responsible for the examination, diagnosis, and treatment of program animals; uphold medical standards of care; perform a variety of procedures as needed including high-volume spay and neuter; maintain knowledge of shelter medicine including common infectious diseases and conditions and their treatment; conduct diagnostic procedures.
• Support on call and emergency response; ensure a safe and effective clinic environment, educate, mentor, and coach veterinary students, technicians, assistants, and volunteers; communicate with shelters, outside veterinarians, and clinics regarding cases including referrals or post-adoption support. 
• Promote continuing development of medical care through continued education; keep abreast of veterinary concerns and trends in animal welfare; and uphold the highest standards of professionalism.
• Lead by example in delivering superior customer service in our operations, where we relate to all visitors, adopters, fosters, and others in a friendly, informational, and professional manner. 
• Work collaboratively with and assist Best Friends’ team members in all areas of operations to develop, evolve, and implement efficient processes to achieve lifesaving goals; follow policies, procedures, and task lists, including accurate and timely communications, work completion, data entry, and recordkeeping. 
• Maintain a safe workplace, value, and model safe work practices, adhering to organizational safety practices and rules, and addressing or communicating to leadership about unsafe practices and conditions.

Skills and Experience:

• Doctorate of Veterinary Medicine (DVM, VMD), work experience preferred but new graduates considered.
• Licensed in good standing with state veterinary board, license or application for license with Drug Enforcement Agency.
• Bilingual or multi-lingual skills preferred but not required. 
• Customer-centric, non-judgmental approach to engaging with adopters, partners, visitors, volunteers, and colleagues; familiarity and comfort with a conversational adoption process. 
• Ability to work with, leash, kennel, walk, and handle cats, dogs and other species, including those with health and/or behavior conditions/concerns; basic ability to identify and speak to medical and behavioral characteristics of dogs, cats and a variety of other species. Equine experience preferred but not required. 
• Strong interpersonal skills, a team player, personable, professional, and able to get along with people from different backgrounds, as well as the ability to handle sensitive and confidential situations.   
• Ability to work in a fast-paced environment with well-developed organization skills to juggle multiple competing tasks and demands.  
• Resourceful, get-it-done attitude; initiative to assist in any area or process; problem solving, seeking answers independently and enthusiastically; flexibility to persist until goals are achieved. 
• Proficiency with Microsoft Office products; familiarity with shelter software/animal management software, or desire to learn. 

Physical Requirements:

• Must be able to:  
  1. Routinely lift 40 pounds and perform daily strenuous activity including, but not limited to lifting, carrying, reaching, stooping, squatting, cleaning, and bending.  
  2. Perform repetitive tasks for extended periods of time including typing, sitting, walking, arm, and hand motion.    
  3. Work indoors and outdoors in a variety of weather conditions including extreme heat and cold.  
• Exposure to dogs, cats and other animals of all sizes, temperaments, and medical status.   
• Valid driver’s license, meeting Best Friends Animal Society’s driver qualification standards; ability to travel, including overnight stays, when needed.   
• Daily hours and days of the week may vary according to the needs of the department schedule; position includes weekends, nights, and holiday work.

Thank you for your interest in pursuing a career at Best Friends Animal Society.  Best Friends Animal Society is an equal opportunity employer. All qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to their race, color, religion, ancestry, national origin, sex, sexual orientation, age, disability, marital status, or domestic partner status.

Applicants for employment in the US must have valid work authorization that does not now and/or will not in the future require sponsorship of a visa for employment authorization in the US by Best Friends Animal Society.

About Best Friends Animal Society

We started with little fanfare and even fewer resources: creating a sanctuary for homeless and special-needs animals literally from the ground up, forging roadways and erecting buildings with our bare hands. We were creating a better world through kindness to animals. Today, the Sanctuary remains our anchor, and as we’ve grown, our national network partners and pet lifesaving centers have become hubs for innovation and inspiration. We’re bringing tangible lifesaving tactics to shelters and rescue groups across the U.S, touching every community in the country. Working together, we’re building on this foundation of compassion and inclusion to help both pets and people. We’re making sure that everyone has the same access to loving pets and that every adoptable pet has access to the comfort of a foster home instead of a kennel in a shelter. We have opportunities available across the country for people who want to make a difference for both pets and people. Whether your passion is accounting, technology, animal care or making a difference for people, whether you have loads of professional experience or you've simply been volunteering for a few years, there's a career here for you.

Connections working at Best Friends Animal Society