What Questions Should I Ask A Dog Trainer?

The best questions to ask a dog trainer are about their education, how they explain behaviour, how they train, what you’ll learn, and how they adapt when dogs struggle. You’re not just hiring someone to teach your dog. You’re trusting someone with your relationship with your dog.

Finding the right dog trainer can feel overwhelming.

Type “dog trainer” into Google and you’ll quickly discover there are plenty of people offering to solve your problems.

Some focus on puppies.

Some focus on obedience.

Some specialise in behaviour.

Some promise quick fixes.

Some guarantee results.

Some sound incredibly convincing.

So how do you know who to trust?

Ask questions.

Not because you’re trying to catch the trainer out.

Because you’re trying to understand how they think.

To me, that’s far more important than memorising a list of commands your dog might learn.

You’re not buying a television.

You’re choosing someone who will influence how you communicate with another living creature for years to come.

That deserves a little homework.

When I started looking for help with my own dog, Alfie, I had no idea what questions I should be asking.

I knew I wanted someone to help.

I just didn’t know how to tell the difference between good marketing and good training.

Looking back now, there are questions I wish I’d asked much earlier.

Those are the questions I want to share with you.

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Quick Answer

If you’re short on time, these are the six questions I’d ask before hiring any dog trainer.

1. What qualifications do you have, and how do you continue your education?
2. Can you help me understand why my dog is behaving this way?
3. How do you train dogs?
4. What will I learn during the process?
5. What happens if my dog struggles?
6. What does success look like for a dog like mine?

If a trainer can answer those questions clearly, honestly and without relying on buzzwords or empty promises, you’re probably off to a good start.

Let’s look at why each one matters.

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Why Asking Questions Matters

Most people don’t start looking for a dog trainer because everything is going brilliantly.

Usually something has happened.

The puppy has discovered that ankles are delicious.

Your adolescent dog has suddenly developed selective hearing.

Your recall has disappeared.

Walks have become exhausting.

Your dog is barking at every other dog.

Visitors are greeted like they’ve entered a wrestling ring.

Or maybe your dog was attacked, had a frightening experience, or simply isn’t coping with the world the way you’d hoped.

By the time people contact me, they’re often frustrated.

Sometimes embarrassed.

Sometimes exhausted.

Occasionally they’re worried they’ve somehow failed their dog.

That makes it very easy to be drawn towards certainty.

If somebody confidently says:

“Don’t worry. I’ll fix your dog.”

it’s incredibly tempting to believe them.

I get it.

But confidence and competence aren’t the same thing.

Behaviour is complicated.

Dogs are individuals.

Good trainers know that.

The first thing I want to do isn’t tell you what’s wrong.

It’s ask questions.

Tell me about your dog.

When did this start?

What does it look like?

What have you tried?

When does it happen?

When doesn’t it happen?

Has anything changed recently?

How are they sleeping?

How are they eating?

What’s a typical day look like?

The answers matter.

If I diagnose your dog before I’ve learned anything meaningful about them, I’m making assumptions.

That’s not how I want to work.

I often tell people:

Train the dog in front of you.

Not the dog from the last lesson.

Not the dog from a textbook.

Not the dog your neighbour owns.

The one standing in front of you today.

Every dog arrives with a different learning history.

A different personality.

A different environment.

A different family.

A different emotional state.

The principles of learning stay remarkably consistent.

How we apply them shouldn’t.

That’s one of the reasons I don’t like trainers who have exactly the same solution for every dog.

It makes me wonder whether they’re seeing the dog or simply applying a recipe.

Dog training isn’t cooking.

You can’t just add two cups of “sit”, stir in a handful of “stay”, bake for twenty minutes and expect every Labrador, Border Collie, Cavoodle and Staffy to come out identical.

Life would certainly be easier.

It just isn’t how dogs work.

Good trainers should be curious.

They should be asking questions before giving answers.

They should be trying to understand before trying to change.

Because if we misunderstand the problem, there’s a good chance we’ll choose the wrong solution.

That’s true whether we’re talking about dogs, people, or almost anything else.

It’s one of the reasons I enjoy behaviour so much.

It’s rarely as simple as it first appears.

The barking isn’t always about barking.

The pulling isn’t always about pulling.

The reactivity isn’t always about the other dog.

The behaviour is information.

Our job is to understand what it’s telling us.

Once we understand that, we can start building a plan that actually makes sense.

That’s why the questions you ask before hiring a dog trainer matter.

You’re not just interviewing a trainer.

You’re discovering how they think.

And in my opinion, that’s far more important than finding someone who promises the fastest results.

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Question 1: What Qualifications And Education Do You Have?

This is always the first question I’d ask.

Not because qualifications tell you everything.

They don’t.

But they tell you something.

You’re trusting someone with your dog.

It’s perfectly reasonable to ask what education they’ve invested in.

What I wouldn’t do is stop at the word “certified.”

Not all certifications are created equal.

Some involve years of study.

Some involve practical assessments, case studies and mentoring.

Others can be completed in a day.

Both might allow someone to say they’re certified.

That doesn’t mean they represent the same depth of knowledge.

Instead of asking:

“Are you qualified?”

I’d ask questions like:

• What qualifications have you completed?
• What did they involve?
• How long did they take?
• How do you continue learning?
• Who do you learn from now?
• What have you studied recently?

That last question is one of my favourites.

I don’t think education has a finish line.

Dogs keep teaching us.

Behaviour science keeps evolving.

Our understanding of learning keeps improving.

If someone thinks they know everything, I’d be a little nervous.

The trainers I respect most are still students.

They’re attending seminars.

They’re reading books.

They’re taking courses.

They’re discussing cases with other trainers.

They’re comfortable saying:

“I hadn’t thought about it like that.”

That’s not weakness.

That’s professional growth.

Learning doesn’t happen in a vacuum.

Some of the biggest improvements I’ve made as a trainer haven’t come from sitting alone reading another book.

They’ve come from working alongside other trainers.

Watching how they solve problems.

Having my own thinking challenged.

Being willing to say:

“That’s a better idea than mine.”

Dogs don’t care whose idea it was.

They care whether it helps them learn.

Experience matters too.

I’d rather work with someone who’s handled hundreds of dogs than someone who’s only ever trained their own.

But experience isn’t the whole story either.

Twenty years of doing something doesn’t automatically mean twenty years of improving.

Sometimes it’s one year’s experience repeated twenty times.

The sweet spot is experience combined with curiosity.

A trainer who has seen plenty of dogs.

But still asks questions.

Still learns.

Still seeks feedback.

Still invests in becoming better.

That’s the sort of trainer I’d trust.

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How I’d Answer That Question

If you asked me about my own education, here’s what I’d tell you.

I completed the NDTF Certificate III in Dog Behaviour and Training in 2021.

That gave me a solid foundation in learning theory, behaviour and practical dog training.

But I never wanted that to be the end of my education.

Before, during and after the course, I spent countless weekends attending seminars and workshops, trying to learn from people who were better than me.

I also spent a significant amount of time with North Coast K9 Academy.

That experience gave me valuable hands-on exposure to a wide range of dogs and training scenarios, and helped bridge the gap between theory and practical application.

More recently, I’ve been working through the School of Canine Science courses.

At the time of writing, I’m partway through their three-year programme, and I’m constantly finding ideas that make me rethink how I approach behaviour and learning.

I hope that never stops.

I still read.

I still listen to podcasts.

I still attend seminars.

I still discuss cases with other trainers.

I still ask questions.

And I still change my mind when somebody presents better evidence.

I don’t see that as inconsistency.

I see it as growth.

Because my loyalty isn’t to my own opinions.

It’s to helping dogs and the people who love them.

If a better way of doing that comes along, I want to know about it.

That’s the trainer I’d want for my own dogs.

So it’s the trainer I try to be.

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Question 2: Can You Help Me Understand Why My Dog Is Behaving This Way?

This is my favourite question.

In fact, I wish more people asked it.

Most people contact a trainer because they want to stop something.

Stop the barking.

Stop the lunging.

Stop the pulling.

Stop the jumping.

Stop the growling.

Those are understandable goals.

But they’re only half the conversation.

The more interesting question is…

Why is the behaviour happening in the first place?

Because behaviour doesn’t happen randomly.

Dogs are always responding to something.

Sometimes it’s obvious.

Sometimes it takes a bit more detective work.

A dog barking at another dog could be frightened.

They could be frustrated.

They could desperately want to play.

They could be trying to create distance.

They could simply have rehearsed that behaviour so many times that it’s become their default response.

The behaviour looks the same.

The reasons behind it can be completely different.

And if we misunderstand the reason, there’s a good chance we’ll choose the wrong solution.

That’s why I spend far more time trying to understand behaviour than trying to label it.

“Reactive” isn’t a training plan.

“Stubborn” isn’t a training plan.

“Dominant” definitely isn’t a training plan.

Those words don’t tell me what the dog needs.

They simply describe what you’re seeing.

I want to know what’s underneath.

Because understanding reduces frustration.

When people understand why their dog is behaving the way they are, they stop taking it personally.

They become more patient.

They make better decisions.

And that’s usually where real progress begins.

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One of the biggest shifts I try to help people make is moving from asking:

“How do I stop this behaviour?”

to asking:

“Why is my dog choosing this behaviour?”

Those questions lead us down very different paths.

If we only focus on stopping behaviour, we risk treating the symptom instead of understanding the cause.

If we understand why the behaviour exists, we can often change it in a way that’s clearer, kinder and much more likely to last.

That’s why one of the first things I do with behavioural cases is start looking at the bigger picture.

I developed what I call the Layered Stress Model because behaviour doesn’t happen in isolation.

Imagine trying to teach a child maths after they’d slept three hours, skipped breakfast, argued with their best friend and been running around all morning.

Could you still teach them?

Probably.

Would it be where you’d start?

Probably not.

Dogs are no different.

Before we start changing behaviour, I want to understand what else might be influencing it.

• Are they healthy?
• Are they getting enough quality sleep?
• Is their diet appropriate?
• Are they receiving the right balance of exercise and enrichment?
• How stressful is their everyday environment?

None of those things replace training.

But they absolutely influence it.

If we ignore the foundations, we’re often making the job much harder than it needs to be.

That’s why I don’t see behaviour as something to simply “fix”.

I see it as information.

Dogs are constantly communicating with us.

Sometimes we just haven’t learned how to listen yet.

If your dog is struggling with barking, lunging, fear, frustration or other behavioural challenges, that’s exactly where my Reactivity Support service begins.

Not by asking how we stop the behaviour.

By asking why it’s happening in the first place.

Because once we understand the dog, the training plan usually becomes much clearer.

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Question 3: How Do You Train Dogs?

This sounds like a straightforward question.

It isn’t.

Because two trainers can answer it very differently.

Some will talk about obedience.

Some will talk about control.

Some will talk about leadership.

Some will talk about tools.

I’d rather hear them explain how dogs actually learn.

If I asked a trainer this question, I wouldn’t be looking for fancy terminology.

I’d be looking for clarity.

Can they explain their methods in plain English?

Can they explain why they use them?

Can they explain why they wouldn’t use something else?

Good training should make sense.

If I leave a session confused, there’s a good chance my dog is confused as well.

One of the biggest misconceptions I see is that dog training is about teaching behaviours.

I don’t actually think that’s the job.

Teaching behaviours is easy.

Teaching learning is much harder.

I’d much rather teach a dog and their guardian how to learn together than simply teach another sit.

Sits are great.

I use them.

Drops are useful.

Stays have their place.

But they’re only small pieces of a much bigger picture.

I often tell my classes:

I don’t really care how good your sit is if your dog can’t think when life gets interesting.

If your dog can sit beautifully in the kitchen but completely falls apart when another dog appears, we haven’t finished training.

We’ve just trained in one environment.

Dogs don’t automatically generalise the way people do.

Just because they understand something in the backyard doesn’t mean they understand it at the beach.

Or the café.

Or Bunnings.

Or the local markets.

That’s completely normal.

It isn’t the dog being stubborn.

It’s the dog being a dog.

That’s why one of my favourite sayings is:

If it doesn’t hold up outside, it isn’t training.

The real world is where behaviour matters.

Not the lounge room.

Not the training paddock.

The real world.

That’s where your dog has to make decisions.

That’s where distractions exist.

That’s where emotions change.

That’s where life happens.

Another phrase people who train with me hear repeatedly is:

Behaviours rehearsed are reinforced.

Dogs become good at whatever they practise.

If they spend months rehearsing pulling on lead, they’ll become very good at pulling on lead.

If they repeatedly practise ignoring their name, they’ll become very good at ignoring their name.

If they rehearse checking in with you, choosing calm behaviour and responding to clear communication, those behaviours become stronger too.

Training isn’t about waiting for good behaviour to magically appear.

It’s about creating opportunities to rehearse the behaviours we want.

That’s one of the reasons I enjoy teaching people just as much as teaching dogs.

The dog learns during our sessions.

The person continues teaching for the next ten years.

That’s where the real value is.

When people ask me how I train dogs, the honest answer is this:

I teach people how dogs learn.

The dogs usually take care of the rest.

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Question 4: What Will I Learn During Training?

This is probably the most overlooked question you can ask.

Most people think they’re enrolling their dog in training.

They’re not.

They’re enrolling themselves.

The dog learns too, of course.

But if all I’ve done is teach your dog to respond to me, I haven’t really done my job.

One day our training will finish.

You’ll still have your dog.

You’ll still go for walks.

You’ll still have visitors.

You’ll still need a recall at the beach.

You’ll still have adolescence.

You’ll still have distractions.

You’ll still have real life.

So my goal has never been to create a dog that works beautifully for me.

My goal is to help you become the sort of person your dog understands.

That’s a much more valuable skill.

I often joke that I don’t actually teach dogs.

I teach people.

The dogs are just the excuse.

There’s a surprising amount of truth in that.

When people understand how dogs learn, everything starts making more sense.

Instead of wondering:

“Why won’t they listen?”

they begin asking:

“Have I actually taught this clearly?”

Instead of blaming the dog, they start evaluating the training plan.

That’s a huge shift.

It’s also where confidence comes from.

I don’t want people leaving my sessions dependent on me.

I want them leaving confident they can continue teaching their dog long after I’m gone.

That’s why I spend so much time explaining the “why” behind everything we do.

If I ask you to throw a treat behind your dog…

I want you to understand why.

If I ask you to reward beside your leg…

I want you to understand why.

If I ask you to wait before progressing…

I want you to understand why.

Because once you understand the principles, you stop memorising exercises.

You start solving problems.

People often expect dog training to be about teaching:

• Sit.
• Drop.
• Stay.
• Come.

Those behaviours are useful.

But they’re not what excites me.

I’m much more interested in teaching:

• How reinforcement changes behaviour.
• Why timing matters.
• How marker words create clarity.
• Why reward placement changes future behaviour.
• How to build engagement.
• How to work around distractions.
• How to recognise when your dog is struggling.
• How to change your training plan before frustration builds.

Those skills don’t just help with one exercise.

They help with every behaviour your dog will ever learn.

That’s one of the reasons Week One of my Life Skills Group Program is completely dog-free.

People are often surprised by that.

They expect to arrive with their dog.

Instead, we spend ninety minutes talking about learning.

Why?

Because before I ask dogs to learn, I want the humans to understand how dogs learn.

Once that foundation is in place, everything else becomes easier.

The dogs don’t know it’s Week One.

But the people leave with a completely different way of looking at behaviour.

That’s far more valuable than teaching another sit.

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Question 5: What Happens If My Dog Struggles?

I love this question.

Because every dog struggles.

Every single one.

Including mine.

If a trainer tells you their dogs never struggle, I’d be sceptical.

Learning is messy.

Progress is messy.

Dogs don’t improve in a perfectly straight line.

One week they’ll look brilliant.

The next they’ll convince you they’ve never heard their own name before.

Welcome to dog training.

Dogs don’t read calendars.

Good days happen.

Bad days happen.

Sometimes the environment is simply harder than yesterday.

Sometimes the dog is carrying more stress.

Sometimes we’ve progressed too quickly.

Sometimes we’ve asked for more than the dog currently understands.

That doesn’t make the dog stubborn.

It makes them honest.

If my dog struggles, I don’t immediately think:

“How do I stop this?”

I think:

“What is my dog trying to tell me?”

Behaviour is feedback.

That’s one of the most useful ideas I’ve ever learned.

If something isn’t working, I become curious.

Does the dog actually understand the behaviour?

Has it been trained in this environment?

Is the reinforcement valuable enough?

Are we too close to the distraction?

Is the dog tired?

Hungry?

Frustrated?

Over-aroused?

Carrying stress from something completely unrelated?

Every answer changes the plan.

That’s why I don’t believe in rigid programmes where every dog progresses at exactly the same speed.

Dogs don’t learn at exactly the same speed.

People don’t either.

If something isn’t working, I don’t keep repeating it hoping it’ll magically improve.

Hope is not a training plan.

We make the exercise easier.

We increase success.

We change the environment.

We improve the communication.

We adjust the criteria.

Then we try again.

That’s what good coaching looks like.

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Question 6: What Does Success Look Like?

This is another question I wish people asked more often.

Because success isn’t the same for every dog.

If somebody comes to me with a young Labrador that pulls on lead, success might be enjoyable walks together.

If somebody comes with a Border Collie that never switches off, success might be learning how to relax.

If somebody comes with a reactive dog, success might simply be noticing another dog, taking a breath and recovering.

For another dog, success might be confidently walking into a new environment for the first time.

Success isn’t measured by how many tricks your dog knows.

I don’t measure success in ribbons.

I measure it in quality of life.

Can your dog enjoy the world more?

Can you enjoy your dog more?

Do you understand each other better?

Can you communicate more clearly?

Has life become easier for both ends of the lead?

If the answer is yes, then I think we’re winning.

Helping dogs and their people thrive in the real world has always been a much more exciting goal to me than producing perfect obedience.

Because perfect obedience isn’t what most families actually need.

They need confidence.

Communication.

Understanding.

And practical skills that still work when life gets messy.

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Red Flags I’d Watch Out For

Every trainer is different.

That’s a good thing.

If every trainer thought the same way, dog training wouldn’t continue improving.

But there are a few things that would make me pause before handing over my lead.

The first is guarantees.

If somebody promises they’ll fix your dog, I’d ask exactly what they mean by “fix”.

Dogs aren’t machines.

They’re living, learning individuals.

Behaviour is influenced by genetics, health, environment, learning history, stress, emotions, consistency, management and the people around them.

No trainer can honestly control every one of those variables.

Can we usually make significant improvements?

Absolutely.

Can anyone honestly guarantee exactly how every dog will respond?

I don’t believe so.

Another red flag for me is anyone selling complex behaviour change as a single-session solution.

Can one session be incredibly valuable?

Of course.

Sometimes one conversation completely changes how someone understands their dog.

Sometimes a small change in timing transforms an exercise.

Sometimes a management strategy immediately improves quality of life.

But genuine behaviour change usually takes practice.

Dogs learn through repetition.

People do too.

If behaviour has been rehearsed for six months, twelve months or five years, I think it’s unrealistic to expect a one-hour appointment to permanently rewrite that learning.

That’s not pessimism.

It’s simply respecting how learning works.

I’d also be cautious of trainers who can’t explain why they’re asking you to do something.

If the answer is:

“Because that’s how I’ve always done it.”

I’d want more.

I don’t expect everyone to quote research papers.

I certainly don’t.

But I do expect a trainer to explain their reasoning.

You deserve to understand what you’re doing and why.

I’d also be wary of anyone who immediately starts talking about being the alpha, dominating your dog or showing them who’s boss.

Behaviour is usually far more interesting than that.

Most of the dogs I work with aren’t trying to take over the household.

They’re confused.

Overwhelmed.

Excited.

Frustrated.

Scared.

Or they’ve simply become very good at rehearsing behaviours that work.

That’s a much more useful place to begin.

Finally, I’d be cautious of anyone who seems to have exactly the same solution for every dog.

Every Labrador doesn’t need the same plan.

Every Border Collie doesn’t need the same plan.

Every Cavoodle doesn’t need the same plan.

Breed matters.

Learning history matters.

Environment matters.

The individual dog matters most.

That’s why I keep coming back to the same phrase.

Train the dog in front of you.

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Questions I Hope People Ask Me

After everything we’ve talked about, there are a few questions I genuinely love hearing.

Not because they help me sell training.

Because they tell me the person is already thinking in a way that helps their dog.

Instead of asking:

“How do I stop this?”

they’re asking:

“Help me understand.”

That simple shift changes everything.

Some of my favourite questions are:

• Can you help me understand why they’re doing this?
• How can I help my dog feel more confident?
• What will I learn during this process?
• How will I know we’re making progress?
• What should success realistically look like?
• What can I do between sessions to help my dog?

Those questions tell me we’re already moving away from chasing quick fixes.

We’re starting to think about understanding.

Understanding reduces frustration.

When you understand why your dog is barking, you stop assuming they’re being naughty.

When you understand why your dog is pulling, you stop thinking they’re trying to annoy you.

When you understand why your dog is reacting, you stop seeing the behaviour as a personal challenge.

You start seeing information.

That changes the conversation completely.

And once the conversation changes, the training usually changes too.

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How I’d Answer Those Questions

Everything we’ve talked about so far has been about the questions I’d encourage you to ask any trainer.

I think it’s only fair that I answer them myself.

If we were sitting down over a coffee before working together, this is what I’d tell you.

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“What qualifications do you have?”

I completed the NDTF Certificate III in Dog Behaviour and Training in 2021.

Before, during and after that qualification, I spent a significant amount of time learning with North Coast K9 Academy.

That hands-on experience exposed me to a wide variety of dogs, training styles and practical problem-solving that you simply can’t get from reading a textbook.

More recently I’ve been studying through the School of Canine Science.

At the time of writing, I’m still working through their three-year programme.

I also spend a ridiculous number of weekends at seminars.

I read.

I listen to podcasts.

I attend workshops.

I discuss cases with other trainers.

And I genuinely enjoy having my thinking challenged.

I don’t think education ever finishes.

If anything, the more I learn, the more I realise there is still to learn.

I hope I never lose that curiosity.

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“How do you train dogs?”

I use reinforcement-based training.

But that’s only part of the answer.

People often hear “positive reinforcement” and immediately think “treats.”

Treats are important.

They’re also one tiny part of a much bigger picture.

My job isn’t simply to reward dogs.

My job is to create clear communication.

I want dogs to understand what earned reinforcement.

I want handlers to understand why.

I want everyone speaking the same language.

That’s why I’m so pedantic about marker timing.

People sometimes laugh about how picky I am.

They’re not wrong.

But timing changes learning.

Small differences matter.

Clarity matters.

Because confused dogs don’t become confident dogs.

Clear communication creates confident learners.

And confident learners make faster progress.

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I also don’t believe every dog should be trained exactly the same way.

The principles of learning are remarkably consistent.

Dogs learn through consequences.

They learn through repetition.

They learn through reinforcement.

They learn through experience.

How we apply those principles should change depending on the dog standing in front of us.

A fearful rescue dog doesn’t need the same approach as an over-excited adolescent Labrador.

A frustrated Border Collie isn’t the same as a nervous Cavoodle.

That’s why you’ll hear me say:

Train the dog in front of you.

Not the breed.

Not the diagnosis.

Not the dog from YouTube.

The individual dog in front of you today.

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“Can you explain why my dog is behaving this way?”

I’ll certainly try.

In fact, that’s one of the first things I want to understand.

I don’t see much value in jumping straight to solutions before we’ve understood the problem.

Behaviour isn’t random.

Dogs are always responding to something.

Sometimes it’s obvious.

Sometimes it isn’t.

I want to understand:

• What happened before the behaviour?
• What happened afterwards?
• What does the dog gain from it?
• What emotions might be involved?
• How much stress is the dog carrying?
• What has the dog been rehearsing?
• What has their environment been teaching them?

That’s why I developed the Layered Stress Model.

Behaviour doesn’t happen in isolation.

Health matters.

Sleep matters.

Diet matters.

Exercise matters.

Enrichment matters.

The environment matters.

Imagine trying to teach a child maths after they’d slept three hours, skipped breakfast and just had an argument with their best friend.

Could you still teach them?

Probably.

Would it be where you’d start?

Probably not.

Dogs are no different.

If we ignore everything else that’s influencing behaviour, we’re often making training much harder than it needs to be.

That’s why I don’t see barking as the problem.

Or lunging.

Or growling.

They’re behaviours.

The interesting question is what’s underneath them.

Because once we understand that, we can build a plan that actually makes sense.

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“What will I learn?”

Hopefully…

How to train your dog.

Not how to copy me.

Not how to become dependent on me.

How to understand your own dog.

I don’t want you leaving with a folder full of homework that sits on the kitchen bench until next Christmas.

I want you leaving with principles.

Because principles transfer.

If you understand reinforcement, you’ll create more of the behaviours you like.

If you understand timing, you’ll become clearer.

If you understand engagement, you’ll become more relevant than the environment.

If you understand criteria, you’ll stop accidentally making training too difficult.

If you understand how dogs learn, you’ll be able to teach almost anything.

That’s why my goal isn’t to create dogs that perform beautifully for me.

My goal is to leave you with the confidence to continue training long after I’ve gone home.

One day our sessions will finish.

You’ll still have your dog.

I want you to feel excited about that, not nervous.

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“What happens if my dog struggles?”

Then we listen.

Struggling is information.

It tells us something needs changing.

Maybe we’ve progressed too quickly.

Maybe the environment is too difficult.

Maybe the reinforcement isn’t valuable enough.

Maybe the dog is tired.

Maybe they’re worried.

Maybe my plan needs improving.

I don’t expect dogs to get everything right the first time.

I don’t expect people to either.

Learning is messy.

Dogs don’t read calendars.

There will be great sessions.

There will be frustrating sessions.

There will be days where your dog behaves as though you’ve never met before.

That’s normal.

Hope is not a training plan.

If something isn’t working, we don’t just repeat it louder.

We change something.

We adjust the criteria.

We change the environment.

We improve our communication.

We increase the chances of success.

That’s coaching.

That’s training.

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“What does success look like?”

Success looks different for every dog.

That’s one of the reasons I love this job.

For one family, success is finally enjoying a walk together.

For another, it’s a dog that can settle while they have a coffee.

For another, it’s being able to walk past another dog without an explosion.

For another, it’s simply watching their dog feel safe enough to explore the world with confidence.

I don’t measure success by how many tricks your dog knows.

I measure it by quality of life.

Can your dog cope better?

Can they recover faster?

Can they make better choices?

Can you communicate more clearly?

Can you enjoy each other more?

If the answer is yes, then I think we’re heading in the right direction.

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Why I Became A Dog Trainer

People often assume I’ve always wanted to work with dogs.

I didn’t.

I simply wanted to help my own.

My dog, Alfie, was attacked by two off-leash dogs.

Like many people, I assumed the wounds would heal and life would go back to normal.

It didn’t.

The physical injuries healed.

The emotional ones stayed.

Watching him struggle was heartbreaking.

I felt lost.

I read everything I could find.

I watched videos.

I searched forums.

I tried to piece together a plan from dozens of conflicting opinions.

Eventually, I found an incredible trainer.

She didn’t just change Alfie’s life.

She changed mine.

For the first time, somebody explained behaviour in a way that made sense.

She helped me understand what Alfie was feeling.

She gave me hope.

More importantly, she gave me a plan.

That experience sent me down a rabbit hole that I’m still happily falling down today.

I became fascinated by learning.

Behaviour.

Emotions.

Communication.

Why dogs do what they do.

And how we can help them navigate our world a little more successfully.

That’s why The Operant Dog exists.

Not because I wanted to teach dogs to sit.

Because I wanted to help people understand the dogs they love.

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Final Thoughts

If you remember one thing from this article, let it be this.

Don’t choose the trainer who promises the quickest fix.

Choose the trainer who helps you understand your dog.

Because one day your training sessions will end.

You’ll still have your dog.

The best trainer isn’t the one who creates a dog that listens to them.

It’s the one who leaves you with the knowledge and confidence to keep helping your own dog for the rest of their life.

You’re not just investing in obedience.

You’re investing in a relationship.

I think that’s worth asking good questions for.

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Related Reading

• Life Skills Group Program
• Reactivity Support
• Should I Hire a Dog Trainer or Train My Dog Myself?
• What Is the 3-3-3 Rule for Rescue Dogs?
• What Is the 7-7-7 Rule for Rescue Dogs?
• About The Operant Dog

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Frequently Asked Questions

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