I ran across an article – Why Smart Bosses Treat Their Employees Like Dogs – comparing dog obedience training to the way that business owners should treat their employees and I found it very intriguing. I spend considerable time training my German Shepherds and they are too big not to have manners! I hadn’t thought about it before but there are many valuable lessons that can be learned from dog training. Here are a few of them:

• Be consistent – teach and ask things to be done the same way every time, inconsistency is confusing
• Always reward good behavior – by figuring out what motivates each individual
• Love matters – gifts and rewards can be intangible, in some cases they are more effective
• Practice makes perfect – learning new behaviors and/or skills may take several practice runs
• We learn by doing – people just like dogs often times learn best by doing, not just being told or shown how
• Keep a positive attitude – bad attitudes and moods are distracting as well as uninspiring to dogs and people
• Sometimes you have to get tough – failing to confront the situation does not do any favors, it may even end up costing more in the long run or create a bigger problem to deal with
• Correct mistakes immediately – rewarding for the wrong behavior only encourages and reinforces it turning it into a habit
• Get professional help – when all else fails, call in a professional to help