We are passionate about education and helping owners have healthy relationships with their dogs!  Often it is just lack of understanding or being completely overwhelmed by mixed information that causes owners to struggle with their dogs, which then means their dogs aren’t as balanced.

This is why we provide plenty of free information, training tips and live Q&A sessions on our social media pages!

Our goal at Dogs By Design is to not only teach and train dogs, but also to educate and empower their owners! Dog training professionals can change dog behaviour quickly, but what really matters is teaching the owner and getting positive changes in their behaviour to bring out the best in their dog!

Our philosophy is to educate owners about their dog’s behaviour and teach them how to communicate in a way their dog can understand. The aim is to have calm and relaxed members of the family who look to their owners for guidance, protection and stability in the pack (that is ultimately the pack leaders role). I like to teach people how to live with and embrace their dog as a dog and to communicate and build a relationship with that in mind. We take this holistic approach and don’t just work on a specific issue because most behavioural issues are just a symptom of a root cause. We address the root cause, rather than putting a band-aid on the symptom.

Your dog is a social animal. All social/communal animals have some form of social structure: elephants, chickens, great apes, hyenas, rats. In more complex structures there are leaders. Their role is to keep the group safe and ensure their survival.

The word leadership or pack leader can instill a little uncertainty, but it shouldn’t. We are definitely not talking about the leadership of the manager that everyone tip-toes around, the one that is constantly micro-managing or the one who is trying to prove they are “the boss”!  We are talking about that person people naturally gravitate towards and respect, not because they scare you into it but because they have a quiet confidence, but are also devoted to meeting the needs of their team.

Your dog needs you to be a good leader – your responsibility is to provide stability, direction and protection to your dog, in a way that makes them trust and want to follow you.  Many of their natural behaviours are not appropriate when living in a human world and they need you to show them what is and isn’t acceptable.   Lead by example, calmly and confidently.

The dog training industry likes labels, so we are what would be classified as a balanced trainer. This means we use both rewards, guidance and discipline in our training. We believe it is far clearer and kinder to tell our dogs when they have done the right thing AND the wrong thing. By giving them all the information, they can make better decisions around how to behave.

We work with the owner and dog in front of us. Often, the majority of changes need to be made by the owner so their dog can feel like they are part of a safe and stable pack. While we do teach training techniques, our focus is on creating a healthier relationship between you and your dog. We will work on your energy, body language and state of mind, which in turn impacts your dog’s behaviour.  As well as this, we will teach you how to fulfil your dogs needs with proper exercise, structure, rules, boundaries and limitations.

Because our ultimate goal is to help owners and dogs have a fulfilling life together, our ultimate goal is to create a calm, confident and empowered owner.  Because no two people are the same we use a wide variety of training techniques & tools to be able to help owners get to that point!

If you would like to get a better feel for what we do, tune into our Facebook live Q&A sessions every Monday at 7.00pm. We are more than happy to answer any questions about our training philosophies. You will find it will give you a better idea for who we are too!