Engagement – Becoming the Centre of Your Dog’s World

Hello, dog peeps. Jack here. Just a quick one before we get into this episode. You may or may not be aware that when I'm not talking dog stuff with Max, I in fact interview people who are incarcerated in prisons across the United States on a show called One Minute Remaining: Stories from the Inmates. And that show has been nominated for an award in America. And I would love your support if you've got 60 seconds to click the link in the show notes of this episode and just vote for my show. That would be amazing if you could. Thank you very much indeed. Oh, and don't forget to verify your email address. Otherwise, the vote does not count. Thank you.

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It's the Dog People Podcast with your host Jack Lawrence. Once the kids have gone to bed, I have to say to Becky, I have to say, I've got to get— we've got to go out. She jokes that I take the dog out more than I take her out.

You know, Malinois seem to be like the dog at the moment. Like, I think people see them on Instagram doing these incredible things. Yeah. Go, oh my God, that's awesome. And then they get one like, oh my God, what the fuck have I done? And Max O'Neill.

You would not believe how many people I meet and I go, what made you want to get, say, an Aussie Shepherd? They go, I don't know. I go, had you met one before? They go, no. If you want to ask me how often I walk my own dog a week, it's only twice a week.

It's the Dog People Podcast, podcast giving you a no-nonsense approach The approach to dog training so you never have to yell, it's okay, he's friendly. My name is Jack Lawrence, not a dog trainer at all, just a dog training enthusiast. But Max O'Neill, Dan O'Donnell Dog Trainers, is here to answer all our questions and give us some straightforward advice. And we are on our topic of the 5 sort of, I keep messing it up. There's doing, we're doing 5 things that are important with dogs. You know, that's, that's—

5 essential things for your puppy.

There you go. 5 essential things for your puppy. And engagement is number 5.

So in no particular order, for a lot of people, they consider engagement number 1 and they wouldn't be wrong. But yeah, topic number 5 is engagement. So same as always, we're going to talk about what it is, why it's important, and how to do it. Because again, engagement can be one of these buzzwords. And I quite often say with clients, oh, we're, you know, we've been looking a lot of online stuff and really trying to work on engagement, but we don't actually know what it really is and we don't really know how to teach it. So we're going to give you just a nice little bite-sized podcast today that really dives into engagement, hopefully gives you some helpful examples. And some things to take away that you can actually start to use. Yeah,

I think, I think the best way to know if you've got good engagement with your dog or not is to go into a new environment, get them out the car and see what they pay attention to. Is it you or is it everything else that is around you? The other day I saw someone with the dog. They came to where the dogs are and all this stuff. They took him off the lead and the dog just went woof and it was gone. And it was just gone. And it was just like, and then he just started walking around where we were with it facing the phone. And the dog was just doing its own thing. He was doing his thing.

And that's a great point to start off with is engagement first and foremost is an attitude. So, when people typically think of engagement, they might think of it as like a focus sort of thing, but focus is really a behaviour. So, if you, you know, for example, Nelson's got a cue where we tell him focus and he has to lock eyes with us and hold that until we tell him, you know, free or you're done or whatever. And that's a behaviour, whereas engagement's an attitude. He doesn't have to look at me and stare me in the eye the entire time, although it's quite often what he does. But it's more his attitude of, I am dialled into you, I'm connected to you. And I guess a lot of people lately from the Mustard Dogs TV show refer to this as a Bluetooth connection, which is also a really great description of it as well. But it's having your dog just dialled into you. And in the same way that we can tell if we're chatting to another person, whether they're engaged in the conversation or not, it's the same with that dog. We can tell whether they're engaged with us and they're connected or not. So that's what it is. Engagement's just an attitude of whether or not your dog is dialled in. In terms of why it's important, you need this, whether you just have a pet dog, whether you've got a working dog, but engagement is so important because if your dog's not engaged with you, they're likely doing something else. Like Jack said in an earlier episode, he had a lady whose dog was completely disengaged from her running up to him, and she had to do the old famous line, it's okay, he's friendly, and all that sort of stuff. Yeah. Or that guy there, you know, his dog's disengaged from him running around the park, Causing havoc, doing its thing, completely disconnected. But also, if our dogs disengage from us, if you then suddenly try and give them a command, they're like a computer you've got to boot up. You first got to build that connection, reestablish connection, and then give them the command. Whereas if they're completely disconnected and try and say, you know, hey, how's it going? Come to me here, blah, blah, blah. That's just not going to happen. Whereas if you've got a dog who's already engaged with you, what that means is they're engaged with you. They're ready and waiting for the next command, okay? If you've got a dog who's engaged with you, everything becomes easy. You tell them to come, they come. Yeah, I'm engaged. I want to be with you. Hey, walk beside me on the lead. Yeah, cool. I'm engaged with you. This is easy. And especially if you've got a dog who's maybe a tad reactive to certain things, building engagement is absolutely paramount because— Yeah. You want to be at the forefront of their focus and not the other thing. If, if all of a sudden you're in the foreground and the trigger is in the background and it's background noise, it's a lot easier to deal with than if your dog's totally disconnected, facing away from you, disengaged from you and focused on that thing. It makes things harder to deal with. So, That's what engagement is and that's why you want it is if you're going out, I also think engagement's a responsibility. It's your responsibility to have your dog engage with you, because they're going to engage in something. They're either engaging in, you know, the family's trying to have a picnic on their blanket, they're engaging with the dog who's just trying to play fetch with their owner, or they're engaging with something they absolutely shouldn't. So it's up to you to engage with your dog and keep them engaged with you to make everyone else's life around you a bit easier too. Things like recall and all that sort of thing.

It's just non-existent if you've got no engagement, because if the dog doesn't find you interesting or fun or engaging, then they will, as you said, they'll go and find something that is. And that may be another dog that might be reactive. It's run across to it, or it might be kids that are playing and it's chasing the kids or anything like that. And you're calling it and calling it and calling it and it's not coming back because it's like, well, why would I listen to you? Well, there's nothing fun to be had with you.

Exactly. And that's a great point, is that it's really important to understand our dogs and look at our dogs that are constantly trying to better their own situation. They're total hedonists. They're constantly seeking pleasure and the most amount of fun. So if that's not you, it's something else. So, and that's what we're going to talk about now is how to start building engagement because you've got to be that source of your dog's fun and engagement and dopamine. And hopefully you find this helpful, but this is something I like to explain to my clients is when our dogs engage with us, they generally engage with the thing in the environment that provides the most amount of dopamine. So here's an example. Let's say you take a kid to a cafe or restaurant and it's really boring. There's nothing to do. They're just sitting there at the table. Aimlessly looking around going, oh, this sucks. There's nothing for me. And then the waiter or waitress brings over a colouring-in book and they go, oh, well, finally, this looks like a bit of fun. I'll engage with this. And the kids head down playing with the pencils and crayons, doing their things, colouring in. They're engaged with that and that's providing some small amount of dopamine. Then all of a sudden, the waiter or waitress flicks on the TV and a show that they like is on. And all of a sudden, as we can imagine, a TV provides more Dopamine than a colouring-in book. And now our kid has ditched the colouring book and now they're focused on the TV. That's a thing in the environment providing the most amount of dopamine. Then all of a sudden the parent goes, oh, actually, do you want my phone? Now the TV's gone. Phones provide way more dopamine than TVs. And now the kid is completely dialled into that. So it's up to you in terms of building engagement with your dog is you've got to be the phone in every environment. What? When a kid's on a phone, most of the time a building could bloody burn down in the background and they wouldn't have a clue. They're completely dialled in. And that's what you need with your dog, engagement. So in terms of building that level of engagement, it's being the source of your dog's dopamine. It's going, hey, I'm the one who plays tug. I'm the one who throws this ball. I'm the one that feeds you. I'm the one that gives you the pats. Whereas if you constantly let your dog get all their pleasure and fulfilment and all that Dopamine from their outside environment, engaging is really hard. Okay. Imagine if, again, trying to get your kid's attention while there's a TV on, while they've got a phone, all that sort of stuff, and you're kind of waving your arms, dancing around, trying to get your dog, you've got no chance. So instead, it's much easier in the same way. So then easy to get your kid's attention. Hey, let's turn the phone off, flick the TV book off and close the colouring book. Now I can have your attention. And you'd find that much easier. It's also the same for your dog. So the equivalent being there is going, hey, let's not let you get all your fulfilment and enjoyment out of this walk by playing with the dog over there, sniffing absolutely everything and getting pats off every person you meet. You can get that off me. I'll come take you fun places to sniff. The food won't be from the kids' picnic over there. It'll be from me. The, you know, the toys and whatnot I'll throw. Don't go and steal someone else's ball. And if you want to play with someone, don't play with the other dog. Play with me. When we actually start to flick these things off in the environment and remove access. It makes us way easier to engage with because we become our dog's not only our best option, but our only option. And that's how we get that really engaged attitude. And it's just so, so, so important to have is once you've got engagement, everything is 10 times easier.

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Hello legends. Just a quick reminder before we jump back into the episode that we have got a Facebook group that is open to you right now. Right now, just search the Dog People Podcast on Facebook. Join us for the discussion around dogs, everything to do with dogs and dog training. We want to be your source of help because we know this world of dog training can be a minefield to work your way through. So join us right now. Let's get back into the episode. I've mentioned in previous episodes before, like, I taking Kira out now engagement-wise when we're out, like, I'll give her a free command. That's an opportunity to go and sort of do what she wants and have a sniff. She only goes to a certain distance before she stops and looks back to see where I am. We still, even still a battle when it comes to other dogs. Like she will no longer sort of just run off after another dog. She'll stay with me. But if a dog comes to us and comes to investigate what we're doing, that's when I find it a lot more of a struggle to keep her attention with me. We have it a lot at the place we go, this place that I found, which is fantastic because there's other dogs, but there's not too many. And it's just a huge space where we can avoid other dogs, but still train with them. So, there's that distraction. If a dog comes bolting towards us—

And that's where I guess it ties into that early socialisation is with Kira being receiving a bit of overexposure with dogs and a lot of play. It's really hard to convince her. She's like, no, no, no, I know how much dopamine these things produce. So, I guess it's just constantly looking for ways we can tip the scales and go, well, how can we offer something even better? And how can we start to show her that this isn't as exciting? And that's where I guess if you've got a dog in a similar situation to Kira, It's going, okay, well, let's try and for the next couple of months do what I call a bit of a dopamine detox. Let's make sure that the next time she's around those triggers or around those things, if it's dogs, it's not dopamine-inducing events. So have her be around dogs, but just at a cafe with no play. Have her walking past a lot of dogs. Having dogs come up in that close proximity, but it offering no sort of play with her. Slowly, that connection between, ah, that equals dopamine is slowly severed. And especially if we start to build value in the activities we do, sooner dogs start to become oh, actually, this is not that interesting. Same with, you know, one thing we're lucky with Nelson, he loves dogs and he's social, but we did his socialisation correctly. So quite often he's— it's— we laugh about it now. We, we, if we take him places and there's dogs, he's usually not interested.

Yeah, he shrugs them off.

He's like, oh, that's not as good as Dad. That's why you want that engagement. It's just, it makes everything a million times easier. And when you go to the park and you see that person with their dog off lead and the dog's not under a command, the dog's not being told to heel, but the dog is just Orbiting and revolving around that person. That person is a sun and that dog is just a planet orbiting around them. Is that's what you're seeing there is engagement and that's how to build it. Just become the biggest source of dopamine and your dog will engage with you in the same way that a dog will run 200 metres down the beach to play with another dog. Your dog is just going, hey, that's dopamine, I'm going to chase it. If

you see that, that was Kira, 100%. Yeah, that was it. That was her. I mean, so we've come a long way and then here's a— here's me now asking a free bit of advice. In that situation where you're saying, you know, let those interactions be less enjoyable, be less sort of dopamine sort of endorsing. Yeah. So, you know, for instance, we put ourselves in the position like we were, say, this morning with the kelpie. We were just training, that sort of stuff, we're off lead, she's doing what she's doing. Then obviously this kelpie comes out of nowhere charging towards us. I recall her to me, she comes to me, but then as soon as that kelpie gets close enough, it's like, and then we're off and then we're running. I can call her back, she will come back once, you know, she's had a bit of a run. So it's not like she's ignoring me, but again, I'll get her to call back. Kelpie's now come back. And then she comes back again and it starts again. So, in that situation, if I was to say, call her back to me, pop her on the lead, and then just make her sit next to me or even walk away when that dog comes by.

It's tough. Like sometimes, like that's why people letting their dog run up to you is— I know, it's frustrating. It can be really hard to salvage that situation, whether you're working on engagement, reactivity, or something else. It's quite often there's, in terms of salvaging, it is tough. I mean, you could put, I could say, pop your dog on lead and walk away. That dog could follow you for 100 metres.

Well, that's the other thing.

you know, get between you and the dog and use some spatial and social pressure to try and get the dog away from you, like moving towards them. But again, that dog might not be responsive to that. They might just walk straight past you and go back to your dog, or that dog might go, hey, I actually take issue to that. So, it's really hard to salvage that situation. Yeah. In terms of Kira's behaviour, it's just about exposing her to that situation or a small version of that situation over time and gradually increasing it. So, it might be Let's do training along a dog park fence where dogs are going to fly up to the fence to greet her. Yeah. But having that barrier there kind of protect— prevents anything from going further. So, she's like, oh, a dog ran up to me. Wasn't that fun?

Yeah.

Or if you've got friends with dogs, it's— you can practise it there. Their dog might run up to you, then right as Kirra goes, are we playing? And the other— and then the other person calls their dog back and she goes, oh, I used to think dogs running up to me meant something, but I'm slowly learning that it doesn't. But To answer your question, at the moment it's tough because I could say one thing and it might be right in that situation, but it might be entirely incorrect in another situation. And that's why the, you know, I know everyone makes a joke out of it now. It's like, it's okay, it's friendly. I mean, it's the tagline of the potty, but it is just such a sucky and annoying thing. And I, I had a client the other week, um, done maybe 4 or 5 reactivity sessions, come a long way. We'd convince the dog like, hey, not every dog's out to get you. And then we just had this overenthusiastic golden retriever run up, jump in this dog's face, and this dog's like, hey, you told me the dogs weren't going to do this. And it's just happened again.

Boom,

boom, back to square one. And we go, cool, let's do 5 more sessions. And it's shit. It costs a lot of people time, effort, money that sometimes they don't have. So if that is your dog, just make this your turning point. Stop doing it. Because as we've just seen here, it's, it's, it's pretty hard to come back from depending on the situation.

The one thing that irritates me about that is when you have those dog conversations and those people are out and you say, you know, don't, don't just let your dogs run up to other people. The argument I hear is, and again, we're going off on a tangent here, but the argument I hear is that Oh, well, you shouldn't be in this. This is an off-leash area. You shouldn't be here. Like, that's— it's going to happen. You've got to just deal with that. And part of me agrees with that in a sense. But also another part of me is like, well, no, you should probably have a little bit more control over your dog that it's not just bolting off somewhere to another dog.

No, you're 100% right. I actually completely disagree with when people say that because depending on which council and jurisdiction and whatever you're in, but pretty much every legislation I've ever read all over Australia and international for that matter states that if your dog is off lead, You still have to have effective control of that dog. Yeah, yeah. It's always written down in some similar wording to that. But if your dog's off lead, cool, but they have to be able to come back. And what's actually really interesting is whether it's been passed or just proposed, I'm not sure. But the Gold Coast City Council are now starting to do— going to be dishing out more fines for effective control. So, or ineffective control rather. So, if you're in an off lead area with your dog, but they witness you trying to recall your dog and your dog doesn't come back. That's going to be worthy of a fine either from now or coming very soon. No way. I actually— call me Karen.

No, I'm all for that too. I'm 100% all for that because there's some people that just, you know, don't care. There's other people that genuinely are trying their best, but there's other people who are just like, as I said, that guy who just let his dog off, head in the phone and just walked and his dog was just running amok going nuts.

Yes, exactly.

I mean, anyway, I mean, I look at it as small wins as well. So, I mean, with Kira in that situation, we've come a long way from where we were.

Yeah.

And I can recall her back from a dog now when they're playing.

Yeah.

So I'm like, you know what, small wins, let's celebrate those. Because at the end of the day, I don't need a dog that's glued to my side of my hip. As long as she comes back when I call, there's no aggressive situation or anything like that, then, you know, celebrate the small wins.

Yeah, absolutely, guys. Absolutely. So that's engagement in a nutshell. What it is, it's that attitude where your dog's dialed in. In terms of why you want it, it's because it makes everything easier and you want to be a responsible dog owner with effective control. In terms of how to do it, Become the biggest source of dopamine. That looks a little bit different for every dog, but find what your dog loves, become the source of it, and things will become easy from there.

One quick one. This is the advice you gave me, especially with engagement. No more feeding out of a bowl. Yeah. Hand feed.

Yeah. Hand feeding. Exactly. Especially if your dog is foodie. Nelson didn't know what a food bowl was until he's like 12 months old. It meant nothing to him. I mean, every ounce of food came from our pants.

Kira had no food drive when we first met. And you're like, yeah, no more food in a bowl. It all comes from you, blah, blah, blah. And like now her food drive is just like, you know, just as much as her toy drive.

There you go. Exactly. So if you've got something that's not a currency, you can build it. If your dog's got low food drive, you can absolutely build food drive. Your dog's got low toy drive, you can also definitely build toy drive so that at least you have some currency with your dog so that you can provide dopamine to them.

And that's given us another couple of topics to talk about in another episode. But of course, if you've got any questions, Dog People Podcast on Facebook, jump in there, ask away, and Max will answer your questions. I might I just make, you know, silly comments because I don't have anything to add. But

you'll be the troll in the page.

Yeah. The Dog People Podcast is a Mashed Pumpkin production hosted by Jack Lawrence and Max O'Neill. Edited, produced, and audio production by Jack Lawrence.

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