Positive Training Only | SOURCE

Hi everybody, welcome to The Source Podcast. I'm happy to sit down and have a— I don't know if this is a debate or if this is just like a conversation because I hate to say debate. Because then they're going to expect, you know, like, us to argue and fight. So I can't start off by saying that this is going to be a debate, but I guess a discussion. Yeah. And a discussion that we feel needs to be had.

Yeah, absolutely.

From a lot of different perspectives. So I'm joined today by Brandon Martin and the voice of reason off camera, off camera, hiding in the background. But we're happy to have everybody on today because we get to discuss the positive debate on The Source Podcast today. All things working dogs and positive training. That's the buzzword, right?

Yeah. And so I do the social media, so I see a lot of the backlash. We had a comment actually on a video of K9 Gallo. and in the video she's only wearing a flat collar, but someone thought they saw a remote trainer on her, and, um, they were commenting about how it's cruel and blah blah blah going on their whole spiel. And so I just commented, you know, replied back. I was like, actually, K9 Gaia was only trained on a flat collar. She's not wearing a remote training collar, uh, in this video.

So, but is it, is it wrong to use a remote trainer?

That's what this conversation is for.

I think we need to educate because that's the biggest thing, right?

Yeah, I think people just have a misunderstanding and they start to— and have seen remote trainers, for example, be used inappropriately or incorrectly, and that turns people away from them. And then that's where the positive-only training comes in, and people think, oh well, you can train a dog with just positive only and they don't have to do anything else.

Well, you're absolutely right. I think, uh, All training should be positive, right?

Yeah, absolutely.

Are we in agreement with that?

Yeah, absolutely. I think that we— yeah, I agree. I think that the term positive only training is a little bit different than what we mean though.

Oh, okay.

I think that's where they're mistaken. Maybe we are. Maybe that's what we're confused about.

Yeah. Well, you know, I always say this because this debate came up. We had done a project. This is several years ago and there's a pretty well-known project across the country at the time. And that was one thing, because one of the partners on the project as well, which was providing the dogs for us, brought that up and said that we had to agree to only positive training to be used on this project. I said, yes, no problem, no problem at all. Absolutely. Why would we do anything but? Positive training. Okay, yeah, we agree. Yeah, voice of reason.

Yeah, I mean, you came in as a client, so yeah, I mean, I will say when I came in as a client, all I had seen— and I think this is where things get misconstrued— is the—

no, there's no misconstruing on my end. How about on your end? I understand it.

Not as a professional, it's not.

You understand.

I think as a client or as a civilian, someone who's not in the working dog world or in dog training in general, like you come in and you're like, oh, they're just going to toss treats at my dog, dog's going to listen, and my problem's going to be solved.

Right.

And that is not real life.

Well, so this— I think we need to start by saying what is truly positive, right? Like, we need to discuss what, what does truly positive mean? And I know the connotation, you know, believe me, I've been around the industry a long time, so I know what, you know, people try to force-feed people.

The positive only, right?

And they tried to make the connotation that it is only food-based type training, maybe some reward training in there as well. And, you know, but most of it's in the connotation of, oh, I'm only going to give this dog a treat. But so I'll leave it at that. That's the connotation that other marketers. And I think this is what— this is just my belief, this is not yours, or of course force your reasons, but I think it's because most of those people that force-feed that are very inexperienced in what they're doing. And so it's easy for a new trainer to gravitate towards that because they're very inexperienced and very— what's the right word? Naive, maybe naive, but also, also moderately educated. And the only reason why I say that, and I'm not saying this in a bad way, I'm saying this in a way that it's easy for me to teach you to only give treats and you can't mess that up. How can you mess that up? Yeah, right. How can anybody ever say that you're doing anything wrong if you only give a dog a treat and let them follow your hand around with a little treat? Yeah, they could never question your ability. They could never question what you're doing, because even if you screw that up, what are they gonna say? He only used positive training and he screwed my dog up? No, there's no, there's no conflict there ever. But the problem with that is, and again, I've been around a long time, the problem is, is when that doesn't work, And that methodology, especially with some dogs, lends to a lot of other issues. So we don't have a positive transfer of learning, we have a negative transfer of learning. I'm dealing with a very good friend of mine right now that took their dog to another place, uh, as a puppy before I knew this gentleman, and they're having a ton of issues with this dog now. And The only thing they know is to feed treats. Well, this dog just happens to take advantage of that. And also on top of that is counter surfing, is digging in the trash can, is also now biting the other people. And I know there are going to be some people that listen and say, well, positive training didn't cause that. Yes, I would agree to some extent. Because there is a ton of issues that I see consistently with dogs that have problems that stem from that type of only training. And I'm not saying that training is bad by any means because we use it. The problem is, is when you only have that methodology, then that's it. And I'll give this example. When owners tell us this, and I say, okay, that's no problem. With this belief, that that's the solving of every problem, right? Because we're using, let's say, the dog's appetite. Most people nowadays are generated by money. Would you not agree? Okay. If you won the lottery today, Brandon, and won $2 billion, would you be satisfied and be positive about your experience? No matter what that was?

Yeah, exactly.

Right. Exactly. Right. I feed into that, I'll just give you money. So I always ask this question, if that true if-only positive training only works in and of itself, and is consistently the best methodology, then why don't we just pay everybody in the US $2 million and say if you stay out of prison, we will consistently pay you $2 million every 5 years. We'll take away all the prisons, we'll take away all the jails, We'll take away the police and just say, hey, listen, here's all the money you need to stay out of prison. The amount of money we spend on law enforcement, incarceration, management of that, on probation, and all those things, why don't we just give everybody money and say, just stay out of prison. Don't commit crime. Stay out of prison. That may work for some people.

Right.

But the vast majority of the bad apples it will not work for you.

They're going to continue to be bad apples.

Correct. So you have to use a combination of methodologies. Prison alone doesn't work. Rehabilitation alone for everybody doesn't work. There's different techniques, there's different experts, there's different ways to approach things. But some things are not all positive because you do have positive results from corrections as well. Okay, I remember when my kids were growing up. Don't touch the stove. They touch the stove, they got burned. Guess what? They didn't touch that stove no more. Right? But that wasn't a positive experience for them.

No.

But it had positive results.

Right.

And I'm not saying that either one is better than the other per se, but I can say overarching food reward in that connotation alone, in and of itself, does not have the results that are generally desired by most dog owners. They do work for some dogs. It does. But I've also seen a lot of other issues caused by them in and of itself. And we use a lot of food reward here. We do. But because we have knowledgeable trainers they know how to apply that technique and when it's best and when it really fits the equation to be most advantageous, if you will.

And I think even when we're using treat as a reward, there's a goal to where that becomes no longer, right? We're moving towards that goal where, all right, this dog's where we need it to be doing this X, Y, and Z. We can phase treats out.

Yeah, because, you know, and I think maybe that's some of it, some of the issues too, is that maybe the training plan is not followed all the way through. These owners are given, just do this, here's a treat bag full of treats. Yeah, just buy those, give that to said dog, and that fixes all your problems. So there's no follow-through, and that becomes the overarching reliance of the be-all, fix-all. Some of that could be lack of knowledge by the trainer. But again, I guess every educational— not every lawyer is a good lawyer. Yeah. Not every manager is a good manager. Not every trainer is a good trainer either. So again, I can't say that I'm leaning one way or another, I guess.

Yeah, but I mean, I can say my first dog that I started coming here with, I brought her here when she was just over a year old because she was trained off of treats, and then she would only do anything for treats. Like, there was no listening if there wasn't food involved. But that eventually grew into, like you said, counter surfing, begging for food whenever we had food, sitting at the table trying to get on the table. Eventually morphed into resource guarding, which I might— I don't know if that directly relates to treat training, but we ended up having to deal with resource guarding, which is when she came here.

Well, you know, there's a fine line between that, right? Because in the case of any reward, and again, not just saying food in general, but the pretext is to tap into the dog's desires on their innate desires to survive, right? Ultimately, right, through food, through feeding that desire, right, through eating and such, right? Anyway, I won't go off on a tangent, but my point behind that is, and that's where that knowledge— and when you give an owner a resource and don't stay connected with those owners, and then all they have is that, and then that desire for that from that animal And let me go back to this is an animal we're dealing with, right? Correct. They don't negotiate. They don't compromise. They don't have thoughts like we have. What I always say is it's very black and white, right? You know, if I had neighbors over, okay, you can jump on me, but you can't jump on my neighbors. The dogs don't comprehend that. So my point behind that, when that desire becomes now this is mine, that could be a toy. That can be love and affection from a, from the owner, because we've seen unhealthy relationships there. We've seen maybe unhealthy relationships, like you said, the resource guarding with the food particularly, but that resource could be anything, right? So that's where being connected with a knowledgeable trainer moves you through a training plan and recognizes those signs. So Brandon, you know, you were talking just a minute ago about that end goal. And I think that goes right back to that where you have an end goal in training, and that end goal is to accomplish this without the stimulus because you, you know, you're relating to the dog not doing anything without the smell or the sight of food and such, whereas your end goal is for this— a very specific stimulus to trigger the behaviors you want, right?

Is that Yeah, and so, you know, when we're using treats, it's maybe it's just to get them started and let them understand where they need to be. And then, you know, we use fixed ratios with reward and treat, and then we start to vary those ratios. And so we're just slowly starting to phase that out so that we can then get the behavior that we're looking for after the reward is gone.

But I think the treat But the thing too, you're saying treat, but that treat could also be a ball, right?

I mean, the end goal is to get rid of the ball eventually too, right? And no longer need the ball, or no longer need— you know, it's like, uh, you don't get paid extra for doing the basics. You get paid extra when you go above and beyond, right? And so the same kind of applies when we're training dogs, is at the first beginning, they don't understand what they're supposed to do. So whether it's that ball or whether it's that treat they're getting paid on that, and then, okay, now this is your job, and you're not getting paid extra to do the basics. Yeah, when you go above and beyond, then we'll talk, but right now you're just doing the basics. You're not getting extra.

And that's why I go back to training should always be positive, especially when you're teaching a new task. You can't hold a dog accountable for something they don't know, right?

Just like you can't hold a human accountable for something they don't know.

Perfect. Yeah, perfect example. You know, you hire a new employee and then you expect them to know everything day one, and then you— they don't. Next morning they come in and say, hey, we're going to fire you because you don't know this policy or that policy. What sense does that make?

Right.

You teach first, you mentor, and then you hold accountable. And it's very much similar with a dog because you're really trying to tap in. Think about your students. Is every student learning the same way?

No, no, no.

The information is the same.

Yeah, the information is the same, but we're going to have to, you know, part of the dealing with students is we're having to learn a little bit about them to help them understand. You know, maybe one student responds well to being yelled at, for example, but another—

Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa. You yelling at students? I haven't yelled at anybody. Quit lying, Joker. But go ahead.

So, you know, maybe one student, yeah, you know, responds well to that stern voice, and then another student needs, hey man, just pull them to the side and you're doing good, you know, a little bit more positive reinforcement to letting them know versus yelling at them. So yeah, it's the same with dogs. Like, not every dog is going to learn the same way either.

Well, I have kids, and so, you know, my kids are a lot older now. Maya, you have kids? But I know you do too, Brandon. But, you know, even seeing them grow up, think about how much they can learn in a smaller classroom setting from a teacher that teaches the way they best learn.

Right.

Wouldn't that be positive? Right.

Absolutely.

And, you know, people cry about class sizes, people cry about this, but then you have some students that like certain teachers. And I always find that interesting because I ask my girls this. They're like, every year in the soccer season, they get to pick their favorite teacher and they recognize them. They bring them out to the field and they do like a recognition. And I always ask the girls, like, why did you pick that teacher? Because she let you get away with everything? They're like, no, like, they teach in a way that they best understand. And they connect. Yeah. And so even with a dog, to be positive, we need to find a connection with that dog. And you guys do that very quickly. You know, that's probably the first step is building that bond, building that relationship, and then start tapping into what motivates that dog. Motivation is a key word there, right? Because some humans are motivated towards— I mean, think about law enforcement in general, public service. Most people in public service are not in it for the money.

There ain't no money in it.

So they're in it because that's what their heart is really towards. So, you know, you make that a bad experience and that reward or motivation is no longer there. They're going to find something else to do versus, you know, maybe someone in Wall Street is motivated by money. So they're going to push and push and push to see the dollar signs come in. You tell them to have a little bit of compassion for that client, and they'll be like, no, we need to flip, we need to turn, you know, these assets. So it's a different perspective, but there's also different people in those fields and different types of people, just like there's different dogs and different types of training. And our training should be tailored towards that. At least that's what I agree with.

Yeah, I would say I would agree as well. I mean, you can't one training style or method doesn't fit every dog. Because those people only really have experience in positive only, treat training, things like that, they— I don't want to say that they think they know it all, but that, for a lack of better terms, I believe that they think that they have the answer to training all dogs that way. And that they can get all the results out of doing it with treats, for example, that we can get out of starting to remove those treats. They don't have experience training that way, and so they look at it as it's not necessarily the best, or it's not for me, or it's not good because they don't have experience. The example she used with Mocha and the remote trainer You know, people look at that as something bad because they've had a bad experience with it, or, or either they have a bad experience with it or they just don't know. They know nothing about it. And so sometimes people put the, the buggy before the horse and think that they know everything, and that's not the case. Yeah, you can see positive results out of a remote trainer, and it's not something that is an end-all be-all, just like treats. It's a training tool.

Well, I think also from the social media side, you're going to get way more hits talking about something awful that happened to a dog than you can have 100 TikTok videos saying my dog's trained on a remote trainer and so obedient, blah blah, and you have one video where one trainer or one owner misuses a remote trainer and that one's gonna blow up. Yeah, and that's when you have millions of people seeing one bad case, bad apple if you want to call it that, and it ruins it for everyone. Because before I knew anything about training, I had no knowledge, no real understanding of even what it did. The fact there's a noise, a vibration, and then stimulus, like it's not all just—

Yeah, but you didn't say shock in there.

That was the point. The thing that I was going to point that out to— thank you for not saying shock.

That's good.

That's— I mean, that's what I thought it was called though. I was like, oh, it's a shock collar.

A shock collar.

And now I'm like— now I will say I have learned you should only buy from reputable manufacturers. Like, we carry Dogtra, for example.

You know, if you're going to go to a cancer doctor, you, you want to go to a cancer doctor that works in that field and has a long-standing reputation of that, right?

Yeah, absolutely.

If I'm going to go, I'm going to go to the experts. In remote trainers because dog safety is paramount. And giving you a tool or using a tool that's not reliable or not proven reliable from a long track record of research and technology development and continued development in that specific field would absolutely be risking dogs. Yeah, and we can't do that.

Yeah, it's a $300 billion industry. That's what it was last year. So we're seeing continuous growth. What that also means though is you have trainers coming out of the woodwork with their positive only training.

Yeah.

Is it possible every dog's needs and temperament with, um, let's use the conventional definition of positive only, which is just going to be treat training.

Oh, I say no. Would you— I mean, what's your thing?

Uh, I always like to use the example of what if the dog doesn't treats. You know, not every dog is motivated by treats, and so then what? What do you do then? So I would also say no, that you cannot just use X training for X every dog. It doesn't, it doesn't always work.

And I think what a lot of people fail to realize, right, there's a difference between process training is what I call it, like, okay, step 1 is this, Step 2 is that, step 3 is this. You do this, this, and this to achieve this, right? And that's the problem with a lot of trainers being taught that way. And that's why I'm firmly against that, because there's so many different mixtures that you can come across that if you're only stuck in this realm, A, B, and C equals D, it's really going to do a disservice to a lot of dogs because they don't fit in that box. And then you make problems worse. And then what ends up happening? Well, then it becomes a gift or gab, or when I say smoke and mirrors is, oh, it's a dog issue, or, oh, you're not following my plan. Absolutely, you're going to have issues. You're dealing with behavior. You know, if every behavior can be fixed, our psychologists would only have one book. They go, okay, well, you come in with this problem, it's A, B, and C, right? And it's fixed. But it's absolutely not the case.

There has to be outside-of-the-box thinking.

Yeah.

And what you're saying with, with the example that you just used, there's no, there's no outside-of-the-box thinking because not every dog is the same. And they're— but they're putting every dog inside of that box and just assuming that they have to— it has to work this way. Because that's how it works, and that's not the case.

I think we're doing a little bit of injustice because we're saying they, you know, right? Like, we're sort of like pointing the fingers at whoever they are. I don't even know who they are.

No, not necessarily. It's more just like, if you're going to enter an industry with— you're working with clients with their own mind, dogs with their own mind, you've made this point before— you can't expect that your one solution is going to be the be the—

yeah, either end-all be-all. Yeah, absolutely. I, I agree with that.

But that also goes into— and, and this isn't a knock on us— maybe our solution isn't for everybody.

That's perfect. Wouldn't you apply the same training you apply to a detection dog into a client dog that comes in, or a bite dog into a detection dog?

Every dog is different and every client is different. I, I mean, um, You know, I'm sure there's some similarities that you can do in, in that training, um, but it goes into what is our end goal. And we may think we have a plan— okay, well, here's where we're going to start and here's where we're going to end— but the path that we get to that is going to be different for every dog.

Yeah, yeah.

You know, that's the crazy thing though, right, is because we have very We have frameworks, I say, that we work within, but that can take on so many different paths, and every dog is a little bit different. I can't count the number of times that I get questions about, well, how long is it going to take? I'm always like, you know, well, so-and-so said they can do this in 2 weeks. I said, well, if you feel comfortable with that, go do that. Yeah.

And I see actually, you know, on social media, I follow all different kinds of dog trainers and, and see all kinds of different videos. And my favorite thing that I recently saw was a trainer that had basically plans set out, and that's the packages that you were going to buy. And it was like, in one week I will have X, Y, Z, all the way down a list of things that are going to happen inside of that one week. And And to me, that's just like, what if that dog doesn't respond well? What if that dog takes 3 days to get used to the— even being in a kennel before it's willing to come out and actually do some work? Then what? Now you're past your week. How can you even fit that dog into a week schedule and have all these things done in a week that you don't even know that that dog is going to eat for the first 3 days?

Yeah, yeah, there's so many variables. But what I have found with those, if If you look a little bit deeper, there's this little asterisk. I just, and this is really because of my upbringing and the bad side I saw to a lot of things before I ever became a professional trainer, that I'm 100% against those types of things because I think that as a professional, I should educate people on how behavior works. Like I said, you're never going to see anything else in any other profession. Think about it. Go to the gym, right? You're never going to see an advertisement for $9.99 for one week. We will do this, this, this, and this and this. Change your, your thinking, change your habits, change your— and I've read a lot of books on habits. And not just— I'm not talking about dogs. I'm just talking about the psychology behind habits. How they're built, how they change. And there's never one that says, here's a framework of how long to change every single habit if you just do this, because there's so many variables. And dogs have a lot of variables, whether environmental, internal, previous things that are dealing with, and their demons they're fighting with or whatever. So I don't understand how as an industry we get away with putting stuff out there like that to give that to a client to say this.

A lot of people do, but a lot of people do, and I think to each their own.

I think even do whatever you're comfortable with.

I think even dogs and trying to figure out their psychology is a whole lot harder than people a lot of times because at least a person can tell tell you what's going on, and they can talk. This dog, you know, with years of experience, you start reading dog's body language and, and things like that. It's not as cut and dry as somebody just being able to tell you when you go to the psychologist, hey, I'm depressed. Okay, now we can— now we've got the problem. Let's get to the root source. Dog doesn't just come in and say, hey, I'm food aggressive, or I'm, I'm depressed, and this is why, and this is why, right? The dog doesn't do that.

Yeah. Yeah, I think that's the hard thing. We, you know, we have to go into this with, okay, well, how do we reach the goals of the owner, keep it reasonable, but give them sustainable results? And I say a famous trainer, a good friend of mine that's a trainer, always says this: I'm a trainer, not a musician. So I don't wave a little magic wand and change things for you.

Yep.

This is a habit that's been occurring for a year and you want me to change it in a week? You know, that's what we have to kind of wrap our head around.

Expectation doesn't always meet reality.

Correct. Yeah. Yeah. Let's see what we got. Let's come together as a team and let's try to work this out and figure out what is the root cause and how do we modify that. But that's positive, right? Because we still want the dog to enjoy what they're doing, you're always going to get better results from, from honey than you ever will with spice. It's just the reality of it. So we have to figure out what is positive for that specific dog.

But I think that's the key though, right?

You know, I've, I've seen dogs though excel in an area where a negative approach was taken. And it just put focus into them because I've seen a lot of dogs that are just cloudy in the head and we brought focus to them through a corrective measure and setting boundaries and that dog just excels and you're just, you're mesmerized by the fact that I've tried treats, I've tried toys, I've tried love and affection, I've tried withholding love and affection But it wasn't until you actually corrected that dog that it focused them, and it was like a light bulb went off. And just like you said, some students thrive. I've had students tell me, I need you to yell at me. I need you to be to the point, and I need you to get on to me hard. I learn best that way. I mean, I've, I've seen some training, not just dog training, but I've seen some higher-level training. Okay, think about fighters. Do you Jiu-Jitsu.

Yeah.

Okay. So, you know, I'm sure when you first started, it was nice and pleasant and, you know, teaching technique and learning technique, but there's a time when in order to be a real fighter and to be a high-level fighter, you got to get punched in the mouth. Right. Right. Eventually you got to get punched in the mouth. I mean, you do. And okay, you think about soldiers that are going to combat. They can't ever step into combat day one and be prepared if they haven't faced conflict in a training environment where there was a little bit of pain, a little bit of mental toughness that was built into there. And I think working dogs are very much the same. You know, it's controlled stress, right? Because they got to learn how to deal with that. There's a lot that goes on. For detector dog, for patrol dog, for tracking dog, there's a lot of outside influences that could affect their performance. Just like the pet dog that goes out in public, there's a lot of sugar and lollipops over there to go play with that dog or to fight with that dog, and that could be some past experiences. Not to be here with the owner and not to block out all the other stuff. But if we can find a way to make this the best place possible and the dog think for one reason or another this is the best place to be in every situation, or this is the best thing to do in every situation— if you tell me to find drugs, that's the absolute best thing I could ever do in every single situation, is hunt— because you have tapped into the thing that I work for, which is a toy, which is food reward, which could be love and affection from the handler. You know, so we have to— and some dogs will get a toy and go over there and sit by themselves and just, you know, enjoy that without the handler. I've also seen that. But sometimes we also have to make this for worse. Than what it appears to be. And that's where the illusion and the best trainers I see manipulate those environments to accomplish those goals. And if you don't know what I mean, is okay, it's better to hunt when told to than to go over there and mess around and sniff for something that for no reason and just what we call— can I say dick around? Go over there and dig around, you know, and do this instead of focusing on the task at hand. Yeah, I'm sniffing, but I'm sniffing for, let's say, dog odor or something else. But the trainers manipulate the environments to make that the worst thing compared to the best thing that it could ever be. So again, that's where the trainers come in to tap into how that dog learns best and think outside the box. Think outside the box. Everything's not what it appears to be sometimes. But the other thing that I'll touch on is also the resources that are available. And that's the thing too. And Simon said this one time, we were talking about another trainer, and he said, you know, the problem is, is that trainer is left to their own devices. And what, what he meant by that was there was no accountability. Right? The one thing that I have here is I have accountability. Yes, I have accountability to the client. Yes, I have accountability to the dog. Yes, I have accountability to CCU as an entity, but most importantly, I have accountability to the other trainers that are here because they can watch me and know what I'm doing is crap. The client may not necessarily know that because I talk a good game. Or I look very fluid with a dog. And that's where we get lost a lot of times in this industry, is that we learn the talk and we learn to walk the walk, and the clients don't know any different. But our peers know the difference. You can tell me how great you are, but when I see you hold that leash for the first time, I'm gonna tell you if you are, because you know what I mean? Like, you already know, like, this chump He's just been talking because this joke ain't— nah, ain't no way. Right. So we can see that here. We have multiple trainers. So it's that. But the, the flip side to that is, is I can always go to another trainer and say, hey, I want you to take a look at this. Tell me what you think. This is what I've done. This is what the results I've got, but I'm just not hitting the point. And then other trainers can give feedback to maximize the results for that particular dog. To that regard too, you also have to allow trainers to have that flexibility to produce a product in a way that's best for them using their skill sets, because the way they may achieve that may be different than I do, but it doesn't make it right or wrong. It just makes that perspective a little bit different than my own.

If a trainer is set in one way of training, are they missing out on other potential results? Are they missing out on other successes with other dogs?

I think if you're set in a one state of mind, like, here's the way that we're going to do it and it's the only way that we're going to do it— we've talked about it a little bit— you're not thinking outside of the box because dogs have different personalities. If I went out right now and I took a GSP, for example, or a, uh, one of our males, and he's one of our harder dogs, and I did one thing and then I got a result out of that, and then I go and I take a GSP and I try to do the same thing with that GSP, the GSP is not going to react. If I did everything exactly the same, the results are not going to be the same because I'll end up shutting the GSP down or or GSPs typically have a space cadet mind where everything is a distraction and it's so bad. And so getting that result is not always going to be the same for every dog. Every dog is very much different and it— there's a lot of factors that have to go into, okay, here's what our end goal is. Now there's a million different ways to get to that goal. Yeah, and it's not the same for every dog.

The end result or the path to get to the path to get there?

Yeah, the end result can be the same. Say, you know, we're training a dog to be a detection dog, that's the end goal, but the path that I take for GSP example and Mal example is not going to be the same.

Now, is it breed specific or is it dog specific.

It is not breed specific. Those are just two examples of some dogs that I've recently worked with that, yeah, that I have, you know, experience in. The way that I'm going to train Dolly is not the same way I'm going to train Ralph. Yeah. And the end goal is the same, maybe, but the way that we get there is going to be completely different.

Yeah. And I think that's the hard thing. That's the hard approach to training. It's much easier for me to go, hey man, do A, B, C, and D. That's the program, right? Right. A, B, C, D every single time. That's the program. That's much easier. The hard part is saying, okay, you have flexibility to get here. That's what it has to look like. How you get there in this amount of time is up to you. We give loose framework to get there because you got to have flexibility because what if the dog's not— doesn't like a call? What if it doesn't like food? As you made a point before, what if it doesn't? What if it likes a rag? Can we use a rag? Yeah, let's do it.

Yeah.

So again, that's the hard part about training, but I also say that's the hard part about management because from a management perspective, you know, i.e. me, saying, okay, well, why didn't we reach the results that we, that we should have reached in this period of time? But I also think it takes experience to understand both sides of the coin. It's not being done the way that I would do it, it's being done the way you want to do it, but we should still get to the same results around the same time. And if we're not meeting those KPIs, key performance indicators, that for those that don't know what that means. We got to know where we're heading and when, when we should get there. And even in training, we have a framework on what we should be seeing in a period of time. And if we're not seeing that, then somebody needs to be asking questions on why. If that trainer is not doing that, then someone from a management perspective will be like, man, what are we doing? Why are we not got this, this, and this on this dog? And then there should be some discussions with that. Well, I was doing this. Why are you doing that? And then they go, well, I was doing that because of this. Ah, okay. But think about our discussion yesterday about the, the email marketing stuff, right? And I'll bring this up in here because I think the same thing applies even in business in the fact that not because if business was so easy, Harvard Business School, everybody that came out of Harvard Business School would be this big success story.

Mm-hmm.

That didn't hit me until I was in a class with the SBA. And I talked about this in some other podcasts and how valuable of a resource they were. But I was in this class and there was a guy. We were in groups, but none of us were in the same industry, but we were all like either CEOs or business owners. And this particular guy was in there. He graduated from a prestigious school, a prestigious business school. I won't say the name because it's not a knock on the business school. It's just the fact that even as good as the business school is, he was in the same boat as I was, learning the industry and learning to be relevant in the industry. My point behind that is if everything was so lined up that way, then we wouldn't take into effect all the other influences that are involved in that. And business is the same way. There's not one way to do marketing. And my point behind that was, well, we were having that conversation. I mean, I just need to understand why you're doing it. Yeah. Because my perspective is going to be different than yours. I just need to understand where you're coming from with that. I don't need you to think that it's wrong. Think that it's wrong. I just need to understand the perspective. Okay, I got it. That's a great foundation. I have a foundation in marketing. That's it. But you know the ins and outs of it. So, you know, that my point to that is that's the same thing with a trainer. Like I'm saying, okay, I got a great foundation in training, so I can understand if you're feeding me a bunch of crap.

Yeah.

And you're trying to tell me that you're doing something that doesn't make sense in no frame or fashion, and you're trying to justify it to me. Well, you're not meeting requirements because you're doing some crap that has no science or factual foundation behind it. You're just trying a bunch of stuff, and that's absolutely wrong. And, and so that's— I, I think I'm making that point because I want to drive home the point that it ain't just trying a bunch of junk, right, until something sticks. It's going through a process of problem-solving, a process of training in order to develop that training plan that works specifically for that dog within the framework that we have there. So we're on board and trains and we are trying to reach these and fix these problems for this owner, then we need to build a training plan to get there in the time that we told the owner that we're going to get there after the eval. If we're in one-on-ones, that looks a little bit different because our time frames have changed and we've got to also factor in—

are they doing what we want?

95% of that's being done by the owner, so we got to factor that in and still accomplish goals though, right? And set those out, but their approach may be a little bit different.

I think it goes into that old saying, there's more than one way to skin a cat. Yes, but at the same time, there's still a correct way. Yeah, you know, like the results are the same, but the— we've said it a couple times, but how we get there is going to be different every time.

Absolutely.

And then taking the clients in one-on-ones, for example, ran into this problem already. I think a dog should be here, but the dog isn't getting the training at home that it needs to be.

Yeah.

And so now I've got to take a step back to where I thought the dog should be and go back through training some of those things that we should have already hit.

Yeah.

But the owner wasn't hitting them when they should have been.

You know, it's good though to be able to recognize that though. That's the thing as well, right? Because with the experience you start to see, okay, well something's not adding up. Because if you're doing what I'm telling you to do and we're not reaching those, let me scratch my head for a minute. So either I have a totally wrong training plan or you're not doing what I've asked you to do and being consistent with that. Because we should see, we should already be seeing more changes in this behavior or whatever it is. So again, that's And that's where experience comes in. But guaranteeing results? I don't know. I'd like to get somebody on here that can guarantee results. I'd like to interview them. Can we find somebody with that company that you talked about and let me just interview them?

I would love that.

And see how— and see if—

It could be a cordial discussion.

Yeah.

Okay, I can try.

Yeah, and again, I think we're all positive, 100%.

It's a game to the dog and everything is— it's supposed to be fun and it's supposed to be a positive experience for our dogs. So it is—

it's—

we're positive only trainers too.

Yeah, I say that all the time. Absolutely are. We have a lot of things in our tool bag, but I will say this: when somebody needs a dog fixed, right? And I got voicemails on my phone talking to clients that have been— I remember one was 30 plus. They went to 30 plus behaviorists and trainers. And I was very upfront with this particular lady, which is now a good friend of mine. I said, listen, I don't deal well with a lot of excuses and there's only one way to fix Either you give me the dog, I fix it, and return it to you, or you work with us and you do exactly what I say, exactly how I tell you to do it, and for how long I tell you to do it, and you're involved in the training. If you're willing to do that and not make excuses and not cry about how many times I had you come here or how long we're going to meet or where we're going to meet to train at. I'm 100% on board. I mean, she was paying for sheetrock at boarding facilities because the dog would eat through sheetrock. She would try to take the dog to doggy daycare to get the dog socialized. The dog wasn't aggressive, but to try to calm down some of that energy, the dog would destroy the place, and she'd go there and have to pay bills to fix stuff because that dog would destroy stuff. And no control, could not take the dog in public. Like, it was horrendous. But we tapped into how the dog best learned. Mama helped with that, being the dog owner. She was like a freaking student, just 100% committed, listened. You know, there was times we had roundtables. I'm like, like, what am I missing? And trying to figure out, you know, and, but getting now seeing where we are time later, like it all worked out. But it was all positive. The dog loved to come out to train. The dog thrived in that environment. And we started off with a little bit of food reward. We went to a slip collar to give Mama a little bit more control because it was a bigger dog and a smaller lady. She was just very consistent, and we controlled everything that that dog did for a period of time until we got over the hump, and then we started giving the dog a little bit more freedom to make good decisions instead of making the bad decisions. So my point behind that is, is like, the approach has to be changed based on the dog, and that's really what's positive to me because the dog thrived. Think about the relationship that the owner had with the dog before then. And so, but you know, you want to devise a plan that the dog thrives in and excels in because that sense of accomplishment for the dog and the relationship between the dog and the owner will also thrive. There won't be conflict there, so that's also a positive thing as well. We don't want anybody losing their temper with their dog because that doesn't fix anything, makes things worse. Makes things worse. So, did we answer the question for the debate? Positive training, is that the end-all be-all? What would you say?

All of our training is positive.

I'd say yes, all of it's positive.

Everything that we do is positive?

Well, it's not just about us, but I really believe positive training is the end-all be-all. Like it really is, but that doesn't mean that it has to be food reward. And that's why I think people need to be educated. It needs to be what's best for that dog. Dog. 100% that dog. And you know, if a trainer is doing that, I may have a different perspective, but he's spot on. He or she is spot on with what they're doing. On the flip side, if you're not doing that and you're just using one method methodology for each and every dog, I think you're doing a disjustice to people. You know, that's, that's just part of it. So, yep, so that solved the debate. We answered the question. I mean, positive training is the best training. We should 100% be doing positive training.

I mean, yeah. I don't think it's wrong.

I don't think it's wrong. I absolutely think it's spot on. That was the question we came to ask. We're here on Fridays. Every Friday we release an episode, which is our long episode. That's what we're doing now. And then on Tuesdays, I want everybody to key in on our Short Sets, which is just a 5 to 15 minute short set, exactly what it is, that just gives you a piece of training advice, direction, maybe an idea that you you can use in your weekly training regimen. Maybe a different perspective you haven't thought about. So those that don't join us on both days, I think you're not doing something that's positive and you need to be doing something that's positive as well because that's the best thing. Remember, we'll be in Michigan, uh, May 11th through the 17th. May 11th through the 17th, that's right. We'll be there. I think it's open up to law enforcement to also be there if they want to join. It's a great symposium. It's the MWD 2024 MWD Symposium. There's a lot of great trainers with a lot of different perspectives in, and that's what I like about it. All the instructors had a great time with each other. All the handlers from going to different sites, because they rotate throughout the week to different sites, every day they're at a different site learning something new. And they all gave great feedback. So obviously, if you can make it as a handler, if you're law enforcement, please show up. And if not, we're going to be there. And I'm excited to what we're going to be doing this year. Thank you for joining us this week. Great discussion. Remember, you should only be doing positive training.