More Than Just “Get It Done!” Ep203

This week we're gonna talk about how grooming is more than just getting it done. We're gonna talk about how we can tailor our grooming sessions to each and every dog. Now, I think that. We often think that groomers either have to get the job done or refuse, and there's so much that happens in between those two choices.

It's not black and white. It's not yes or no. There's a lot more tailoring that we can do.

This is the Creating Great Grooming Dog Show. I'm Chrissy Nemeyer Smith. I'm a master groomer behavior specialist, a certified professional dog trainer, a certified behavior consultant for canines, a certified professional groomer, a fear-free, certified professional, and educator at Whole Pet Grooming Academy.

And the owner of Happy Critters in Nashua, New Hampshire. And this my friends and colleagues, is the show where we talk about teaching dogs to be good for grooming and other types of care. I wanna start off with this idea that every dog needs to be groomed, and so therefore, every grooming session must be a completed groom.

And I know many of us have been there, [00:01:00] many of us are beyond that. But let's start there because I think that's what our owners are expecting in so many circumstances and what other pet professionals might be expecting from a groomer. I still see discussions about what am I supposed to do?

It's either do it or send him away. He needs to be done. She needs to be done. It absolutely has to get finished. But here's the thing. We have to think about the training process for dog grooming. We have to think about it as a process and not simply a do or do not black or white, yes or no. I think sometimes people hear things like cooperative care and they think that means if the dog says, oh, I don't want to, we all just go, oh, okay.

We, we'll never do that ever again. And that is really not the case. It really misrepresents what many of us are trying to accomplish. What we're trying to accomplish is a dog who says, oh, I'm un, I'm uncomfortable with that. And then we backtrack and help them be comfortable with that. We're not taking it as a refusal [00:02:00] as much as it's an I'm not ready.

And how do we as a team. Like the dog groomer team work toward helping that dog be ready, not it's win or lose. And that one comes up a lot. I hear a lot of groomers still talking about I can't let him win. The dog's not trying to win, and if you're thinking in terms of the dog winning or losing or you winning or losing, then you're not on the same team.

We're on the same team. So when I see a dog who says, oh, I'm not ready, or I don't want to, it doesn't mean that we're just like, oh, he didn't want to, so we're just gonna send him home and he's gonna live off in happy Ducky land where he never, ever gets groomed again. That is not at all what we're talking about.

This is rational, reasonable. Let's break it down, see what this dog is having difficulty with and work toward helping them be good for it for their lifetime. Okay. We know that this dog is having difficulty. Now [00:03:00] you might say the dog is being difficult, but I want you to think in terms of why would they be difficult?

Because they're having a hard time. They find it unpleasant, uncomfortable, and or scary, and they don't necessarily understand why we need to do it. In many cases, they don't understand why it's this particular person or this particular place or this challenging environment that we need to help them through that.

If we in any other aspect of dog training. If we just decided oh, let's just force him through it. You're gonna have to learn to live with kids, so let's bring him to a birthday party and throw 'em in a room full of kids and just, tell him no until he knocks it off. We all know how unsafe that would be.

That's incredibly unsafe. That's wildly irresponsible, yet we don't necessarily think about it that way for grooming. And I wonder why, why don't we, if a dog is saying they're uncomfortable with something, shouldn't we then take the moment to assess the situation? Now, there are a couple [00:04:00] of reasons why, and the first step, whenever we see a pet who is having difficulty, who is giving us some sort of an indication that oh whoa.

Can we stop here? My first step for you is I always want us to think, is there a physical reason? Is there a physical reason for this dog to want us to pause here back off or stop? Because in many cases there is, in many cases there is. And the first step should always be to think about the health and safety and wellbeing and if there is a physical reason.

So what kind of physical reasons could there be? Maybe this dog is sore. Maybe we just held their paw in a way that really puts pressure on an arthritic joint. Maybe we can hold paws differently. Maybe we can adjust their body so that they aren't balancing on their sore shoulder while we pick up one of their feet.

They've got four feet. We pick up one. The other three have to take up the load. So [00:05:00] maybe there's other ways for us to move their body, move around their body, lift feet. Touch them so that they are more comfortable, physically, more comfortable. Now, I'm not saying that. A dog who is uncomfortable has the right to try to rip you open.

That's certainly not what we're talking about, but if they are behaving that aggressively because of something we're doing, then we have a big problem that we should not be forcing them through. There are very few always endeavors out there in this world. But I'm gonna say. Just about always.

Just about always. If we force a dog through, if they give us an indication, I'm not ready. I can't handle this, please stop. And we just force 'em through. I, in my experience, have never seen a dog go, oh, you're right. That wasn't so bad because forcing them through. Is the hard part that is stressful, that is challenging for them.[00:06:00]

Forcing them through when they're trying to tell us, please stop, I'm not ready, is the beginning of a behavior problem. You're literally teaching them to hate it. You're literally teaching them to not trust you. And yet it is the fault that so many of us were taught. And I wanna circle back to the way that many of us are taught.

Many of us were taught as an apprenticeship. We were taught by someone who mentored us, who taught, was taught by somebody else, who was taught by somebody else. And a lot of things get passed down and this forcing dogs through, get it done or do not get it done, this very black and white, get it done or send them to the vet for sedation grooming, which is a beautiful dream.

When you send a dog grooming customer to their veterinarian, they're very likely to have the same exact problems. So anyway. Yeah. Beautiful dream but not real. When we start telling people that we just either need to force it or send them away, you're missing out [00:07:00] on the training part. If your dog barks all the time and you're like either we make him stop by muzzling him all day, or we bring him to the shelter, certainly we can all agree there's a whole bunch of other stuff that we would do in the middle there. So with grooming, we need to think about teaching the dog to be good.

It's just common sense. If we step back from what we're trying to get done, if we step back from the idea that we're selling haircuts or we step back from the idea that I'm gonna bring my dog to the haircut store and buy a haircut, if you know that your dog has difficulty with parts of this process, then we need to tailor it to your dog.

We just need to tailor that grooming and we need to let go of the idea that it's going to get completed today. Let's focus in on the behavior and let go of the idea that we need to complete the groom today. That's part of our problem is that we're still hung up on this idea [00:08:00] of being a haircut store.

Or a nail trim store. And I know I've said it before and I know it's cheeky, but if you can ship two border Colly, groomings to my house, please let me know. That's what products are. Products are things that you can ship. Can you ship it? Can you send it to me? No. It's a service. It's a service.

And many of these pets are not well prepared for our services, but we don't need to just simply refuse them. So when we talk about cooperative care, I think sometimes people think, oh God, as soon as this dog wiggles, they're just gonna let him go and go on home. Nevermind. I guess we're gonna wait until he is okay with it.

We're not waiting until he is okay with it. We're literally working on him so that he will be okay with it. And we'll talk more about that in the next part. If you're enjoying the show, please share it. Find a friend who needs to hear this episode. Maybe it's a groomer. Maybe it's one of your owners. Maybe it's a nearby trainer. But let's talk to each other about the kind of things that we can learn [00:09:00] about teaching our pets to be good for grooming. You can also find this show at creating great grooming dogs.com, and you can listen anywhere you listen to podcasts, and you can find it on YouTube.

So tailoring for each dog. What does that look like? . Let's say I have a brand new dog and I've already talked to this owner about my safety policy. Remember the safety policy? It's on the blog at the website, creating great criming dogs.com. Look it for the blog. You can download the picture if you want, and just use it yourself or change it any which way. Just don't say it's entirely your idea, but my safety policy reads a little bit like this.

To provide the highest level of care for your pet, we have a safety policy. If at any time your pet gets nervous, anxious, scared, aggressive, or even overly silly, we slow down and help your pet to be comfortable and calm. It's very important to us that the pets in our care are kept safe and stress free.

We use sharp tools and need to prevent injuries. We will work with your pet to help them feel comfortable. [00:10:00] This will build a great experience for successful groomings, for your pet's lifetime. Your pet may not be groomed to perfection today. We will charge for the time that we spend working with your pet.

So we start off with an idea that behavior is safety. So the owners are hearing this in the beginning, and this is not a contract, but I do make my owners sign it. I make them sign off that they read it because it brings up a lot of discussion points.

First of all, your pet may get nervous, anxious, scared, or aggressive, or even overly silly, and that's a safety problem. This opens a big door. Why is it unsafe? We use sharp tools. Can I just tell you how many people don't know that we use sharp tools? Yep. Anything that we groom with can hurt a dog. So if you're an owner out there saying, can't they use clippers?

Clippers can hurt a dog. If they swing around and bite a brush, they can hurt themselves. There are lots of ways for a dog to get hurt during grooming. These are safety issues. So [00:11:00] we talk about safety first. Now, when we start talking about safety, the next thing I would do with my own customers is we'd ask the four questions.

Which have been presented on the show many times, but the first question is, what does your pet do? If they don't like something? And I might need to give some examples for an owner, I might need to talk to them about, what does he do if he's left alone in a room? What does he do if , you need to turn on the blender?

What does he do if you turn on the vacuum? Second question, what does your dog do? If he doesn't like something you're doing to him on his physical body, ask them, what does your dog do? This gives us an idea of what this dog might respond like when we're working now, the owner might need some help. So ask them if you have to take something out of his fur, if you have to wipe his feet when he comes in from the rain, if you have to help him, boost him up into a car.

What does your dog do if he doesn't like something you're doing to him? Third [00:12:00] question, what does your dog do if you don't stop? This is when we find out if the owner is even working on it. Oh I always stop. He put his teeth on me. I know he'd never bite me. And then the next minute you ask them, what do you, what does he do if you don't stop?

And they're like, oh, I always stop. He put his teeth on me because reasonable people would stop. It just makes more sense, but they're asking us not to. So our fourth question. What do you think your dog would do if I a stranger do those things? Don't stop. And that's how we help our owners understand that we have a safety issue that is a training issue, a behavior issue that must be trained.

Cooperative care is about teaching and training, and this is how we present it to an owner. Your dog may not be groomed to perfection today. We'll charge for the time that we spend working with your pet. It's important for every professional out there to have an idea of what the hourly rate is. If they need to do things that way, but think [00:13:00] about the owner now saying, oh I just assumed I could drop him off and get it done.

They need to know that we are not the haircut store. You can't just buy a haircut. Okay? So this is how we set it up so that then we can say, I am going to try to teach your dog to be calm, comfortable, and cooperative for this process. I want your dog. To feel comfortable with this because each time we groom your pet, we can make progress.

If we're not making progress, we need to reassess. If things are getting worse, we need to reassess. Now, reassessing can be tricky. Reassessing takes a little bit of a step back from what we're doing. Sometimes we have to step back and go, wait a minute. Is he getting any better at this?

Is it staying the same? Do I expect it to change? Some of our geriatric dogs, they're going to have some difficulty with things. We're gonna do some modified grooming for them. [00:14:00] We need to tailor our grooming to each and every pet. Now, that does mean that might not be a beautiful head.

So for the owners out there, or the non groomers, you may think that trimming a head is a simple matter of getting the haircut but we as groomers know, that's also getting the head clean and getting the head fluff dried. A nice blow dry on a head to get all of those hairs sticking up just the way we want them to so that then we can do our scissor work.

Humans usually have our hair cut wet dog groomers, usually trim hair, dry, clean, dry hair, blown out to perfection, and then scissor, and then clipper. If we can't dry their head, which is a very common thing for dogs to need help with. I'm not gonna say that they can't do it need help with, then we can't do a beautiful trim.[00:15:00]

And I think that the more we talk about these things with owners, the better they'll understand your dog finds this terrifying. Can't you just, and you know what, I listen to people when they say, can't you just do this or this? And I listen and I think about it. And then I explain to them what that process is.

There are ways that we can tailor groomings for individual dogs. So in the case of a dog who is very nervous about the dryer near their head, or maybe anything near their head, maybe they're a dog who has chronic ear infections and they just, they're cleared up, but they still are a little bit worried about anyone going near their ears.

It's going to take some time, it's going to take some work. If we force that dog through. We're literally teaching them. Yep, I was right. I should be scared of this. They're gonna force it through every time, so what if instead we work on helping that dog be calm, helping them be comfortable with it, doing parts of what we need to do.[00:16:00]

It may not be perfect today. That's okay. We've already told our owners that we may just work on touching around the head. We may do. Some trimming before the bath, we might get some tangles out of their face. We might do some of that stuff at the beginning when they have more patience. But let's think about how we can tailor that grooming for that individual dog to be able to learn at their own pace and learn that they can trust us and learn that this isn't scary.

It's more than just is it done or not. Or I can't let it leave my shop looking like that. I find that when we talk to our owners and we really have an educated owner base, they really do want what's best for their dog. They really do. They just need us to help explain it much like any other professional that we go to.

The person who does my breaks the. Plumber who just replaced my hot [00:17:00] water heater. I'm gonna take his recommendations. I don't know if it was installed right before. If things need to be upgraded, then okay. I might ask a second opinion, but I'm gonna take their direction and I'm gonna follow their instructions.

We are professionals and we need to help our owners understand so that they can help us follow through if we work toward better behavior every time crazy things happen. The dog gets better if we don't force 'em through. The dog gets better. If we aren't seeing them get better, we need to explore why.

We need to step back and think, is there a physical reason, physical reasons happen? There are lots of physical reasons why a dog might not be good for grooming, but cooperative care is not simply a matter of do it or don't.

I want you to think every single animal out there is capable of making themselves totally untouchable. [00:18:00] And what does that mean? It means that they're actually still cooperating with you on some level. If you're able to get a muzzle on, it's because they let you, if you're able to have them on your table, it's 'cause they let you.

All right? If you are able to touch that dog, it's because they let you. Any animal can make themselves totally untouchable. So if you're still working on them while they're scared. What if we just back off from that and help them calm, comfortable, and cooperative so that we can build toward the dog, that we can groom to perfection.

And one of the things I keep asking people, when I hear people say, I groom so many behavior cases. I love my behavior cases. I do too. I groom a lot of behavior cases. But the other question I want us to ask ourselves. How many of our dogs who are a joy to groom, who are [00:19:00] easy peasy, I know exactly what we're doing, we're gonna be great.

We're gonna go start to finish on autopilot. We're fabulous. How many of those dogs that you groom used to be your behavior cases? And that really tells me more, the dogs that used to be a behavior case, and the owners don't even remember that. And you ask for a testimonial and they're like, the trims are always pretty.

And you're like, oh, do you not even remember all of the work that we did to make him this comfortable? So I want you to think about cooperative care. Is not just, we're gonna either do it or send them home. And every time someone says cooperative care is wishy-washy, it's because they didn't understand that cooperative care is about teaching the pets to be comfortable for it, which is so much more effective than just trying to get it done.

I can't even imagine fighting with a dog their whole life. Every single grooming for 15 years. I just can't even imagine that. Like, why, [00:20:00] what a colossal waste of time. They're only gonna get worse. I don't understand the logic, but it's still out there because so many of us learned that way. Who learned from someone else?

Who learned from somebody else? And I gotta say it's 2024. It's nearly 2025. We need to stop grooming like it's the 1900's We are not just here to get it done. We're gonna tailor that grooming to the individual dog, to the individual problem, and we're going to work toward cooperative care so that we can have a lifetime of easy groomings.

We are going to create a great grooming dog.

Are you an experienced groomer who wants to take your career to the next level? Are you committed to helping pets learn to be good for grooming? I teach the Master Groomer Behavior Specialist Diploma Program, it's four online classes. They are each eight weeks long.

There's modules, reading presentations, followed by live Zoom calls each week so you can stay here [00:21:00] and enjoy all of this free content or you can take your career to the next level at the whole Pet Grooming Academy, we're a licensed post-secondary trade school offering real diplomas for real professionals.