You love dogs… You love training your own dogs… You should become a professional dog trainer! It just makes sense. Right?!
Well maybe.
Dog training is one of those professions that sounds more like play than work. But, like the life of a professional musician or artist, fantasy is often more glamorous than reality. So before you spend a lot of time and money changing your career, consider these top five myths about life as a professional coach:
Myth #1: As a dog trainer, I will be free from the 9 to 5 grind of a desk job.
It’s true that real obedience training doesn’t happen in a cubicle or behind a desk. But remember that in addition to their “official” title, every professional coach becomes an entrepreneur. Yes, they spend some time working with dogs. But, once the training is finished, there is still a lot of work to do. Some of these responsibilities include:
- Promote yourself and your business to gain new customers. Especially as a new trainer, you’ll spend a lot of time building your business by attending local pet-related events. Most of the time, these events are held on weekends and require a participation fee ranging from $25 to $1000. In addition, a successful trainer must spend time developing and implementing print and web marketing strategies.
- Performing accounts receivable and accounts payable functions. Usually only an established trainer can afford to pay a bookkeeper. Most new trainers spend 5-10 hours a week managing the financial operations of their company.
- Provide customer service. Courteous and professional customer service is imperative to building a successful dog training business. This is true throughout the entire customer acquisition cycle, from the first time you speak with a potential customer to ongoing interactions with long-time customers.
Myth #2: As a professional trainer, I will spend my time with dogs instead of people.
When I was going to school to become a dog trainer, one of the best lessons I learned from my mentors is that training is as much about people as it is about dogs.
If you want to be a professional trainer because you prefer to interact with animals than with people, you should choose another profession, because the goal of any good trainer is to improve a dog’s relationship with his human companions. Some of this improvement can be achieved by working one on one with a dog. But to truly help a dog learn to function more effectively in his world, you need to engage his human.
Myth #3: The life of a professional trainer is low stress and highly rewarding.
Dog training is not a low-stress career. In fact, sometimes it’s quite stressful. Trainers worry about getting enough clients to pay the bills. They care about owners who just can’t help no matter how hard they try. They care about dogs living with owners who are more likely to
sacrifice than solve problems. They care about those owners who will not put down an obviously troubled dog that poses a danger to humans and/or other animals. The list goes on and on.
Training is a rewarding profession, but the rewards are balanced by stress and frustration, just like in any other career. It’s very rewarding to see his efforts result in a better relationship between a puppy and his companions, but those results can be hard to come by.
Myth #4: Dog training is an easy profession.
Some dogs are easy to train. It is as if they were born with an understanding of how to interact with humans. If you have one of those dogs, consider yourself lucky, but don’t assume that every dog you train will be this easy. As a professional trainer, you will often work with the puppies that are the most difficult to train:
for example, those with problems of aggression or severe anxiety.
The hardest thing about working as a professional trainer is that every dog is different…and every owner is different. His job as a trainer is to provide simple advice that is tailored to each unique dog-human relationship. That is more difficult than it seems.
Myth #5: Every dog I train will end up being a success!
Oh how I wish this was true. But unfortunately, as a professional trainer, you can’t help every dog. Sometimes, due to physiological problems or just the wishes of the owner, fixing a situation is simply out of your hands. You must be prepared to accept these situations as they arise. This is one of the most difficult challenges of working successfully as a coach.
Learn more about becoming a professional dog trainer.