29/12/2025
This is so well articulated. Thank you Kamalfernandezdogtraining
Balance, Responsibility, and the Reality of Dog Training
There’s been a lot of discussion recently — debates, arguments, conversations, call them what you will — around dog training methodologies and whose approach is more effective or more appropriate. As a trainer, I’ve always been open about where I stand and the beliefs that guide my work. At the same time, I try to operate from a place of curiosity and good faith. I don’t believe most people in this industry are acting with ill intent. Most care deeply about dogs and genuinely want to help.
Where I think things start to unravel is when the conversation becomes less about responsibility and more about proving whose method “works,” often using the most extreme cases as the benchmark.
The dogs with the biggest behaviours.
The dogs with the highest risk.
The dogs whose stories provoke the strongest emotional reactions.
Those cases matter — but they are not the place to build ideology from.
I often think about this in the same way I think about learning to drive.
When you first get behind the wheel, everything feels overwhelming. You’re all fingers and thumbs. You have to consciously think about every movement — the clutch, the brake, the accelerator, the mirrors, the indicators, your position on the road. You stall. You misjudge distances. You overcorrect. It’s exhausting.
I certainly did. In my early years of driving, I made plenty of mistakes — not because I was reckless, but because I was inexperienced. I didn’t yet have the awareness or instinct that only comes with time.
With practice, things begin to flow. You stop consciously thinking about every action. You anticipate rather than react. You read the road more clearly.
I’ve now been driving for decades, in different countries, on different sides of the road, and over hundreds of thousands of miles. And even now, I still have to be mindful. If I’m tired, I stop. If I’m distracted, I slow down. I know that pretending otherwise is how accidents happen.
That awareness — that responsibility — only comes with experience.
And this is where I see a strong parallel with dog training.
When we talk about training tools or methodologies, we need to ask a difficult but essential question: who is actually using them?
Is it the person who is brand new to dogs — unconsciously incompetent, still developing timing, observation, and emotional regulation?
Is it the overwhelmed owner who is already anxious and exhausted, now being asked to apply techniques that require precision, neutrality, and emotional control?
Or is it the highly experienced professional who has spent decades refining their skill set and who still, despite that experience, makes mistakes?
Because mistakes are inevitable. And when they happen, it’s the dog who pays the price.
That reality should sit at the centre of these conversations.
I don’t often share the more complex cases I work with, largely because they’re deeply personal for the people involved. But I have shared some, including Dusty and her owner, Julie.
Dusty came with a significant history of reactivity toward both people and other dogs. Safety had to be the foundation of everything we did. This wasn’t about proving a method or winning an argument — it was about protecting everyone involved while giving Dusty a life that felt predictable and safe.
Through reinforcement-based training, thoughtful management, and skill-building, Dusty and Julie developed a way of living that worked. Dusty can now be walked in public, attend seminars, be around people and other dogs in controlled environments, and live a rich, fulfilling life.
She isn’t “fixed.” She was never broken.
What changed was the framework around her — the clarity, consistency, and understanding that allowed her to cope with the world without being overwhelmed.
When I look back at my early years with Scrunch, I genuinely shudder at some of the mistakes I made. Not because I didn’t care — but because I didn’t know what I didn’t know.
Like many first-time dog owners, I had good intentions and very little understanding of what dogs actually need to thrive. We expected her to behave appropriately without first teaching her how. We expected resilience before we had built confidence. We expected understanding without providing clarity.
And Scrunch paid the price for that ignorance.
She struggled with recall. She developed resource guarding. She struggled with separation and with social interactions. At the time, we saw these as problems to fix, rather than information about a dog who was overwhelmed and under-supported.
We didn’t yet understand emotional regulation, stress thresholds, or how easily pressure — even well-meaning pressure — could shape behaviour. We didn’t understand that behaviour is communication, not defiance.
Looking back now, I can see how many of those struggles were a direct result of our lack of education rather than anything inherently wrong with her. She wasn’t difficult. She was trying to survive in an environment she hadn’t been prepared for.
That realisation reshaped everything for me.
I’ve now been training dogs for over 30 years. I’ve worked with tens of thousands of dogs and supported countless people through behavioural challenges ranging from mildly frustrating to deeply complex.
And I still make mistakes.
My timing can be off. A dog can respond faster than I anticipate. A moment can unfold differently than expected. The difference now is that I choose approaches that leave room for human error — because error is inevitable.
Working with dogs like Scrunch taught me that sensitivity, awareness, and humility matter more than control or certainty. They force you to look inward, to question your assumptions, and to own your impact.
The word “balance” gets used a lot in dog training. Often it’s shorthand for “mostly positive, but with corrections when needed.” That’s not how I understand balance.
For me, balance isn’t about tools — it’s about perspective.
It’s about holding the needs of the dog, the human, and the wider world at the same time. It’s about asking: have I met this dog’s needs? Have I provided clarity, structure, enrichment, and emotional safety? Have I taught this dog how to succeed before expecting compliance?
Balance means looking at the whole picture — not just the behaviour in front of you.
In my experience, when a dog’s needs are truly met, when they are mentally stimulated, emotionally secure, and given appropriate outlets for their instincts, the need for punishment or aversive tools often disappears entirely.
The spaniel that’s frantic and can’t recall doesn’t need punishment — it needs an outlet for its working brain.
The border collie chasing traffic doesn’t need correction — it needs appropriate channels for generations of herding instinct.
The Rottweiler who is wary of strangers doesn’t need force — it needs clarity, predictability, and help learning that the world is safe.
So often, what we label as “behaviour problems” are simply unmet needs.
When we fail to meet those needs, we reach for consequences. When we meet them, behaviour changes naturally.
That, to me, is what balance really means.
Not forcing compliance.
Not proving a point.
But understanding the dog in front of us, educating the human beside them, and creating a life where both can thrive.
And perhaps, if we spent more time doing that, we’d spend far less time arguing about methods — and far more time actually helping dogs.
