Talking to Clients about Daycare Evaluations

“Start with the end in mind”, is a phrase made popular by productivity expert, Stephen Covey. He lists this as one of the 7 Habits of Highly Effective People in his book by that same title. The principle is simple…envision your end state and set up processes that will aid you in getting to that state. This is a great principle that comes to mind in setting up your daycare evaluation process.

The Dog Gurus have long been proponents about properly evaluating dogs to attend daycare. After all, not every dog enjoys off leash play and screening properly will save you a great deal of trouble in the long run. Choosing the right dogs at the start is much easier than trying to kick dogs out after a fight. But getting happy dogs is only one piece of the end state. The other end state is having a happy client.

Clients are thrilled if their dog gets accepted to daycare after a daycare evaluation, but not so thrilled if you have to talk to them about why their dog doesn’t enjoy off leash play. So how can you set up your evaluation process in such a way that you start with your end in mind in terms of creating happy clients? This really boils down to the words you choose to use to talk to clients about your daycare evaluation process.

Rather than telling potential clients you will be evaluating a dog for daycare, you can set yourself up for success by saying you are evaluating dogs to see what activities they enjoy the most. This slight shift in words moves you from evaluating dogs for some pass/fail activity (daycare), to evaluating dogs to see what they love (and they are bound to love something!). Rather than setting up the client to hear their dog either did well, or didn’t do well in their evaluation for daycare, your now setting the expectation for the client to hear what their dog loves to do the most (and that might not be daycare). Here is an example:

• When you set up daycare as a pass/fail evaluation, your closing comments to some owners might be “Well, he really doesn’t enjoy the company of other dogs. He’s a great dog, but he just doesn’t want to play with other dogs. Instead, we will take him on hikes with the staff.” No matter how nicely you say it, most owners will feel bad that their dog can’t come to daycare.
• However, when you explain to owners you are going to evaluate the dog for the best activities, that same owner could be told “Rover loves to go on hikes with the staff! In fact, he would rather chase a tennis ball than play with another dog, and he loves getting in the pool to swim with Teresa, our employee. So we’re going to plan those activities for him.”

See the difference? You’ve changed the entire focus into something more positive and avoided the pass/fail set up. You have moved the conversation from being about whether or not the dog can attend daycare to what activities the dog should do when they come to daycare.  (NOTE: If you don’t offer any other activities at your center, this might be a great time to consider Daycare 2.0, or to create a strong list of referral partners so that your interaction with the owner still comes down to what their dog enjoys the most and where they can find that type of activity for their dog.)

Work with your staff to ensure everyone talks about the evaluations the same way and help set up your clients for the most positive interaction with your facility right from the start. Begin with the end in mind.