Dog owners often mistake that dog training is about sit, stay, down and come. Often, we hear how the local cross aka the Singapore Special is so hard to manage because of their innate fears. Fear is what keeps our local cross alive as a street dog. We can either harness it or feed it.

Through this blog, we hope you get a glimpse of how we have journeyed from a shy young dog to a well-adjusted local cross who has found meaning to her existence.

When I first adopted Lady-Mae 7 years ago, it was clear that she had an innate talent for creative problem solving. That began our journey to find her meaning beyond the sit and stay. We have success because my day job as an employee engagement coach gives me the know how to spark and build intrinsic motivation with Lady-Mae.

What is Engagement and Motivation? And, how are they different?

What is Engagement?

Engagement is the result of a process (what and how) that a leader takes to see that their team members find knowledge and acquire a growth mindset to achieve success together. If you're running a business, your employees are engaged when they have emotional connection to their work and they are intrinsically motivated.

What is Motivation?

It is action initiated. Employees feel like their work has meaning. There are two ways which we are motivated - intrinsic or extrinsic.

We are often motivated but not engaged. When we are engaged, we do the things we do NOT only because of the rewards or recognition but because of PURPOSE.

How do we know if a dog is engaged or motivated? A dog is engaged when you don't need a reward to get it to do what it needs to do. When you need to bring out your treats or toy, that's motivation. Do we need both? YES when you're first starting out in training. That only fixes the dog part. However, dog handling is not just about training the dog, it's teamwork. It consists of a dog and a human. This is why we need to move our relationships from the point of motivation towards engagement.

There are 4 steps to build intrinsic motivation that we need to apply for any team to find success. We will cover each step every day this week by giving you the What (the step) and the HOW (application).

Always start with the WHY.