Laughter and Learning at the PPGBI Mini-Summit
The PPGBI Mini Educational Summit, which took place in early September at the Leeds Mercure Parkway hotel in Yorkshire, England, was a roaring success.
Much fun was had on the first night as the attendees started to gather, register and receive some PPG Swag. Everyone then got to know each other over a welcome drink in the bar. This was followed by a weekend packed full of fun, educational learning and networking.
PPG President, Niki Tudge, opened the Summit with a welcome address to the attendees and also presented several, very well-received, business related presentations, including: Is Your Business Out of Sorts? Develop Your Own Balanced Score; People Training Skills -Engage, educate and empower your clients through effective On-Task-Skill-Coaching® and A Big Dirty Secret – Get with The Programme. How to building an effective and sustainable simple marketing plan.
Tudge also shared information about some of the Pet Professional Guild’s projects and member resources including:
The Pet Dog Ambassador Program – A five-level program for dog guardians to test their knowledge, skills and ability to manage their canine companion in real life settings. The aim of which is to acknowledge the hard work and commitment that guardians and their dogs undertake to make their shared lives enjoyable and recognize these efforts from a puppy’s very early training onwards.
Project Trade – The Pet Professional Guild’s international advocacy program that promotes the use of force-free pet equipment by asking pet guardians to swap choke, prong and shock collars (and any other devices that are designed to change behavior or care for pets through pain or fear).
PPG World Service – The official international e-Radio web-casting arm of The Pet Professional Guild.
BARKS from the Guild – The official publication of the Pet Professional Guild which is distributed free to all members. BARKS presents a collection of valuable business and technical articles as well as reviews and news stories pertinent to our industry.
Pet Professional Accreditation Board – The PPG’s credentialing board which currently offers:
- An accreditation for Professional Canine Training Technicians.
- An accreditation for Professional Canine Trainers.
- An accreditation for Canine Behavior Consultants.
Tudge explained that each program has a rigorous path to completion, provides a meaningful credential that supports pets and their owners and guarantees an unprecedented high level of competency for force-free pet professionals.
PPG steering committee member, Angelica Steinker, gave two informative and fun-filled presentations entitled Using Emotional Learning to Gain Recovery from Aggression and Consent and Preference Testing in Behavior Consulting, which included enthusiastic audience participation, both human and canine!
PPG membership manager, Rebekah King, also travelled over to England from the United States and was on hand to make sure everything ran smoothly, while editor of BARKS from the Guild, Susan Nilson, arrived from Finland and took care of all media related activities.
PPGBI special council member, Helen Phillips, gave two presentations – Going for a Bumble and A Taste of the Foundations for Clicker Gundog Training – both of which contained lots of educational information and much thought provoking video footage. PPGBI board member, Sue Winter, shared information about recruitment skills in a presentation entitled Navigating the Legal Maze – Recruitment of Employees. I attended the Summit in my role as steering committee member and membership manager of PPGBI but also had fun giving a presentation entitled TrickMeister Reinforcement Strategies for Success. Carole Hussein and Stephanie Presdee, PPGBI steering committee members, were on hand to help make feel everyone welcome.
It was wonderful to get to know so many PPGBI members, many of whom commented that they had never attended such a friendly event and that PPG had made them all feel very welcome. Everyone went home with a mixture of PPG goodies, including everything from No Pain, No Force, No Fear bumper stickers, to PPG clickers, pens, caps and informational vet tri-folds.
Books, DVDs, flirt-poles, tug toys, Perfect Fit harnesses and much more were all purchased and lots of information shared, as Victoria Stilwell Positively, Dog Games Ltd and Positive Animal Solutions were all in attendance with trade stalls, manned by Jo Pay, Stephanie Rose Chamings and Karen Backhouse, respectively, who made sure that none of the attendees went home empty-handed.
We now have to make the difficult decision as to when and where to schedule the event next year as everyone was clamouring for it to be in their area or the country!
Look out for the upcoming issue of BARKS from the Guild, to be released online on November 1, 2016, for more details and pictures from the PPGBI Mini Summit!