The Instinct To Defend
As a ‘highly sensitive person’ myself, I get it, I really do.
When someone questions techniques you’ve used for years, methods you were taught by well-respected (and loved) mentors, and/or attempts to discredit techniques you have seen to have worked many times before, it obviously is going to feel personal.
Your expertise, even your intention, is obviously going to feel under attack.
Your professional identity? Well, let’s just say you can feel judged by someone you believe is trying to tarnish your ability and reputation.
And here’s the thing: your defensive response – the knee-jerk desire to kick back with reasons to validate your beliefs, the innate need to lash back in anger and self-protect all that you know – is completely animalistic.
Defensiveness is how your body protects itself against a perceived threat.
All sentient beings feel safest:
- being with the people they know and trust
- doing things they know and trust doing
- doing things they know and trust doing, with the people they know and trust
There’s no denying that you are more likely to take the advice from a person you like, respect, and trust more than a stranger you don’t. So why the heck would you listen to me?
But while it’s true that defensiveness is indeed primitive and reflexive in nature, I would like to challenge you to think about the potential damage it can cause when it comes to your professional development, specifically.
While we can all agree that our survival response is vital to survival (d’uh!), how does it bode when it comes to helping us challenge norms to evolve with the times?
What if our defensiveness is directly harming our ability to change for the better?
It’s About THEM
Every observation, every suggestion for change, every uncomfortable conversation about conventional grooming practices I’ve made/had, has had only one focus: animal welfare:
- The trembling Bichon who’s learned that grooming means force and restraint.
- The Golden Retriever who pants and drools with stress before you’ve even picked up the brush.
- The Chow Chow who is instantly blacklisted just for looking a certain way.
- The Romanian Rescue dog who has never learned that human touch can be gentle, kind, and consensual.
For example, I’m not attacking your skills when I talk about the limitations of specific restraining methods, nor am I saying never to use a restraint ever again. What I am saying is that in many (if not all cases) there is an alternative approach to what you’re doing that *may* result in a better experience for the dog in your care.
Equally, when I challenge the “just get it done” mentality, I’m not undermining you or your mentor’s professional judgement, but I am challenging the belief that the experience on how you get there doesn’t matter (because it absolutely does!).
Love for the Industry Not Criticism of Professional Groomers
Every debate I have about grooming practices comes from a place of profound love for this industry and a genuine desire to support groomers in ways I can.
I’ve watched countless groomers burnout from endless experiences with “difficult” dogs, express feeling increasingly frustrated that they don’t seem to be making any progress (no matter how much they try to show them there is nothing to fear), and eventually resort to blacklisting dogs – all because they can’t decipher what really could have been relieved and/or resolved with a different approach.
I’ve also witnessed the toll that conventional methods take on dogs too, many of which go on to develop serious and chronic health disorders that I suspect is the result of repetitive exposure to grooming-specific trauma.
A note on the word ‘trauma’: Please click here.
The word “trauma” sounds awfully scary and can instantly evoke a knee-jerk reaction of feelings of anger, but let me be clear here, trauma in grooming environments can be something as “insignificant” as restraining a fearful dog for grooming tasks – it doesn’t necessarily mean a groomer is smacking the dog into walls, which I feel is often what many instantly default to imagining when I use the term in my content.
The Evolution Our Industry Deserves
Because our industry deserves evolution and we deserve to be seen as more than stylists who “enjoy making dogs look pretty”.
When people say that competitions help show the world just how technical our role is, I die a little inside.
Because the word ‘technical’ can disconnect us from the very emotional side of our roles – we may instead think of systems and processes, and possibly even machines and computers.
But dogs are not machines and we are not servicing a computer when we take on the responsibility to care for, and groom them.
It’s important to remember that words can be translated differently from person to person, which means we should be mindful of the message we are giving off when we are using them to describe our roles, and when we are using certain terms, we must also be sure to effectively communicate what we mean when we use them to prevent any misunderstandings.
Yes, styling is very technical but what about the other aspects of our job that we are either born with, or not?
I’m talking about:
- empathy
- compassion
- effective communication
It’s these areas of the job that I see constantly devalued and/or ignored every day.
Don’t we deserve to be recognised for the approach we take to ensuring an animal receives the very best experience? Because these are the skills that help to enhance a dog’s wellbeing.
While many groomers still desperately try to hold onto styling as the best way to demonstrate professional excellency, first ask yourself:
- Does styling demand respect that is truly meaningful, or does it merely tell the world we are talented with a pair of scissors?
- Does being considered as stylists encourage other pet care professionals to take our opinion seriously when it comes to more health-specific issues and concerns?
- How does being recognised as a great stylist help to demonstrate the value we offer when it comes to early intervention of health-related disorders beneath the surface of the skin?
Moving Beyond the Defensive Response
I’ve been working on myself a great deal this past year, and when someone raises concerns about the way I work or the things I say I’ve been trying to work on how I receive their feedback.
It’s become an important part of the process for me to learn how to receive feedback with grace (which can be challenging) and with an open heart. It’s incredibly challenging because, whether we like it or not, we can be tempted by our egos, especially when we also truly believe our way is best.
So here’s what I try to do when faced with challenging feedback:
- Pause before reacting. Take a breath. Remember that the person speaking likely shares your love for dogs and respect for the grooming profession.
- Listen with curiosity, not defensiveness. Ask yourself: “What if there’s something here I haven’t considered?”
- Separate your identity from your methods. You are not your grooming techniques. You’re a professional who can learn, adapt, and grow. Changing your approach doesn’t diminish your expertise – it enhances it.
- Focus on the dogs. In every conversation about industry practices, bring it back to the animals. What would be best for them? What would reduce their stress? What would make their grooming experience more positive?
A Call for Open Hearts and Minds
I’m honestly not asking you to abandon everything you know and love, feel ashamed of your current practices, or even hang up the grooming shears for good, because:
I know you love the dogs you care for.
I know you are amazing at what you do.
And, I know I’m far from perfect myself.
I’m only asking that you see past the glitz and glamour of styling for a second to see grooming as more than just washing, bathing, and styling a dog.
Ask yourself:
What impact do you have, and could potentially have, on the dog in your care if you were to adapt your process to suit their individual needs, rather than follow what a textbook tells you to do?
The future of grooming shouldn’t be about how a dog looks over and above how a dog feels.
The future of our industry should be more about educating the world on how grooming can enhance the health, well-being, and overall quality of life a dog has.
The future of grooming should be about professionals grasping every opportunity they can to demonstrate ethical and updated dog care to the general public, over and above their artistic talents, because this is where we will make the biggest impact.
At the end of the day, it’s not about protecting our egos or defending our methods out of fear of being cast aside and/or called a “bad groomer” – there’s too much energy consumed in obsessing about who is better and not enough consideration of the impact our approach and methods make on the actual lives of the animals in our care.
Again, ask yourself:
How can we contribute our skills to helping improve welfare standards in our sector?
How can we demonstrate our value enough to be considered invaluable assets to the broader pet care community so that we can effectively contribute to the quality of life a dog has?
There’s no stopping science evolving, yet our industry remains stagnant when it comes to how we teach and support future groomers – while many things have changed, not enough has changed to warrant the respect we so desperately crave.
Trust me, when it comes to veterinary and behaviour professionals, groomers are not yet considered assets, but that’s not to say that we can’t change common perception.
If we can step into our vulnerability and work together to improve standards, we can position ourselves so high up the pedestal of pet care that we could quite easily demand a substantial increase in our pricing, allowing us to reduce the number of dogs we groom in a day to allow for a more bespoke and dog-centred approach which also helps to prevent burnout as well.
Let me know your thoughts!
Learn more with The HGA | Behaviour Grooming Education.
