Shelter’s Edge

Do you supervise staff or volunteers? How do you show appreciation to them for a job well done? Check out these ideas for staff recognition shared by your colleagues in the sheltering field during our recent webinar, “Hiring, Firing and Supporting Your Staff,” presented by the ASPCA’s Kate Pullen. (And P.S., if you’re not in a supervisory role, there are some great suggestions for letting your coworkers know you are thankful for their hard work.)

- “We have a thank-you box, and at each staff meeting we read all of the thank-yous for specific staff members.”

- “Each month I get a card going around to celebrate the work anniversaries and get that person a gift certificate. It honors their time with our agency.”

- “We have a Victory Wall—a large bulletin board where staff from other departments can see on their way to the kitchen. My team posts thank you emails and photos from people we’ve helped.”

- “Send thank you emails to the staff for small things, and be sure to copy their managers on it.”

- “We write notes and post them on the windows of cubes for all to see.”

- “It may be juvenile, but I love to give the staff ‘high fives’ when they’ve done something well. It is a very visual thing that makes everyone happy.”

- “We have a ‘Things That Make You Happy at Work’ board”

-  “We have a Bonus Bones program—employees and managers compliment one another by putting a ‘bone’ on a bulletin board.”

- “We have a whiteboard in the kitchen that’s updated daily for all to note who we are appreciating that day and why.”

- “Use the 10-4 rule… always acknowledge staff and volunteers when passing in the hall.” [Note: Amy Mills references this in her webinar, Customer Service for Social Change.”]

Which of these have you tried? How do you show appreciation for a job well done at your agency?

Missed the “Hiring, Firing and Supporting Your Staff” webinar or would like a refresher on interviewing, orientation and training? Listen to the recording and download the slides here.

Join Kate for part 2 in her Personnel Basics webinar series next Tuesday, May 14, from 3-4pm ET. She’ll provide you with “A Road Map to New Hire Orientation”—register here!

Related links:
Free Webinar Series: Personnel Basics
“Tip of the Week: Pay Your Colleagues a Compliment—Literally”

I love simple ideas that serve multiple purposes at once. So on a recent visit to Nevada Humane Society (NHS), this little gem really popped for me:

In the busy NHS hallways, you’ll find a humble plastic brochure holder with these simple “Cat Needing Medial Attention” forms. Staff, volunteers and even visitors – potential adopters and others – are asked to fill out one of these forms and hand it in at the front desk if they spot a cat sneezing or showing any other symptoms of impending kitty cold or other nastiness.

I love how this empowers all staff, volunteers and visiting community members to help care for the cats. And I love how it also implicates staff, volunteers and – especially! – visiting community members in the welfare of the cats. In my mind this is a cool example of community education that doubles as community engagement. It acknowledges that cats in shelters (like kids in day care) are susceptible to catching colds from each other AND it says that the shelter staff cares about these cats and wants to know right away if there’s a possible problem. Nice transparency. Best of all, it explicitly asks the community to help out by alerting staff to any potential issues they spot. Shelter tour guides greet visitors and show them around the place – pointing out these little tickets and asking the visitors to use them as needed. Way to engage!

So, this simple idea that costs less than $10 to implement:
- helps to keep the kitties healthy and well-cared for,
- establishes one reliable routine (complete with paper trail) for identifying and responding to possible health issues,
- gives staff, volunteers and visitors a voice,
- demonstrates the agency cares, and
- provides a little education to visitors and engages community members in taking care of the cats.

Now that’s a win/win/win/win/win approach.

Related links:
“3 Secrets to Volunteer Success”
Using Social Media: Slammin’ Shelter Video Roundup
Webinar Series: ASV Shelter Guidelines

The ASPCA’s B.J. Rogers gives us a sneak peek at the material he and Bert Troughton will be covering in their upcoming workshop on Sharpening Your Supervisory Skills at Texas Unites for Animals’ annual conference, March 16-18. In part one, B.J. and Bert look at how to ask good questions – which can make for more energized supervisory meetings and improved employee performance. And you don’t have to be a supervisor to put these tips to work – read on and put ‘em to use during your conversations with coworkers and adopters.

Most of the time we pose a question to get an answer. Sometimes the answers are satisfactory, sufficient and, in glorious moments, even game-changing. Sometimes, they’re less than that – and we often have to follow-up with additional questions until we’re satisfied with the answer or answers we’ve received. But, have you ever considered how the quality of the question affects the quality of the answer? If the point of the question is more than to elicit a simple “yes” or “no” – in other words, to engage in a meaningful dialogue with another person – then the nature, the structure and the phrasing of the question are often just as important as what comes next.

How we ask questions tells the listener all sorts of things about how we’re approaching a conversation – potentially disclosing our own bias or thinking, our level of desire for dialogue (as opposed to simply a quick exchange of information) and our true interest in their actual thoughts and feelings on a given subject. For example, consider what you might infer about the questioner’s position when asked,

“You don’t really want this old sweater, do you?”

The questioner’s desired reply is implicitly stated in the question itself. Based on the construct of the question, not only is the “witness being led,” but the proposed options are limited – it’s a “yes” or “no” question by design. What if, instead, you were asked,

“What would you like to do with this old sweater?”

You might still have a sense of the answer the questioner might want to hear, but your options for answering are wide open – and that’s why the former is called a closed question and the latter an open question. The very structure of the latter question lends itself to a conversation, whereas the former aims to inhibit conversation. And this doesn’t just hold true for cleaning out your closets with a partner or spouse!

Consider the simple difference between the following two questions posed to an employee during a performance evaluation:

1. “Do you think you have met or achieved your goals for this year?”

2. “How do you think you have met or achieved your goals for this year?”

The difference should be obvious – and still, there’s even more room to “open” up the question:

3.“Let’s talk about the progress and challenges you’ve achieved/encountered in working toward your goals this year. Where would you like to start?”

The aim of question #1 is to elicit a definitive reply – namely yes, no, or some variation in between. The aim of question #2 is to elicit a more qualitative reply – perhaps a narrative response that reflects the employee’s impression of their progress. And the aim of #3 is to initiate a dialogue. While question #1 imposes a yes/no dichotomy, question #3 assumes both progress and challenge, implicitly asks for dialogue (i.e., “Let’s talk”) and shares control of that dialogue with the employee. Though you’ve set the topic, you asked where they would like to begin.

Though not every question requires dialogue – and some are meant to avoid it altogether – when a meaningful exchange is the desired outcome, opening up the questions we ask (of our staff, supervisees, constituents, etc.) can have dramatic effects on the exchange that follows.

More like this? You can catch B.J. and Bert in real-time this March 16-18  at Texas Unites for Animals. Get registration details here.

B.J. Rogers is a Community Initiatives Director for the ASPCA, covering four northeastern states and the District of Columbia, as well as working with ASPCA Partnership Communities in Shelby County, AL, and Miami, FL. He’s a former shelter chief executive and lives with his partner and their small pack in Northern Vermont.

Related links:
Managing Staff
“We Were There: 4^th Annual Texas Unites for Animals”
Texas Unites for Animals

Guest blogger Brenna Jennings shares a view from the other side – as a pet owner faced with an end-of-life decision for her family’s beloved Bertie.

I am the Web Manager for ASPCApro.org, and before starting here 4 years ago, my only animal welfare experience had been adopting our 3 dogs. As someone now enriched with both ‘civilian’ and animal welfare knowledge, I appreciate what Dr. Emily Weiss has contributed here regarding adopter relations. I hope my story will contribute to this ongoing dialogue.

In 2004 we brought home our first dog. He was a dachshund who’d spent all of his 3 years caged. Just as he was learning to live with us, he suffered a herniated disk that resulted in a $4,000 surgery. At the vet I dried my tears just long enough to read the credit application.

In 2011, our 9-year-old adopted terrier mix started to exhibit scary and mysterious symptoms, and over the course of her treatment I scraped together what money I could from our bank accounts, credit cards and generous donors. After 2 months and $3,000 spent investigating her illness, Stella died at home.

In July, when we learned that our third dog had developed a tumor in his skull, my husband and I took time to consider the heartbreaking news and make a plan in advance. We decided then not to intervene. We talked about bringing Bertie to the end of his life once we saw signs of pain; the decision was difficult but we were grateful for the time to prepare.

Today, we brought Bertie in to be euthanized. We carried him in, newly blind, with a protruding eyeball and deformed skull, and still so much enthusiasm. We’d had time to think this through, to fortify him with love and bacon scraps, and to prepare our 4-year-old daughter for his absence.

We walked into the exam room with puffy eyes and tight throats, our hands crowding his soft, squirming body. We were here together in this decision, not ready but accepting, nuzzling our goodbyes.

As our vet sat Bert on her table, she offered, “I want to let you know that surgery for this is still an option. It’s delicate; he might not live through it. But I just hate to do this with him being so young.”

I know where her heart was. I know that she wanted to save his life and thought she could spare our heartbreak. I know she didn’t mean to ignite guilt and doubt beyond what we already felt, but her words had such impact on me. I was stunned, though my husband and I were unwavering in our decision.

As adopters we haven’t been perfect. We haven’t followed through on training, we’ve been late on immunizations, and we’ve had to be reminded to license our dogs. But as the humans responsible for our animals’ lives, it is always gut wrenching deciding between a mortgage payment and a veterinary procedure. It aches to not be able to return our pets’ unconditional love with unlimited resources.

Adopters may not always think in the same way animal welfare professionals think, but whether they’re faced with a relinquishment, a medical emergency, even an adoption, these decisions – like those made in a shelter every day – are arrived at through a complex equation of heart, logic and resources.

Brenna Jennings is Web Manager for ASPCApro.org and also runs a popular blog of her own.

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The zone of proximal development, that is. The WHAT, you ask? Let me back up. I’ve been thinking about the “It won’t work here” phenomenon that Dr. Weiss talked about recently and some of what’s behind that. To state the obvious, humans are complex, and groups of humans – such as an agency staff or agency volunteers – present complexity to the nth degree. Still, one way to help a group that’s in the habit of shutting down new ideas with a quick “That won’t work here” is to figure out what the group needs to feel safe enough to learn the new thing. And that’s where the zone of proximal development comes in.

After a decade of studying how children learn, developmental psychologist Lev Vygotsky proposed that if a new task is too simple, it will be boring and the child won’t learn. But, if the new task is too difficult (and risk of failure is too great), the child will become frustrated (or won’t even try in the first place for fear of a negative outcome). In between the too-simple zone and the too-complex zone is the zone of proximal development: the sweet spot, if you will, for learning. In the sweet spot, the task is just barely out of reach of the learner. And here’s the key: With the help of a supportive “other” such as a teacher, a parent, a mentor…the learner can succeed at the task. After succeeding with help, the learner can then go on to mastery on her/his own. Voila. Learning accomplished. This short video explains the zone well. As you watch, where the narrator refers to “teacher,” think “manager,” and where he refers to “student,” think “team.”

Managers can help a team overcome the negative knee-jerk “It won’t work here” reaction by finding the group’s zone of proximal development. Shape new ideas so that they’re neither too boring nor too far out of the group’s reach. And this is really important: Provide the group with a “supportive other.” That might be you – or somebody else on your team who’s a good cheerleader and mentor. But it might be somebody from another shelter who’s already accomplished the thing you’re trying to take on. Or maybe it’s somebody here at the ASPCA who could hold a conference call with your team. What matters is that you find somebody who can help your team feel safe enough to learn and try new things. And then get into the zone and enjoy your team’s learning.

Related links:
“It Won’t Work Here…”
6 Tips for The Perfect Brain Storm
“No Shortage of Big Ideas Here”
Preventing Staff Burnout