Pictured from left: Marcel, Griffin, Zach, Simon and Lucy.

Of course, we here at Dogster HQ welcome pups with open paws. On any given day, we have one to eight dogs working (or more accurately sleeping, playing, begging for treats, walking across keyboards, etc.) alongside us. As our team has grown, and more dogs have come on board, we’ve realized that even a dog-centric company like Dogster needs to have guidelines, so we’ve developed always-evolving policies to help ensure employee/pooch happiness and productivity.

In honor of TYDTWDAY, we thought we’d share our current guide as a small part of our experience with having pets in the workplace.

DOGSTER, INC. MEMO

Accident Policy:
Whenever an accident occurs the owner must scrub, spray and thoroughly clean the area. No stain should be visible.

Time-Outs:
First accident – Dog takes one week time-out from office.
Second accident – Dog takes two weeks time-out from office.
Third accident and onward – Dog takes one month time-out from office.

Every dog starts with a clean slate.

It’s important to recognize that time-outs are not meant to punish the dog or the owner. Their purpose is to reduce the amount of pee/poo and keep the office clean and healthy. If there is any dog behavior that is disrupting your work, please let your Team Leader or Human Resources know when it is happening, and we will ask the owner to help control the situation.

We are totally open to feedback, so please let us know if you have any questions or concerns about all this. We all have done a really good job in making this a better place to work with the dogs. We all love having the dogs around, and by being aware of others and having fewer accidents, we will continue to enjoy a great work environment we can share with our pets.

The pawsitive effects of allowing employees to bring their pets to work have been widely surveyed and verified. Each work environment is unique, so one company’s policy may not work as well somewhere else, but with some creativity and open discussion with management and staff, we’re confident that almost any company can arrive at a policy which works for its organization.

Do you take your dog to work? Does your company have a pup policy? Talk about it here!