Having Dogs in the Office: What You Should Know
This story is one company’s journey in building a dog policy in their office. Long story short, we are pro-dogs in the office.
By Zibby Keaton, Head of External Communications @ Puppet
In honor of Take Your Dog to Work Day (which is happening tomorrow), I wanted to share an incident that recently happened at my company, Puppet — not the marionette company, the tech company. We were approached by The Wall Street Journal to participate in an article about bringing dogs to the office. The article (on the front page of the Journal!) centers around how, with the increase of pandemic puppies, more in-person offices are likely to adopt a dog-friendly policy. It was super fun to participate in and our very own Otto (pictured below) got to see himself in The Wall Street Journal. Otto, you were born for the stage!
Puppet has a long history of allowing dogs in the office when the building allows (our Singapore and Sydney offices are not dog-friendly per the building rules). I thought it would be helpful to share a bit on how we’ve structured our dog policies at Puppet as a means to help organizations looking to transition to a dog-friendly atmosphere.
Read on for how our policy started, how it changed, and where it stands today (or when some of us go back to a physical office again; we are a hybrid-remote company).
Our introduction to dogs in the office
In the early days of the company, bringing dogs into the office was on an honor system. Then it turned into an honor system with certain rooms that were off-limits to dogs and those that were not. In 2017, employees were required to sign a policy agreement, which incorporated items like dogs needing to be attended at all times and the need for potty training before dogs were allowed in the office. Company lore is that our former CEO found canine feces in our shared kitchen in Portland, Oregon.
Soon we realized that, as we scaled as a company, we needed to build a policy framework for our many wonderful employees and their dogs. We wanted to set guidelines and communicate expectations for how dogs should act in the office, with other dogs, and with people. We’ve found this to be really helpful. People can generally tell whether their dog would be a good fit for the office, but having the policies helps employees consider details they may have inadvertently overlooked.
Our policy framework evolution (a blueprint, of sorts)
Check your building’s rules. Not all landlords will allow you to have dogs and they might have different requirements if you do want to be a dog-friendly office. Make sure you know what these are and ensure they are communicated in your dog policy before someone brings their dog to work.
Communicate and set expectations for behavior that is allowed and what is not allowed for dogs and the caretakers that bring them in. We have people register their dog in advance, sign a waiver and acknowledge the dog-related protocols. If they or their dog breaks the rules three times, the dog is not allowed to come back. For example, some of our rules include:
- The dog needs to be fully vaccinated before coming in.
- The dog needs to be at least 6 months old and housebroken.
- The dog needs to be attended to by the owner or a designated “buddy” 100% of the time.
- The dog cannot exhibit aggressive behavior.
We’ve found that people can better understand if they should bring their dogs to work in communicating these policies upfront. We all love our dogs! But some are not a good fit for an office environment.
Set physical boundaries for the dogs. Not everyone is a dog person, and it’s important to create psychological safety for those who are less comfortable around dogs. Under our policies, dogs need to be on a leash at all times and we’ve designated certain conference rooms that are dog-friendly to adjust for those who have dog allergies.
If you can have dogs in the office, we highly recommend it!
Landlord permitting <<please do check this>>, we have generally loved having dogs in our office. They are imperfect creatures and can disarm stressful moments. It can be magical when, during a tense or heads-down work moment, a dog in a conference room does something hilarious, or having a dog in your lap has a way of instilling a sense of calm. This is really special and we would love to see more dogs in the office.
We’ve had so many amazing dog moments at Puppet — including a dog wedding in the Portland office. Two pups had lunchtime nuptials, one of our (actually ordained!) employees officiated and the scene was set with flowers and a bone-shaped cake for the humans to enjoy — and of course, treats for the newlyweds.
Sharing fun moments around dogs also doesn’t need to happen just in the office. We have a dog Slack channel (with over 20% of the company!) that provides joyous dog moments throughout the day. They can also make appearances on our Twitch feed.
I should mention, dogs aren’t the only animals that get special treatment at Puppet. We have cat t-shirt Fridays and when our first CEO joined, there was a request from an employee to bring bunnies to the office! Our current CEO actually has three — they and her chickens are occasionally featured in our employee emails.
The request was denied (by the building). We are sticking to dogs when we eventually go back to our hybrid remote office space.
