We meet STEVE MANN, the renowned dog trainer whose name has become synonymous with happy dogs and even happier owners. Sitting down for an exclusive interview, Steve, the man behind ‘Easy Peasy Puppy Squeezy’, opens up about his latest book “Another Day, Another Collar: Confessions of a Dog Trainer.”

With over three decades of experience, Steve felt it was time for something different: a celebration of what dogs have taught him throughout his remarkable career. In our interview, Steve shares, “For all of my previous books, the emphasis was on what we can teach dogs, but this time I wanted to turn that on its head and celebrate all of the lessons that the dogs in my life have taught me.” Filled with anecdotes from his travels and training adventures, Steve’s latest book is packed with moments that dog owners will relate to. “Readers will definitely find themselves saying, ‘Oh, that’s just like MY dog,’ as they go through the pages,” he tells us with a smile.

From his early days idolising local dog trainers—whom he saw as “astronauts, saints, and wizards all rolled into one”—to training celebrity pets like Graham Norton’s mischievous Labradoodle, Bailey, Steve’s journey has been anything but ordinary. In our chat, he fondly recalls Bailey crashing through picnics in Hyde Park, with Graham in tow, apologising profusely to startled park-goers. In our interview, Steve also opens up about the emotional highs and lows of his job.

“Losing a dog is like opening the front door to find out the world’s been stolen,” he says. “But it’s the exit price for loving them.”

For Steve, his dogs have been his greatest teachers, from his Greyhound Pele, a retired racer with an obsession for bread, to the desert dogs of the Middle East, who taught him about the subtle art of canine body language. Whether you’re curious about his work with celebrities, his experiences training dogs around the globe, or simply want to hear what drives one of the world’s top dog trainers, read on for our must-read interview…

What inspired you to write “Another Day, Another Collar: Confessions of a dog trainer” at this point in your career?

‘Book number 10’ seemed a nice round number to do something a little bit different. For all of my previous books, the emphasis was on what we can teach dogs, I wanted to turn that on it’s head and celebrate all of the lessons that the dogs in my life have taught me. I love telling stories about all of the dogs and owners I’ve met on my journey, I use these anecdotes in my seminars all of the time and I’m sure readers will find plenty of ‘..Oh, that’s just like MY dog..’ moments in ‘Another Day Another Collar’.

Can you share a memorable moment from your early dog training days that significantly shaped your approach?

When I was a kid I used to look up to the dog trainers who taught at the local dog club as absolute rock stars. To me, the dog trainers were astronauts, saints and wizards all rolled into one. However, as I got a little older and desensitised to the glitz, (yep, to me dog training classes had ‘Glitz’!), I started to see cracks in the lessons. What the trainers and owners saw as ‘excitement’ in the dogs, I saw as over-arousal and stress. I started to listen closer to the owners who would ask ‘How can I make my dog Come’. I didn’t want to make a dog do anything, I wanted to build a relationship with dogs so they’d want to Come back to the owner, not have to come back out of fear. That was the moment I decided that I wanted to be a dog trainer, but my way, which was a very long and twisty road.

Training dogs for celebrities like Graham Norton and Emilia Clarke must have its unique challenges. Can you tell us about a particularly interesting experience with a celebrity’s pet?

Graham’s dog Bailey, and I’m sure he won’t mind me saying so, was murder for running through people’s picnics at Hyde Park! If it wasn’t surprising enough for the picnic guests to have a huge Labradoodle romping through their Quiche Lorraine, it was even more surprising for them to see Graham Norton in hot pursuit, apologising to all who’d listen!

What are the biggest differences you’ve observed in training dogs in different parts of the world?

China is fascinating. Relatively speaking, they’re quite new to pet dog ownership. Whereas in the UK we’ve many generations of selective breeding, working dogs and pet dogs, China has kind of fast-forwarded in modern pet ownership. I was asked when first out there to set up educational courses for Trainers, ‘we really want to love our dogs, we just don’t know how to?’. That really chimed with me and I’ve made it a bit of a personal ambition to help dogs and owners in China as much as I can. If they’re ready to love their dogs, then they’re half way there already. How do you handle your job’s emotional highs and lows, from the joy of success to the grief of losing a beloved dog? I feel so lucky to be a dog trainer for the last 30+ years, that I’m always in a bit of a panic and expecting someone to hook me from my job to say I’ve been getting away with it for too long, to get back in line and to get a ‘real’ job as my pals would say!

I struggle a little with enjoying the highs to be honest as I’m always onto the next task before my time runs out. The lows of the job are fine by me as long as I learn from them and I don’t repeat the same mistakes. I tell other trainers who I teach that I’ve made all of the mistakes so they don’t have to! I wouldn’t say the grief of losing a dog is a low of the job, it’s an absolute kick in the guts that goes on for weeks and wrecks my life. When I lose a dog it’s like opening the front door to find out the world’s been stolen; I don’t eat, I stop listening to music, I’m empty. I write about how I deal with the loss of a dog in ‘Another Day Another Collar’. Grief of losing a dog has happened too much to me in the past but I’ve learned to sit with it and accept it as the exit price for loving.

What’s one common mistake you see dog owners making, and how can they avoid it?

Owners are too mean with their reinforcement! We all work for pay and dogs are not different. You want the best behaviour, then pay the best wages! Your books, like ‘Easy Peasy Puppy Squeezy,’ have been incredibly successful. What do you think resonates most with your readers? I try to write as I speak. I’ve hundreds of dog training books at home, written from the 1940s to the present day and to be honest, they’re all a bit of a dry read. Factually, a lot of them are on point (a lot are not!), but my god they’re boring or worse still, boring and patronising. We all know that behaviour that gets reinforced is more likely to reoccur, be it dogs or readers. I try to make my books a pleasure to read if possible, adding humour where I can to key in important lessons. The more we can anchor lessons to an emotion, hopefully joy, the more chance we have of that lesson to stick.

Can you give us a sneak peek into one of the humorous or touching stories from your memoir?

The opportunity to write ‘Another Day Another Collar’ gave me the chance to turn back the clock to revisit all of my old dogs which was a real treat, and I loved writing about Pele, my ex-racing Greyhound. Pele raced at Walthamstow Dog Stadium and I had a permanent grin on my face as I wrote about his adventures at the track, his obsession with bread and his pure joy at waking every morning to embrace life and give whatever he was going to do that day; be it racing or sleeping, his 100% undivided attention. I learned so much from that dog.

How has the role of dogs in our lives evolved over your career, and what changes do you foresee in the future?

Everything seems to be going in the right direction, just not fast enough! I think day by day people are appreciating more and more the wonderful, sentient genius characters that dogs prove themselves to be. People are embracing the ethos that rather than focusing on punishing the behaviours we don’t want, to actually take a step back, think, and figure out how to reinforce the actual behaviours we do want instead. I want owners to teach their dogs in a way that the owners would like to be taught themselves, with kindness, understanding and empathy.

What advice would you give aspiring dog trainers looking to follow in your footsteps?

Surround yourself with dogs as much as you possibly can. When I was a kid I used to daydream about being a dog trainer, until my Mum gave me a postcard with a picture of a farmer with the quote saying’ You’ll never plough a field by turning it over in your mind’. Basically, she was saying ‘get on with it!’ Volunteer at rescue centres and attend educational courses at The Institute of Modern Dog Trainers. Then, when you’re ready, you can concentrate on the trickier end of the lead, the wonderful owners.

‘Another Day, Another Collar: Confessions of a Dog Trainer’ is available from all good retailers. You can find out more at www.stevemanndogtraining.com and www.imdt.uk.com.

Main image credit: Liz Seabrook.