DDR is featured in the Harvard Business Review!

We’ve been featured in the latest Harvard Business Review, and we’re excited to tell you all about it! In an article titled, “Are You Solving the Right Problems?” author Thomas Wedell-Wedellsborg reveals that most companies and organizations are good at solving problems, but not necessarily good at figuring out what the real problems actually are. He goes on to explain that reframing problems often brings about unexpected, creative solutions.

Using dog adoption as an example, DDR is highlighted for the way in which we reframe the issue. Instead of focusing on promoting pet adoption or marketing the sad realities, we employ our Shelter Intervention Program (SIP). Of course we want to see more animals get adopted and of course we hurt for those at risk of euthanasia, but we come at it by trying to keep pets with their original families in the first place. If these animals don’t come into the shelter system at all, we can help everybody – the families, the shelter staff, and most of all the animals.
Wedell-Wedellsborg explains how whenever a family comes into the shelter to hand over a pet, one of our staff asks without judgment if the family would prefer to keep the pet. If the answer is yes, we try to help resolve the situation, instead of waiting for the animal to come into the system and then trying to get the dog rescued or adopted. Instead of demonizing the family or casting blame.
We are very grateful to be singled out for our approach, compassion, and hard work. The author goes so far as to say that thanks to our reframing, overcrowded shelters may someday be a thing of the past. Here’s to hoping that dream comes true!

MEDIA ALERT: DOWNTOWN DOG RESCUE: Best Friends Network Charity Winner


September 17, 2010, 5:16PM MT
By Ted Brewer, Best Friends staff writer

Pawsitive Alliance wins Network Charities grant for its innovative adoption program;
Downtown Dog Rescue is runner-up.

When Best Friends’ Network Charities launched last year, the impetus was to provide small animal welfare organizations with the support they needed to implement and sustain their life-saving programs, programs helping us achieve a time of No More Homeless Pets. As part of that support, the Network Charities announced in July it would be awarding $10,000 total in grant money to two participating charities with the most innovative, effective and collaborative programs that have already been established or are in the works. Network Charities received 44 applications for the grant.

“There were lots of great programs, and it was definitely a hard choice to pick the two winners,” says Lavanya Raju, Network Charities coordinator at Best Friends.

But the choice had to be made. We’re now pleased to announce that Pawsitive Alliance of the Seattle, Washington, area has won the $7,500 first-place grant. Runner up and winner of the second-place $2,500 grant was Downtown Dog Rescue of Los Angeles.

The program that garnered Pawsitive Alliance the win is simple, yet incredibly effective and collaborative: Bring animals from shelters and rescue groups located in rural areas around Washington, where there is an overabundance of adoptable pets, and showcase them at super adoption events in the Puget Sound area, where the human population is densest in the state and the animals stand the greatest chance of getting adopted. And that’s what Pawsitive Alliance has been doing since Andrea Logan and Yolanda Morris founded the group in 2005.

Shelters and rescue agencies in Washington’s rural areas are generally hard-pressed to find homes for the animals they care for — too many animals, not enough people to adopt. Pawsitive Alliance has helped fix that problem, by creating a venue for those adoption agencies to showcase their dogs to a captive audience. The alliance goes to great lengths to make the adoption events as fun and attractive as possible, which is drawing people to them who might be hesitant about going into a shelter and adopting.

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