Colorado Animal Welfare Conference Session

7 Habits of Highly Effective Behavior Teams

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10:45am–12:15pm • August 27, 2024

Westminster Ballroom I and II

Shelter Operations

Whether your organization supports the behavioral health of animals in your care with a team of one or a team of 15, cultivating these seven habits in your behavior team can help build the efficiencies necessary to create capacity, ensure consistency in processes and decision making, and reduce length-of-stay in the shelter.  With an application for both behavior professionals and organization leaders, these habits can have the greatest impact when integrated into an organization’s broader mission and culture, where the values that guide these actions are not only upheld but celebrated.

Dr. Nita Mosby Tyler

Maggie McSchaefer

Maggie McSchaefer is currently the director of animal behavior and sheltering for Foothills Animal Shelter in Golden, CO.  Working in animal shelters since 2007, she specializes in shelter operations with a focus on animal behavior, reducing length of stay, and the integration of those concepts across shelter processes.  McSchaefer has expertise in improving the emotional experience of shelter animals through agency and choice, embracing imperfection and removing adoption barriers, and believes strongly in the elevation of applied animal behavior as the science it is. She has a particular affinity for cats and has redesigned a number of shelter cat spaces to the benefit of their residents including the Humane Society of Boulder Valley’s 2014 Cat Adoption Center remodel featured in Jackson Galaxy’s book, Catify to Satisfy.  She serves on the board of the Animal Welfare Association of Colorado, is a graduate of the Karen Pryor Academy, and a certified animal welfare administrator (CAWA).