If you’ve ever visited Charlie Bravo HQ, one thing that’s clear from the get-go is that most of us bring our dogs to work. We’ll admit the primary reason we bring them is simply because we’d miss them too much otherwise, but the truth is that having dogs at the office has quite a few benefits, and we’re not the only ones who think so.
According to the Humane Society of the United States, having dogs in the workplace “reduces stress among employees and increases connectivity between coworkers.” At Charlie Bravo, we’ve seen it firsthand.
The Humane Society also said, “Dogs in the workplace, in general, make people happier. And less stressed. And more productive.” To prove it, a study conducted by Virginia Commonwealth University’s Randolph T. Barker took 90 participants and divided them into three groups: those who had dogs and brought them to work, those who didn’t have dogs, and those who had dogs but didn’t bring them to work.
According to the Humane Society, “The study found that stress levels were overall lowest among dog owners who brought their dogs to work. Stress levels were highest among those without dogs, and interestingly, stress levels spiked in late afternoon among dog owners who didn’t have pets in the office. (Barker hypothesized this was a result of worrying about their dogs at home alone while the owners were stuck at work.)”
In addition to reduced stress and increased productivity, we’ve found that our dogs often serve as a conversation starter for pilots, passengers, and others that happen to be wandering around the hangar. Multiple times per week, travelers waiting in the lobby will walk through our door just to pet the dogs, and on more than one occasion, it’s led to conversations about the purchase of an aircraft.
Another unforeseen benefit is that having dogs in the office gives us an excuse to get outside during the workday and get some exercise when the dogs get antsy, which is especially enjoyable during the spring.
From a marketing perspective, having dogs in the office makes our social media more fun, allowing us to include the dogs in our Instagram photos, as well as the photos we use for our marketing collateral, which is a fun alternative from the corporate-looking photos we typically see in the industry.
It’s also a low-cost benefit that can be used to attract potential employees with dogs that don’t handle staying at home all day very well, which companies like Google and Amazon have used to their advantage for years.
Bonus Benefit: If one of us happens to pass gas during a meeting, having dogs in the office gives us somebody to blame it on…
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