About · Neil Wood
Behaviour is not something to control. It is something to understand.
Dogs do not exist in isolation. Behaviour reflects a system — environment, relationships, learning history, and the conditions in which they are asked to function.
What shaped my practice
Most of us who are called to work as behaviour consultants have had that one dog.
Here’s mine.
The local rescue phoned. There’s a dog named Luna scheduled to be euthanised. The ‘owners’ claimed that she is aggressive. Would we take her.
The label said aggressive.
Luna was a seven-year-old dog from an abusive home. The dog in front of me, a Boxer-Shepherd mix, barked and lunged. Life is full of noise and movement. And we soon noticed that when we moved too fast, raised our voices or gestured with our hands; Luna would get as small as possible — shrink to invisibility.
Luna had never bitten anyone.
The label was wrong.
What was actually there was a dog so profoundly frightened by her early experience that she processed a raised voice or a hand gesture differently. It was not aggression. Terror expressed in the only language available to her.
Luna was the dog who taught me to see the dog who is in front of me.
It was the beginning of my practice — the pivot from training behaviour to understanding behaviour to create the conditions for change.
Philosophy
What does your world look like?
And what would make it better?
These questions are at the core of my practice. They help ground our work — and orient it toward a good life — where dogs can engage in behaviours that are natural to them and meaningful in their world.
01
Every behaviour has a story. Our work is to understand it — not override it.
04
Even thoughtful, loving homes can be a difficult environment for a dog.
02
The work begins with what we are actually seeing. Not labels. Who is in front of us.
05
The goal is a good life — where dogs engage in behaviours natural and meaningful to them.
03
We suspend judgment. We observe and understand before we interpret.
06
Emotional state precedes behaviour. We create the conditions for change.
About me
My passion is learning to understand.
My practice is shaped by academic training, professional credentials, and working with dogs whose behaviour has become frightening, exhausting, or isolating for the people who love them.
My doctoral training in philosophy taught me discipline and curiosity — to suspend judgment, to refuse sweeping generalisations, and a commitment to the particular.
Professional coaching certification changed how I work with people — arriving with questions rather than answers, so that the people I work with co-own the outcomes they are working toward.
Together, these are not separate threads. They are a single orientation: toward the individual in front of me, and toward understanding before intervening.
Credentials
These shape how I approach the work — not a list of accomplishments, but a map of intellectual commitments.
PhD — University of Glasgow
Doctoral training in late-medieval epistemology — the study of how knowledge is formed and what we can actually claim to know.
KPA-CTP — Karen Pryor Academy
The tools for creating the conditions for change through non-aversive, evidence-based methods.
CPCC — Co-Active Professional Coaching
Arriving with questions rather than answers. Balancing expert knowledge with curiosity so guardians co-own their outcomes.
Aggression in Dogs Master Course
Michael Shikashio. Practical frameworks for working with dogs labelled aggressive — management, safety, and protocol design.
Unlocking Resilience
Kristina Spaulding. The stress factor in dogs. Changed how I understand what a dog may be experiencing — and why that matters as much as observable behaviour.
Family Dog Mediation (L.E.G.S.)
Kim Brophey. A framework of interpretation — Learning, Environment, Genetics, Self — from the study of many to the study of one.
IAABC Member
International Association of Animal Behavior Consultants.
Next Step
The first step is a conversation
A free twenty-minute call to understand what’s happening and whether this is the right fit for you and your situation.