About Us
More than training. A better life with your dog.
Private, reward-based training in your home, on your block, and in the places where your dog actually needs to behave — taught so training is something your dog genuinely enjoys, whatever their age or behavior level.
Our Training Director
More than 20 years of training dogs — and still learning something from every one of them.
Jeff has trained dogs for more than twenty years — starting at twelve, when a neighbor who worked as a police K9 handler introduced him to real training, and Jeff put those lessons straight into his own Rottweiler, Sasha. As Training Director at Good Dog Boston, he’s the trainer behind every program: he takes the evaluation calls, builds each dog’s plan, and personally handles our toughest reactivity cases.
His range — shelter rescues, detection dogs, comfort and therapy dogs, competition sport dogs — comes down to the same skill applied to different dogs: read the dog, set the plan, reward the right thing at the right second.
“My personal mantra is to maintain the ‘always learning mentality,’ because of the ever-changing science in dog training.”
JeffTraining Director, Good Dog Boston
His specialty is the dog who’s wonderful at home and a handful everywhere else — because that’s the dog who needs a trainer who understands both ends of the leash, and that’s the dog Boston makes.
Pet dogs
Working & sport dogs
Behavior
Program development
Why in-home training
Your dog doesn’t live in a training facility. They live in your apartment, ride your elevator, walk your block, and pass other dogs in the exact places you actually take them — so that is where we train.
A dog that is flawless in a training facility and impossible outside Harvard Square hasn’t learned much. Dogs don’t generalize well — behavior learned in one room stays in that room until it’s deliberately taught everywhere else.
Real Dogs, Real Diplomas
Every program ends the same way: a diploma, earned at home and on your own streets. Meet a few recent graduates — including Miley, whose family’s five-star review is just below.
Four principles behind every session.
01
When the behavior clicks, run three to five more successful repetitions, then stop before frustration sets in. End every session on a high note.
02
Ask once, then wait — patiently, without repeating the command — until your dog does as you ask. That’s how a request stops being optional.
03
A reward only works within about one second of the behavior. We reward what is happening, not what already happened.
04
Small, soft treats at high frequency win: a quick hit of dopamine, straight into the next repetition.
I would recommend Good Dog Boston to anyone! Our trainer Jeff was patient, kind, and extremely helpful when working with us and our dog Miley. Miley struggles with reactivity triggered by other dogs and living in downtown Boston makes avoiding other dogs nearly impossible. Jeff provided a tiered program which laid the ground work for Miley’s basic obedience and built up to working through her reactivity issues. We have already seen huge improvement in Miley’s behavior and all thanks goes to Good Dog Boston! Also shoutout to Jeff’s furry assistants: Danny, Halo, & Doctor for being the good-est boys and helping their friend Miley with her manners! Truly a 5 star experience!
We couldn’t be happier with our experience working with Jeff and his training program. We enrolled our labradoodle puppy in the puppy program at 5 months old, and it made a world of difference. Jeff helped us navigate and correct those early, unwanted puppy behaviors while building a solid foundation of training that’s stuck with our pup ever since. Jeff is not only incredibly knowledgeable, but he’s also clearly passionate about what he does. His approach is effective, thoughtful, and tailored—and the results speak for themselves. Our puppy is now a well-behaved city dog we’re proud to take anywhere. On top of that, Jeff is responsive, flexible, and genuinely a pleasure to work with.
We were having trouble training our adolescent spitz, who was quickly becoming quite reactive/aggressively territorial on regular walks around the neighborhood. We’re so grateful that we had the chance to work with Jeff at Good Dog Boston — though we’d read a handful of books and watched a few videos about how to work with reactive dogs, there’s nothing quite like having someone with a great deal of experience point out to you the specific tools to use and nuanced cues in your specific dog’s behavior to watch out for. Jeff was wonderful — worked with our busy schedules (and the weather), clearly excellent/fond of dogs, highly results-driven, and he gave us customized “homework” to do. Walking him is now pleasant instead of embarrassing and stressful.
Schedule an evaluation call and speak with one of our trainers today.
Free · No obligation · Know the plan and the price before you commit