C6 | Friday, June 15, 2012 | The Union | Section C

Keeping employees happyis one of the main reasons citedby employers.

“Engineering and softwarecompanies are often the type ofcompany that is pet-friendly,”Kain said. “These companieshave trouble finding people withthe skills they need and do notwant to lose these employees.”

Extrovertic, a health carecommunications agency with 40employees and offices in NewYork City and Cambridge,Mass., tested the waters last yearwith Take Your Dog to Work

Day. On June 22 this year, it wassponsored by North Carolina-based Pet Sitters Internationalto promote adoption.

The experiment was so suc-cessful that the company wentdog-friendly and Sally, a 5-year-old rescue beagle owned bysupervising account managerJared Shechtman, became TakeYour Dog to Work Day’s posterdog.

“We are a small agency. Wewant to be different. We wantthe quality of our employees’lives to be better than theywould get at a bigger agency.Having dogs in the office is

another way of saying, ‘We aredifferent and we care aboutyou,’” said company CEODorothy Wetzel.

Fifteen to 20 of the 120employees or freelancers work-ing at Authentic Entertainmentbring their dogs to work, saidco-founder and executive pro-ducer Lauren Lexton.

Lexton and Tom Rogandecided to let people bring dogsto work when they founded thecompany 11 years ago, because“it always felt right. Dogs give asofter element to everyday workand there is something abouthaving them around that makespeople happy.”

When you have great peo-ple, you want to keep themforever, she explained, so if theyhave a dog that’s used to comingto work, the person is less likelyto accept a better job offer if itcomes along.

Having animals around alsoencourages camaraderie,McCormack said. “Dogs auto-matically break down barriers.They are automatic conversationstarters and ice breakers.”

Not every business canallow dogs, said Kain, who start-ed DogFriendly.com with hiswife Tara 15 years ago inAnchor Point, Alaska.

Companies may be locatedin buildings that ban dogs; it canbe illegal for a food store, restau-rant, hair salon (in some states)or medical office; and insurancemay be a barrier, he said.

For others, allowing petsmay be a way to help make dowith fewer employees workinglonger hours. “By allowing dogsat work, an employee doesn’thave to leave to take care of thepet,” Kain said.

At Authentic Entertain-ment, Dolly’s biggest hurdle wasdeliverymen. “She has alwayshad a fear of carts and boxes andpeople in uniform,”McCormack said.

She introduced Dolly toAuthentic’s maintenance man,and because Dolly still barkedand growled at outside delivery-men, McCormack asked for aheads-up call from the frontdesk when they arrived.

Now she puts Dolly in herlap until the deliveries are fin-ished. Problem solved.

Dolly’s favorite part ofcoming to work is the attention,McCormack said. At home, sheplays second-fiddle to a 3-year-old. At work, Dolly is MissNovember in a calendar featur-ing employee dogs as characterson their shows.

“She is the toast of thetown,” McCormack said.“Everybody knows her and sheis the star.”

DOGS:Continued from C1

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AP photo

Bebe, a mix, sits at her owner’s desk while she works at Authentic Entertainment in Burbank.