You can hire a trainer to come into your home and train your dog or you can go to classes for training, but you still may not be successful with your dog’s training. Why?…… It takes commitment to want change and make change happen. If you are allowing your dog to make too many decisions on their own and giving them too many privileges then behaviors will probably not change. You can complete all kinds of classes, have a dog who does well in class but goes home and growls at its owner when asked to move off a bed.
To change behavior the norm that you live with now must become different. Providing structure and rules that your dog expects and lives by. When you eat in the evening and you put your dog in “Place” or a “Down-Stay”, they learn quickly this is the routine or what is expected. I think there is confusion by what it means to provide structure. It is the privileges you allow your dog to have. Is your dog allowed to push through doorways to exit his crate or go outside? Structure would be you asking your dog to wait before exiting. A dog will do much better and behave appropriately when the rules are established and they know what is expected.
It takes commitment and willingness to change – it can be done! Change doesn’t have to be unpleasant, just different.