What kind of leader are you?

So I've been bothered alot lately by the fact that a few of our former volunteers have now taken everything they were taught by Ohio Pet Placement and running off and "starting thier own rescue".  I guess I was looking at it like "what the hell", we work so hard and they are abandoning us because they think it's soooo easy and they can do it on thier own.  Well that combined with the crap they stir up at the same time. 

We've done the hard part, we've created the paperwork, the policies and procedures and we have worked out many of the kinks to take rescue to the next level.  We suffer ALOT with the new ground we have tread on.  Why wouldn't we be upset?

Well, I was bitching about it one day and a friend whom I never even met outside of social networking, posted this:

"Crystal - if they can love and care for and save dogs like you do - then the world will be better for you creating all these new rescuers!  There are two different ways to be a leader - people looking up to you and wanting you to lead - or someone stepping on others to get to the top. Obviously you chose the first one. There is great blessing in doing good things well Crystal. Take great satisfaction in that and let the others do their thing. There is no trash talking that can make what you are doing a bad thing. So let it go. Karma will take care of it. Dont let them redirect your focus."

What a tremendous compliment right?  Admittedly it knocked me down a few needed notches and reminded me of the bigger picture, pet rescue.

I am a leader and people will follow me.  Those that branch of and recreate what I started and we built from the ground up are a testament to that.

So rather than wishing you ill will, I say thank you Cosmo's Buddies, thank you Sarah Huska, and thank you to all else yet to come.  Most of all, thank you Joleen for opening my eyes!

Would you come?

Many of you know that Ohio Pet Placement started in my bathroom, basement and garage.  We did adoptions via Petfinder, PetSmart and various other locations.  Then The Animal House came to be about two years ago, and we to rescue to a place it's never been, "THE MALL". 

Basically, we took the stereotypical idea of the "pet store" and only made rescue pets available for adoption, and at near pet store fees.  The foot traffic has been tremendous and adoptions drastically increased with a 7 day visibility schedule.  All great things, no complaints there.  HOWEVER, with the good there is always bad!  Overhead is through the roof, assholes come out of the woodwork and with the increased number of adoptions comes an increased number of unfortunate "imperfect" adoptions. 

Well, now it's time to consider renewing our lease with the Mall.  What if I told you that Ohio Pet Placement and Animal House now had a stand alone building, a nice big area to house adoptables, a huge area to add the service of day care, keep grooming and retail and TONS of land for whatever you can imagine. 

Would you come?