Today is Bring Your Dog To Work Day and earlier this week, Scottish and Southern Electricity Networks (SSEN) opened the doors of its Reading depot to two canine colleagues.
Ozzy and Jake are trained therapy dogs and had accompanied their owner, Cen Owen in to his Theale office to raise awareness of their voluntary role, highlight the benefits that therapy dogs can have on mental health and stress-related illness, and help boost funds for a local charity.
Cen, Ozzy and Jake's mission was to create a little moment of calm for their colleagues and in return receive a tasty treat and a donation for Reading's Duchess of Kent Hospice.
Cen, who works in Network Construction for SSEN, has been taking nine-year-old Ozzy and three-year-old Jake to hospices, care homes and other organisations for a number of years, where they bring affection and calm reassurance to patients and residents.
He explains how his much-loved pets became therapy dogs:
"A few years ago, my Grandmother was in a care home and we would always take Ozzy to visit. The residents loved having him there and when my Grandmother passed away, the home contacted me to say how much they were missing seeing Ozzy and the joy he brought to them. That gave me the impetus to look into how we could help and I set about putting Ozzy through all of the training courses he needed to become an official therapy pet."
"Ozzy retired from his role last September, after six years of bringing happiness and comfort to hundreds of people, and Jake is now stepping up and continuing that good work."
"It was great to bring the dogs in to work today, to hear my colleagues talk about their own pets and the benefits that they can bring to our physical and mental health, and we raised over £100 along the way for a great cause. The only downside was realising that Ozzy and Jake are more popular than me!"
SSEN's Head of Region for the area, Danielle Royce added:
"At SSEN, caring for our customers is at the heart of all we do, offering additional services such as our Priority Services Register and it had occurred to us that Ozzy and Jake may well have visited some of those customers in their capacity as therapy pets."
"It's really important to show our colleagues that we care about them too, so we encouraged them to take a little bit of time out, interact with the dogs and share an understanding of why it matters so much to care; not only for others, but for ourselves and our own health and well-being."
"It's great to know that so many people have benefitted from today's canine 'therapy sessions' and it gave everyone here an extra boost to know they were raising money for a local charity by taking part. Ozzy and Jake are welcome back anytime."