The legacy of Bob and Marian Bailey, and why I believe our greatest responsibility is to empower others.
As I write this, I am returning from a very special week in the United States. Together with my wife Jolanda, I traveled to Arkansas to celebrate the 90th birthday of my dear friend and mentor, Bob Bailey.
But this was not just another birthday celebration. Thanks to the incredible efforts of Rob from Joint Forces K9, we organized an international seminar to celebrate 30 years of friendship, collaboration, and animal training. People traveled from all over the world to attend, while many others joined us through the livestream. It was an extraordinary experience. But for me, it was also deeply personal.
Because just over a year ago, I wasn't even sure I would still be alive to experience this moment.
Standing next to Bob, looking at the audience, I realized that this weekend represented something much bigger than animal training. It was about friendship, science, integrity, mentorship, and the responsibility we have to pass knowledge on to the next generation. And to explain why this means so much to me, I need to take you back to 1996.
It all started with an unusual assignment
In 1996, I joined a specialized police unit in the Netherlands. My assignment was challenging, to say the least. We had to develop completely new ways of training and deploying animals in complex operational environments. Imagine training a dog to operate independently, hundreds of meters away from its handler, guided by radio signals. Imagine developing complex behavior chains that had to remain reliable under enormous operational pressure, in unfamiliar environments, with changing teams, and under circumstances that were often impossible to predict. Traditional police dog training was simply not going to provide all the answers. There was no room for relying on punishment as our primary training strategy. Even the traditional choice of working breeds had to be reconsidered. We needed a different approach. But more importantly, we needed a different way of THINKING. How do you train an animal to make independent decisions? How do you develop reliable behavior when the environment is constantly changing? And how do you know whether your training program actually works, rather than simply believing it works? During my studies, I discovered the work of Marian and Bob Bailey. And that changed my life forever.
They didn't teach me a method. They taught me how to think.
Marian Breland Bailey, together with her first husband Keller Breland, had studied under B.F. Skinner.
In 1943, Marian and Keller established Animal Behavior Enterprises, bringing the science of operant conditioning out of the laboratory and into the real world. They trained an extraordinary variety of animal species and demonstrated what could be achieved when trainers understood the principles of learning and behavior. Their famous IQ Zoo became a remarkable demonstration of applied behavioral science.
But what impressed me most wasn't what they could teach an animal to do. It was HOW they approached the challenge. They wrote protocols. They defined criteria. They collected data. They observed behavior. They evaluated results. And when something didn't work, they didn't automatically blame the animal. They investigated WHY. Their famous 1961 publication, The Misbehavior of Organisms, demonstrated that biological predispositions and species-specific behaviors could interfere with learned responses.
Think about the significance of that. These were people who helped pioneer the practical application of operant conditioning, yet they were willing to question their own understanding when their observations challenged existing explanations. That is science. Not defending a method. Not protecting your reputation. Not proving that you are right. But trying to understand what is actually happening. Marian and Bob taught me that animal training is not about collecting techniques. It is about understanding behavior and developing the skills to change it systematically. And perhaps their most important lesson was this: Never stop questioning, learning, and improving.
From scientific principles to operational reality
I was fortunate enough to learn from Marian and Bob personally.
They challenged me constantly. Sometimes they pushed me so far outside my comfort zone that I wondered whether I would ever find my way back! But that was exactly where the learning happened. They taught me how to break complex behaviors into small, achievable steps. How to develop clear criteria. How to recognize the importance of timing, consequences, motivation, and environmental influences. And they taught me something that I still repeat during my workshops today. Mistakes are information.
When an animal doesn't meet the criteria, something in our training arrangement needs to be investigated.
Perhaps our criteria were unclear. Perhaps we moved too quickly. Perhaps the reinforcement history was insufficient. Perhaps environmental variables were influencing behavior in ways we had not anticipated.
The animal is giving us information. Our responsibility is to observe, analyze, and adjust. Together with Bob, I applied these principles to some extraordinary operational projects. One of the best-known examples was the development of our camera dogs. Dogs trained to operate independently at considerable distances from their handlers, initially using radio guidance and later also laser-guidance protocols. By 1997, we had deployed our first operational dog. What started as a highly specialized project eventually contributed to concepts that would become known to special operations units around the world. But not everything we developed was successful. Far from it. And some of our greatest learning experiences came from projects that failed. Because failure, when properly investigated, can be extremely valuable. That is something we should never forget.
A promise to Marian
Shortly before Marian passed away in 2001, I made her a promise.
I would do everything I could to keep the knowledge and technology that she, Keller, and Bob had developed alive. Not by repeating their work without questioning it. That would actually be the opposite of what they taught me. But by continuing to study, experiment, test, improve, and share. Over the past 30 years, I have tried to honor that promise. Through operational projects, research, workshops, seminars, product development, and countless conversations with trainers around the world. And throughout those years, Bob remained a mentor, colleague, and eventually one of my closest friends. We worked together, challenged each other, laughed, discussed ideas, and sometimes disagreed. And that was perfectly fine. Because friendship and professional respect do not require you to agree on everything. In fact, I believe that being able to challenge each other's ideas without damaging the relationship is one of the most valuable qualities of a true friendship.
Why are we still having the same discussions?
There is something that continues to surprise me about the animal training industry.
More than 80 years ago, Marian and Keller were already demonstrating the practical application of marker-based training and positive reinforcement. They were training an enormous variety of animal species using scientifically established learning principles. And yet, today, we are still having discussions about concepts that have been studied for decades. Why?
We have access to extraordinary scientific knowledge. We understand so much more about learning, motivation, reinforcement, stimulus control, generalization, and the influence of biological and environmental variables. Yet training decisions are still frequently based on tradition, personal beliefs, anecdotes, or whatever happens to be popular on social media. I have experienced this resistance myself. When I started working with breeds other than the traditional Belgian Malinois and German Shepherd, people sometimes laughed. A cocker spaniel for police work? A Labrador for specialized operational tasks? Impossible!
Or was it? Perhaps the problem wasn't the dog. Perhaps the problem was our limited understanding of how to train that dog. When trainers only have one technique available, every problem starts to look like something that must be solved with that same technique. And when the technique doesn't work, the animal gets blamed. I believe we can do better than that. Animal training is a profession that requires knowledge, practical skills, observation, critical thinking, and continuous professional development. It is not simply a collection of tricks copied from somebody else's training videos. And that brings me to something I consider even more important.
The most important animal in the training process
If we want to improve animal training, we need to pay much more attention to the person on the other end of the leash. The HUMAN.
We spend enormous amounts of time studying animal behavior. But how much time do we invest in understanding the behavior of the trainer? How do we teach people to observe objectively? How do we help them recognize their own biases? How do we teach them to collect meaningful data instead of drawing conclusions from a few successful training sessions? How do we encourage them to question what they see, including their own results? And perhaps most importantly, how do we create an environment in which people feel safe enough to make mistakes? Because the principles of learning do not suddenly stop applying when we move from animals to humans. Human behavior is also influenced by its consequences.
If we create a training culture in which people are ridiculed for asking questions, making mistakes, or challenging established opinions, we shouldn't be surprised when they stop doing those things.
And when people stop questioning, learning stops. This is exactly why I increasingly see my role as something bigger than teaching animal training. I want to EMPOWER people.
I don't want people to leave my workshops simply remembering what Simon told them to do. I want them to understand WHY something works. I want them to develop the skills to investigate problems independently. To write their own protocols. To collect and analyze their own data. To recognize when something needs to change. And to have the confidence to question even the things I teach them. Because if someone becomes dependent on me for every solution, I haven't done my job properly. My goal is to make people better trainers, not followers. That is what Marian and Bob did for me. And that is what I want to do for others.
Integrity is not something you can switch on and off
During our seminar, our dear friend Susan Garrett shared a thought about integrity that really resonated with me.
"Integrity is not only about doing the right thing when nobody is watching. It is also about being willing to tell people what they need to hear, rather than simply what they want to hear."
I couldn't agree more. We live in a time when popularity is often confused with expertise. Social media rewards attention, controversy, and emotional reactions. Unfortunately, not always accuracy, scientific reasoning, or professional behavior. But the number of followers someone has tells us very little about the quality of their training. I believe integrity requires us to practice what we preach. To acknowledge the work of others and give credit where credit is due. To be honest about our results, including failures. To stop presenting assumptions as facts. To remain curious instead of immediately judging. To disagree respectfully. And to create safe, inclusive learning environments for both animals and humans. It also means being prepared to change your own opinion when the evidence tells you to. Nobody has all the answers. Certainly not me. After 30 years, I am probably more aware than ever of how much we still don't know. But isn't that what makes our profession so fascinating?
A second promise, and a second chance
Then, just over a year ago, my own life suddenly changed. I was diagnosed with aggressive cancer, and my future became extremely uncertain. There were moments when I genuinely didn't know whether I would survive. During that difficult period, I made Bob another promise. If I survived, I would travel to the United States with Jolanda to celebrate his 90th birthday. Last weekend, I was able to keep that promise. And what a weekend it was. Rob from Joint Forces K9 made something truly special possible. Bob and I shared the stage again, surrounded by people who had traveled from around the world.
Our wonderful friends Susan Garrett, Jimmy Chen, and Lily Strassberg joined us as special guests, bringing their knowledge, friendship, and support. We shared experiences. We discussed science. We challenged ideas. And we laughed. Just as Bob and I have done for the past 30 years. Standing next to him, looking at the audience, I felt an overwhelming sense of gratitude. Not simply because I had survived. But because I was given another opportunity to do something meaningful with my life. To keep a promise. To celebrate a friendship. And to share knowledge that has changed my life.
The legacy is not a monument. It is a responsibility.
I sometimes wonder what Marian would think if she could see how the animal training world has developed.
She would probably be amazed by some of the progress we have made. But I suspect she would also challenge us to do better. Because the legacy of B.F. Skinner, Keller Breland, Marian Breland Bailey, and Bob Bailey is not something we should place on a pedestal and admire from a distance. It is something we have a responsibility to USE. To test. To challenge. To improve. And to pass on.
Their legacy doesn't survive simply because we remember their names or quote their publications.
It survives when we apply their scientific thinking. When we help another trainer understand behavior. When we create better learning environments. When we challenge an unsupported belief. When we admit that we were wrong. And when we empower someone else to achieve something they previously thought was impossible.
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That is why I continue to teach.
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That is why I continue to ask difficult questions.
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That is why integrity matters so much to me.
And that is why I will continue to share what I have learned, for as long as I can. Not because I want people to train like Simon Prins. Not because I want everyone to follow the Bailey approach without question. But because I want people to THINK. To become curious. To become critical. To become independent. And to understand that science is not a belief system.
It is a process of discovering what we know, what we don't know, and what we still need to investigate.
Bob, thank you for more than 30 years of friendship, trust, wisdom, and inspiration.
Marian, I haven't forgotten my promise. And to everyone who made this unforgettable weekend possible, thank you from the bottom of my heart. Sometimes life gives you a second chance. Make sure you use it for something meaningful.
And I would like to leave you with one final question.
If we know so much more about learning and behavior than we did 80 years ago, why do we still so often train as if that knowledge doesn't exist? Keep questioning. Keep learning. And above all, keep sharing
