How To Do A Root Cause Analysis for Dog Welfare Organizations

Every day, dog welfare organizations face overwhelming challenges. From rabies outbreaks affecting over 150 countries to shelters bursting at the seams with surrendered pets, the problems can seem endless. Add to this the concerning rates of veterinarian burnout and chronic funding shortages, and it’s clear that organizations need a strategic approach to tackle these issues effectively. This is where root cause analysis comes in.

Table of Contents

Understanding Root Cause Analysis

What Is It?

At its core, root cause analysis is about looking beyond the surface of problems to understand what’s really driving them. As Harvard Business School defines it, it’s “the process of articulating problems’ causes to suggest specific solutions.” Think of it as being a detective – instead of just treating symptoms, you’re uncovering the underlying story.

Breaking Down the Myths

As dog welfare advocates, we are often too eager to jump into help the dogs, thus blinded by the fact that we are only taking on the symptoms but not the root causes. Many dog welfare professionals also hesitate to embrace root cause analysis due to common misconceptions:

“I already know the root causes.” While experienced professionals often have deep insights into local issues, systematic analysis frequently reveals surprising underlying factors they hadn’t considered.
“Root causes can’t be addressed in the short term.” While some root causes require long-term cultural changes, analysis often reveals quick wins – like improving communication between welfare organizations.
“The root causes are beyond my organization’s control.” Even when you can’t directly influence a root cause, understanding it helps you guide stakeholders to appropriate resources or form strategic partnerships.

Why Should Dog Welfare Organizations Perform Root Cause Analysis?

Set Meaningful Goals

When facing a full shelter or endless spay/neuter waitlists, it’s easy to feel like you’re running on a treadmill. Simply pushing staff to increase adoption numbers or surgical procedures often leads to burnout without solving the underlying issues.

Demonstrate Impact to Funders

According to Battersea, a major international dog welfare funder, donors increasingly expect charities to understand and address root causes. This analysis helps prove you’re investing resources in solving fundamental problems, not just treating symptoms.

Ground Your Work in Evidence

The strength of root cause analysis lies in its foundation of concrete data. Rather than relying on assumptions or anecdotes, effective analysis draws from multiple reliable sources, including focus groups, household surveys, shelter data, as well as municipal statistics. This evidence-based approach ensures your solutions address real, documented issues rather than perceived problems. It also provides a baseline against which you can measure your impact later on.

Engage Stakeholders Effectively

The analysis process itself serves as a powerful communication tool, bringing stakeholders together and ensuring everyone understands the true scope of challenges. When stakeholders see their own data and experiences reflected in the analysis, they’re more likely to support and participate in solutions.

When Should You Conduct a Root Cause Analysis?

Perfect Timing

Before launching a new organization or project
When existing projects have hit a plateau
During annual strategic planning
When facing persistent systemic issues

Common Trigger Issues

Street Dog Challenges:

Overwhelming stray populations
Human-dog conflicts
Community demands for culling
High demand for spay/neuter services

Shelter Dog Challenges:

Overcrowding
High euthanasia rates
Low adoption rates
Competition from backyard breeders

Owned Dog Issues:

Pet obesity epidemic
Rising animal abuse cases
Poor breeding practices
Use of outdated training methods

The Problem Tree Method

What Is a Problem Tree?

There are several common tools used for root cause analysis, including fishbone diagrams, Pareto charts, and change-effect analysis. However, one of the more popular approaches in the dog welfare world is the problem tree analysis, which has been covered by courses taught by Battersea Dogs & Cats Homes as well as IFAW.

A problem tree is a visual tool that maps out the relationship between causes and effects in dog welfare issues. Think of it as creating a detailed map of your challenges.

*Source: www.iisd.org/csconservation/conflict_tree.aspx*

Although some problem trees take the visualized form of a tree, while others are simplified to include only the boxes that represent the causes and effects. Regardless, the key components of a problem tree are the trunk, roots, and branches.

Key Components

1. The Trunk

Think of the trunk as your central challenge – the issue that keeps you up at night. It might be an overcrowded shelter or a surge in stray dogs.

When dealing with complex situations, you might identify multiple trunk issues. Don’t worry if this happens – often, as you dig deeper, you’ll discover these seemingly separate problems share common root causes.

2. The Roots

The roots represent the underlying causes of your trunk issue. One effective technique for uncovering these is the “5 Whys” method. Here’s a real-world example:

Issue: Post-pandemic surge in shelter intakes

Why? People are surrendering dogs as they return to office work
Why? They feel they have no alternatives for dog care
Why? Professional dog care services are prohibitively expensive
Why? There’s a shortage of affordable dog care facilities
Why? Restrictive city bylaws make it difficult to establish new pet care businesses

Each “why” might reveal multiple answers, creating a complex network of root causes. This is good – it helps identify multiple intervention points.

3. The Branches

Branches represent the consequences flowing from your trunk issue. You can explore how an effect could further create chain reactions by asking the question, “then what?”. For example:

Overcrowded shelter →

Reduced exercise time for dogs →
- Declining physical health
- Increasing behavioral issues →
  - Lower adoption rates →
    - Even more overcrowding

Creating The Solution Tree

Once the problem tree is complete, the next step is to create a “solution tree”. The solution tree transforms your problem analysis into action. Here’s how to build one:

Start with your problem tree
Convert each negative statement into a positive goal
Transform root causes into action strategies
Change effects into positive outcomes

An example from Battersea’s Introduction to Strategic Planning course is shown here:

An example from Battersea Academy’s Introduction to Strategic Thinking course.
(Credit: Battersea Dogs & Cats Home)

Real-World Case Study: The Long-Stay Shelter

Let me share a revealing case study from my time as a shelter volunteer. Our shelter had become a long-term home for many of our dogs – not for days or weeks, but for months stretching into years. Every kennel was full, and still, more dogs needed help.

What started as a typical overcrowding issue unveiled itself as something far more complex through root cause analysis.

Problem Tree

Trunk Issue: Dogs staying in the shelter for years instead of months or even weeks

Root causes: Initially, we’d identified the underdeveloped local adoption culture as our primary obstacle. We’d often end discussions there with a resigned sigh, viewing it as an immovable barrier. However, a problem tree analysis would push us to explore further. We discovered that what we’d labeled as “adoption culture” actually consisted of specific, addressable misconceptions. For instance, many potential adopters believed medium-sized dogs couldn’t thrive in apartments – a myth we could actively dispel through targeted education and success stories.

Branches: Our analysis revealed surprising connections we hadn’t considered before. While we’d always understood that long-stay dogs strained our budget, we hadn’t fully mapped out the cascading effects. Extended shelter stays led to increased stress behaviors in dogs, which in turn made them harder to adopt. This created a negative feedback loop: fewer adoptions meant more long-stay dogs, leading to further strain on resources and staff, ultimately impacting our ability to rehabilitate and showcase our dogs effectively.

Solution Tree

The breakthrough can come when we convert our problem tree into a solution tree. Instead of a vague goal to “improve adoptions,” we can set a concrete target: rehoming dogs within three months of intake. This clarity helped us identify specific, actionable strategies.

The solution tree highlighted three key areas for intervention. First, we need to make our shelter more welcoming and accessible to the public, transforming it from a place of last resort to a community resource. Second, we have to invest in behavioral training to ensure our dogs were showing their best selves to potential adopters. Finally, we need to reshape the public narrative around rescue dogs through success stories and community engagement.

You can open the problem tree analysis and solution tree as a template by pressing here.

In addition, you can find additional examples in the resources below:

IFAW and CATF’s Managing Dogs in First Nations, page 187
ICAM’s Humane Dog Population Management Guidance (2019), page 96

Facilitating a Problem Tree Analysis Session

While a problem tree analysis can be a useful individual exercise, it is most powerful when done collaboratively in a group setting. According to IFAW and the Canadian Animal Task Force (CATF), the problem tree tool can be applied in a group workshop using the following 9-step process:

Introduction: Begin by explaining the purpose of the session and providing an overview of the problem tree methodology.
Review Information: Ask the group to review any relevant data, research, or other information that may inform the analysis.
Individual Brainstorming: Have participants individually brainstorm and identify issues they see as relevant for the “trunk” of the problem tree.
Small Group Discussion: Divide the participants into smaller groups to discuss the trunk issues they came up with and agree on the most pressing problem.
Full Group Discussion: Reconvene the larger group and facilitate a discussion to reach consensus on the key trunk issue(s).
Build the Roots: As a group, work through the root causes by repeatedly asking “Why?” to uncover the underlying factors.
Build the Branches: Identify the symptoms and effects stemming from the trunk issue, mapping them out as the branches of the tree.
Finalize the Tree: Review the completed problem tree as a group, ensuring it accurately represents the dynamics and is supported by evidence.
Reflection and Next Steps: Discuss the implications of the problem tree and any additional information needed to strengthen the analysis. Determine the appropriate next actions.

This collaborative approach helps ensure the problem tree encompasses diverse perspectives and is grounded in the community’s real experiences and data. The Managing Dogs in First Nations guide provides more detailed guidance on facilitating these problem tree analysis sessions.

Using Root Cause Analysis to Make Your Dog Welfare Initiatives and Organization Redundant

Lastly, one of the most powerful applications of root cause analysis is using it to work yourself out of a job. This might sound counterintuitive, but it’s the hallmark of truly successful animal welfare work.

This means ensuring a community no longer requires a dog shelter because there are no more homeless dogs, or that they have the expertise and infrastructure to manage their own dog population. A thorough root cause analysis can help identify the reasons your organization is still needed, so you can develop strategies to make yourself obsolete.

Additional Resources

Above represents a quick overview of the importance of a root cause analysis, as well as how to produce one. There are many more resources available, both from dog welfare-related organizations as well as more generic resources:

Dog Welfare Organizations

Battersea’s Introduction to Strategic Thinking Course
- Focus on stepping back from operations
- Strategic planning tools
- Case studies and examples
International Companion Animal Management coalition (ICAM)’s Humane Dog Population Management Guidance (2019)
- Problem and solution tree templates
- Implementation strategies
IFAW and Canadian Animal Task Force (CATF)’s Managing Dogs in First Nations guide
- Community engagement strategies
- Cultural consideration frameworks

Other Organizations

Swiss Federal Institute of Aquatic Science and Technology (Eawag), along with UN-Habitat, published a step-by-step guide on how to perform a problem tree analysis
ODI, a global affairs think tank, has a problem tree analysis toolkit available for download.
Wageningen University has an adapted version of the ODI toolkit which is also available for the public.
World Animal Net contains an explanation of the problem tree analysis on their blog.

Conclusion

In the face of endless challenges in the dog welfare sector – from the global rabies epidemic to overflowing shelters – it’s tempting for organizations to simply react to the most urgent, visible problems. However, to drive meaningful, sustainable change, it’s essential to take a step back and uncover the root causes behind these persistent issues.

Root cause analysis, particularly through the powerful tool of the problem tree, provides a structured way for dog welfare groups to dig deep and reveal the underlying drivers fueling the problems they confront. By visualizing the connections between symptoms, causes, and effects, organizations can develop interventions targeted at the core of the matter rather than just the symptoms.

Moreover, root cause analysis can be a valuable exercise for dog welfare organizations to assess their own need for existence. By using this methodology to identify the reasons a community still requires external assistance, groups can work towards making themselves redundant – the ultimate mark of success.

Investing the time and effort into thorough root cause analyses may seem daunting, but it is a critical investment in the long-term impact and sustainability of dog welfare initiatives. With a deeper understanding of the problems they face, organizations can create more effective, lasting solutions that truly transform the lives of dogs and communities.