Academy Launches New Column on Continuous Improvement in Animal Welfare!
 The Academy is proud to announce the latest offering to better serve our learning partners and the animals in our care. Starting this month, the Academy's monthly e-newsletter will feature the column "Getting Better All the Time," by zoological community animal welfare attorney James F. Gesualdi. James recently published the inspirational and practical guidebook Excellence Beyond Compliance: Enhancing Animal Welfare Through the Constructive Use of the Animal Welfare Act. As an added benefit, Academy e-newsletter subscribers will be invited to participate in one-time, live Excellence Beyond Compliance® teleseminars
Getting Better All the Time
The San Diego Zoo Global Academy's course offerings provide an outstanding resource for zoological organization professional development and ongoing improvement. I am most grateful to be collaborating with the Academy in contributing this column containing best practices and ideas for continuous improvement in enhancing animal welfare above and beyond regulatory requirements and accreditation standards. These ideas derive from more than a quarter century of "lawyering from the heart" through serving the zoological community in transforming "back end" challenges into "front end" opportunities for fostering regulatory compliance, enhancing animal welfare and advancing organizational excellence. Here is this month's inaugural column.
—James F. Gesualdi
Name It
To keep ahead, each one of us, no matter what our task, must search for new and better methods—for even that which we now do well must be done better tomorrow. —James F. Bell
Animal welfare is the "master key" to the future sustainability of the zoological community. First, the well-being of the animals entrusted into our care is essential to maintaining the goodwill of the public, whose support is critical. Second, demonstrating good animal welfare helps the zoological community maintain the moral authority necessary for a leadership role in the lofty mission areas of wildlife and habitat conservation, conservation and humane education, and research to further animal welfare and conservation. Third, and most importantly, championing the well-being of the animals in our care, and the wild, is simply the right thing to do.
As Terry L. Maple and Bonnie M. Perdue write in Zoo Animal Welfare: "If we elevate its visibility and its priority, the welfare of zoo animals is bound to improve. The institutional mission statement must articulate and affirm core values that support animal care and welfare."
So, name it. Animal welfare, that is. Make it an explicit part of your organization's mission, website, and being, as well as your personal daily commitment to the animals in your care. No doubt it is already an implicit part of your tireless efforts on behalf of animals. Let the world know that you understand that some people may have concerns about the well-being of animals in zoological settings and in the wild. You get it. You're on it—in many cases, dedicating your lives to the animals you love, respect, and care for daily. Your zoological organization, the zoological community, the public and the animals all will benefit.
Getting better all the time.
© 2015 James F. Gesualdi, P.C. The opinions expressed herein are solely those of the author. This is not, nor should it be construed as, legal advice.
For more information on Excellence Beyond Compliance® click here
To order the ebook, click here.
To join us for a special April 22, 2015 teleseminar in which USDA APHIS Animal Care's regional directors will answer Animal Welfare Act-related questions submitted in advance, register by email at: info@excellencebeyondcompliance.com.
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