Laptops to lap dogs

Ray Aboyan walked the hallways of the Animal Humane Society, peering into the rooms where newly arrived dogs were quarantined for observation, where cats rested after surgery, and where several frisky dogs awaiting adoption wagged their tails as he approached.

"I don't think the public understands all the services we provide here. I didn't," said Aboyan, who a little more than a year ago was vice president of retail operations at Best Buy. "We've got adoptions for 10 different kinds of animals, an animal behavior hotline, camps for students, boarding for animals. ... That's why I wanted to be part of it."

Aboyan is the unlikely chief operating officer of the Animal Humane Society, the organization that resulted from the 2006 merger of three metro-area humane societies. The society runs shelters in Golden Valley, Buffalo, Coon Rapids, Woodbury and St. Paul, making it the largest Humane Society in the Upper Midwest.

Instead of overseeing service to customers buying plasma televisions and laptop computers, Aboyan now oversees services for people adopting everything from great Danes to parrots.

It is really not such a stretch, said Aboyan, who lives in Woodbury with his wife, Nancy, and their two children.

"You still have an incredible focus on what will meet the needs of the customer," he said. "You need to understand how to provide those services in a very efficient manner. And that includes financially."

The move to the Humane Society was a deliberate shift from the for-profit to the nonprofit world, said Aboyan, 51, who worked in retail more than 20 years.

"I was looking for something different," he said. "I love the commitment to a cause. You wake up and can't wait to go to work."

"Work" includes regular visits to all the shelters. Recently, Aboyan stopped by the Woodbury shelter to touch base with site manager Stacy Arvidson. Arvidson walked him through the shelter, explaining the status of the cats, dogs, rabbits and other animals and offering an update on their numbers.

"We've got 11 puppies coming in from another [outside] shelter next week," she told Aboyan as they eyed some empty cages.

Arvidson warned Aboyan that the shelter usually is relatively quiet in February. "But wait until spring," she said, "when this place will be crawling with cats and kittens."

After the update on supply and demand, Aboyan sat down with Arvidson to discuss general operations at the shelter. That included a staff resignation, the pet supply inventory, committee work and creating a "talent pipeline" to groom employees for new opportunities.

The meeting ended about 5 p.m., when Aboyan took a break in the lobby of the shelter. The sound of chirping birds echoed through the lobby. "Isn't that great?" he asked with a smile.

Aboyan said he has several priorities for his first year on the job. He wants to develop standard operating procedures at all of the shelters. He wants to instill a "relentless" focus on understanding customers and what they want. He wants to make the services offered by some of the shelters available in all of them.

He also hopes to increase the number of animals available to customers -- and at the same time improve those animals' lives -- by taking in more pets from across the state and region.

"I want us to expand our services to reach even more people in the community," he said.

Janelle Dixon, president of the Animal Humane Society, said Aboyan's retail background brings a useful perspective. "Oftentimes in animal welfare, there's a tendency to hire other people in animal welfare," Dixon said. "It's helpful to have an external business perspective and a particular expertise in the customer service area."

For more information on services available through the Humane Society, go to www. animalhumanesociety.org.

Jean Hopfensperger • 651-298-1553