The door opens 6 inches for a package. Your dog is past your knees, down the steps and two houses along before you have said their name. You are standing in the street in socks.
This is not the same problem as a dog who mobs the guest once they are inside. That one is about the greeting. This one is about the gap in the door, and it can end badly.
Why the door is the hardest 3 feet in the house
The front door is the only place in the house where the entire outside world appears at once. Smells, movement, people, other dogs. Every dash that works pays out inside a second.
Adolescence sits on top of that. Around the onset of the stage, dogs respond less to the cues of the person who raised them, and that responsiveness returns later on. This is why calling your dog as they go through the doorway so rarely works.
There is usually a chase in the story too. You go after your dog, your dog speeds up, and the whole thing becomes the best game of the week.
Do these 4 things today, before any training
Check the tag on the collar and the microchip registration. A dog who gets out needs your current phone number on them tonight, not next month.
Put a barrier 6 feet back from the front door. A baby gate across the hallway, or a closed interior door, means the outside door is never the only thing between your dog and the street.
Leash on a well-fitted harness before the door opens, every single time, for the next 2 weeks. Deliveries included.
Tell everyone in the house the same rule in one sentence: nobody opens the front door without knowing where the dog is.
Safety note
A dog who bolts into a road is in danger, and so is the person following them. Never chase your dog down a street; run the other way, or crouch and open a car door, so they come toward you. Get help now if your dog bolts in a panic rather than in excitement, or cannot be caught outdoors. The same applies after a car strike or a near miss. That needs a veterinarian and a qualified behaviour professional. Book the veterinary examination anyway if this behaviour is new, because sudden behaviour change warrants one.
Never tell your dog off for coming back
The moment your dog reappears is the moment you most want to shout, and it is the one moment you cannot. Punishment-based approaches are associated with fear, avoidance and defensive aggression.
There is a practical cost as well. A dog who has been grabbed and scolded on their return gets harder to catch the next time. Pay them, in food, every time, no matter how long they kept you standing there.
Then 5 minutes a day at the door
Put a mat 8 feet from the door and pay your dog for lying on it while you walk over and touch the handle. Nothing opens yet.
Open the door 1 inch and close it, then feed your dog on the mat. Do 10 of these. The door opening becomes the thing that pays, so it stops being the thing to race.
Build to the door standing open for 3 seconds with your dog on the mat and the leash on. Go back a step whenever your dog gets up twice in a row.
Teach a hand touch you can use in a hurry. Hold your palm out, feed when your dog's nose lands on it, 10 reps a day, until it works in the hallway.
Deliveries, guests and the school run
Put your dog behind the gate with a chew before you answer the door, rather than after the knock has already set them off.
Ask couriers to leave packages outside. A note on the door costs nothing and removes the most common opening of the week.
Do the leash first, then the door, then the greeting, in that order, until you have gone 2 weeks without a dash.
Behaviour change is built from management plus reinforcement together, and reward-based methods are what the veterinary behaviour guidance recommends. Keep the barrier up well after the dashing stops. Nobody can promise you a dog who will never try the door again, and the gate is what makes that acceptable.
Today's version, in one line: check the tag and the chip, and put a gate across the hallway before the next knock.