This is Dumb. Don’t Do This.
Ideally, this article would appear on a website aimed specifically at resort dive operators and their employees. As a retailer, though, it impacts you as well. Take its message to heart and share it with those resort instructors and divemasters whom you think need to hear it.
Recently I was talking to an Ohio-based dive retailer whom I’ve known since 1980. She is a vastly experienced diver, instructor, store owner and group trip leader. The store owner related an experience she had this past year on a liveaboard in the eastern Caribbean. According to her, the attitude of a single crew member just about ruined the trip for herself and her group.
Okay, I too have been a dive boat captain and crew member. I know, from experience, that it can actually be beneficial to project a little bit of attitude — so long as you do it in the right way. Those of us who work (or have worked) on dive boats and at dive resorts get to see a lot of idiots — some of them instructors and store owners. So long as we pass on the lessons we’ve learned over time in a diplomatic and constructive manner, our guests can benefit from our experience. There’s a fine line, however, between story-telling-with-attitude and just plain attitude.
Apparently, the divemaster the store owner told me about doesn’t know how to walk that line. He doesn’t even come close. For reasons passing understanding, this divemaster took an instant dislike to the store owner’s group — and to her, its leader.
Okay, I know what it’s like to have a group of bozos* show up on your boat — with the chief bozo being the group leader. I also know what it’s like to come across a wet-behind-the-ears, know-it-all divemaster who thinks that, just because he graduated from 30 Day Wonder instructor school, he knows more about diving than you do (despite the fact you’ve been teaching since ten years before he was born and have taught and guided more divers than he ever will in the six months before he burns out and goes back to Passaic to clerk in a convenience store).
Back to our story: The divemaster in question’s chief problem was that he couldn’t keep his mouth shut.
- He was openly critical of the group, its collective diving ability, and how they liked to do things.
- Worse, he was openly critical of the group leader in front of her customers.
Here is a specific example: I’m not a huge fan of Force Fins; however, I have several friends who not only sell them in their stores, they recommend Force Fins over all others. So, when I’m around these friends’ customers, guess what? Force Fins become the greatest invention since sliced bread.
When it comes to the wisdom of doing this, the divemaster in our story clearly Doesn’t Get It. He apparently made quite an issue around customers that he felt Force Fins were “inadequate” — and that the only people dumber than divers who used Force Fins were the dive store owners who sell them.
Reality Check: I don’t care if it’s Satan and his minions who come aboard your boat (or stay at your dive resort). For that week, it’s the group leader, more than anyone else, who is responsible for not only paying your salary, but the salary of everyone else associated with your dive operation, the hotel — even the folks back at the reservation office on the mainland. If you piss that group leader off, you can not only kiss your tip goodbye, you may need to start looking for employment elsewhere.
In this instance, the store owner I spoke with will most likely:
- Never book a group trip on that liveaboard again.
- No longer recommend it to other dive stores or individual divers.
- Tell other dive store owners (and after 30 years, she knows a bunch of you) about her experience so that they, too, will not do business with this operation.
In other words, because of the attitudes of one individual, this operation stands to lose tens of thousands (if not hundreds of thousands) of dollars of business over the next few years. Could your business afford this?
The young people who work at dive resorts and aboard dive boats are not always the most mature individuals in the world. It’s not unusual for them to place saving the dive industry from whatever ills they imagine are befalling it than it is for them to put their employer’s best interests first. Unfortunately, if you are the one employing these people, you can’t afford that kind of attitude.
As a group leader, you shouldn’t have to tolerate this sort of behavior — not after putting $15,000-$20,000 or more in accommodation and dive fees in somebody’s pocket. As soon as you come across a dive-operation employee with the wrong kind of attitude, go as far up the food chain as you can with your concerns.
- In other words, don’t just tell the employee’s immediate boss, tell the dive operation’s owner or manager.
- If you are staying at a land-based dive resort, tell the hotel management as well. The hotel often has a greater financial stake in your group’s repeat business than the dive operator does.
- If you don’t get satisfaction, by all means, take your business elsewhere.
As a dive store owner, you invest considerable time, money and effort building a reputation among customers. The last thing you need to put up with is some twenty-something with an attitude undoing everything you’ve worked to achieve. And there is no reason why you should.
*“Bozo” is the anglicized version of the Spanish word buzo, which means “diver.” It is only coincidentally similar to the name of a famous clown (which also happens to be a registered trademark).
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