It’s hard to describe some of the leaders of the Australian Travel Industry without mentioning the “C” word. And there are a few complete “T” words as well.
From Flight Centre’s Skroo Turner, to Globus’ Stewart Williams, to Rocky Mountaineer’s Robert Halfpenny, to This Is Africa’s Patrick Barden, or Albatross Tours’ Euan Lanesborough and NCL’s Nicole Costantin, many of the great entrepreneurs, leaders, and minds of the Australian Travel Industry worked as a tour manager for either Contiki or Top Deck (and most of them are probably eternally grateful that they were tour managers long before the invention of phone cameras and social media).
Blessed with good looks (well, except for one of them), charisma, intelligence, natural leadership abilities, and a positive attitude, the aforementioned would have been successful in any field they chose (possibly with the exception of veterinary science), but it is likely the processes, skills, and philosophies they developed and were exposed to on the road, like the following, helped create the foundation that led to their great success today:
Read on for Tour Guide enlightenment.
360° feedback: Tour Managers are evaluated on their role by over 40 different people at the close of every tour. It can be harsh, very personal, and sometimes very brutal, but ultimately it is one of the reasons both of these brands are a breeding ground for creating the best tour managers in the business.
Regular 360° feedback is a cornerstone in many successful corporations. With a rare “TM was a wanker” comment coming through on evaluations, the TM could assure himself that he simply could not please everybody, and have to cop it on the chin. If the “TM was a wanker” comments were on 100% of the evaluations, there’s no way around it, the TM was a wanker.
The Day Song: The start of every coach day on a tour begins with the playing of “The Day Song”. The song creates a sense of identity for each tour group; allows the TM time to gather his thoughts and try to work out where, how and why he got a Justin Bieber tattoo the night before; sets the tone for the rest of the day; and most importantly, pre-empts the three day ahead.
Music is the weapon of choice by stage and screen to tell a large group of people to STFU. Every large scale presentation you do should have music in the beginning to subtly quiet your crowd, and allow you time to focus.
The Three Day Ahead: After the day song, the Tour Manager will give the run down in detail of that day’s activities, followed by a brief summary of the following day, and the bullet points for day three. Traditionally, after the three day ahead, there is “the last night behind” where the tour manager will sit quietly in his seat and try to work out what led him to waking up that morning in the coach’s luggage bay next to a goat.
To a certain degree, if you constantly regurgitate to your staff your company direction, and their short and long term steps to that goal, then you will always have a focussed and engaged team.
The Day Sheet: The day sheet provides the timings, reminders, and announcements for that day, leading up to departure the following morning. It is the ultimate way to follow the number one acronym for every tour manager on the planet, in “CYA.”
Something in writing can never be disputed, and a great tour manager and corporate leader ensure that everything important gets written down, to minimise the risk of “he said-she said” later on.
The First Day Spiel: The first day spiel is the masterfully written, constantly refined, laying down of the law on the first day of any coach tour. It starts from the basic (“Be on time, or be left behind”), touches on the hygienic (“Even if you’ve made the personal choice not to wear deodorant, you must wear it on this coach”), and can get quite philosophical (“If you don’t like somebody, keep a courteous distance but be respectful, if you don’t like everybody, perhaps, it has a lot more to do with YOU, than it does with THEM).
No matter if it’s somebody’s first day on a coach, or in your office, they’ve got to know that it’s your way or the highway (and if everybody leaves, perhaps, it has a lot more to do with YOU, than it does with THEM).
It’s not about the reality; it’s about the perception: Tour Managers learn very quickly that any behaviour that comes close to crossing the line could create as much trouble as behaviour that actually crosses the line. So they learn to take a wide berth.
Taking the voluptuous inebriated Swedish backpacker for a walk home to ensure she arrives safely may seem like the noble thing to do, but nobility goes out the window the next morning when you face 40 sets of suspicious eyes and your driver decides to switch the day song up with Abba’s “Gimme, Gimme, Gimme.”
Taking the voluptuous inebriated Swedish backpacker for a walk home to ensure she arrives safely is not a good idea
Never sleep with a coach driver: There have only been two coach drivers in history that have been worth shagging– “David Cassidy” and “Sandra Bullock.” Sleeping with a coach tour driver is just a really bad idea. But how can this be applied to the corporate world? Easy, Sleeping with a coach tour driver is just a really bad idea.
Count the empties: A basic for any tour guide is to count the empty seats as opposed to counting passenger heads, in that counting to see if there are four empty seats on a 46 seat coach is a lot easier than counting 42 heads. Counting the empty stubbies around you in the morning is also a good way to quickly predict the severity of your hangover.
Any good tour manager or good tour leader worth their salt will constantly be looking at ways to make a process easier.
Terms and Conditions Section 5.3 and 23: Aristotle once said, “The whole is greater than the sum of its parts,” not Aristotle the Greek philosopher, but rather, Aristotle the Greek flotilla captain. He always had good advice, but get him on the ouzo and holy $#@%.
Kicking somebody off of a tour is a rare and hopefully avoidable situation, but absolutely necessary if they are a threat to others or the success of the tour. In the corporate environment, performance management is critical to the success of any team.
French Leave, Smoke Bomb, Houdini: Careers, reputations, and marriages die after at 12am, particularly in the era of social media. French leave is the great saviour of many a tour manager, and many a successful travel industry leader. The rule of thumb is, if you’re going to relieve yourself after 12am, first go to the toilet, and then to the taxi rank (don’t get the order wrong and relieve yourself in a taxi rank).
There’s no need to say goodbye and risk being convinced to stay, just look out after yourself, unless you are a voluptuous inebriated Swedish backpacker, and in that case, find the tour manager.
Problems are temporary: If you don’t have any health issues, or not going through a divorce with a narcissistic selfish psychopath who puts her own needs in front of your kids’ needs, uses your kids to grind every last cent from you, and tries to get you socially ostracised from your kids school, sports teams and, um, yeah, most problems are over in week or two.
What Goes On Tour, Stays On Tour: Whether you’re a tour manager or a manager of a business, other people’s business is other people’s business, rise above the gossip, don’t ever break a confidence or promise, treat your social media like your own personal brand, and don’t ever write anything that can be used against you (or get a nom de plume).