BEATING THE DRUM

Just back from the Trafalgar Tours annual seminar in which we were reminded for the umpteenth time of the importance of service to our clients - a friend in unfamiliar territory, a helpful smiling face, etc etc. Such a contrast to blue badge guiding where qualifications and the status of your badge is of paramount importance. Not a thing was mentioned about the quality of the information you provided, all about the importance of looking after people, not pushing optionals too hard, how to win friends and influence people. Quite a culture shock from bbg - it takes all sorts to make a world.
My own ratings were disappointing (relatively) and I resolved to follow through all complaints until I got satisfaction for the passengers, as far as possible, because people who complain and ahve their grievances addressed become firmer friends than those for whom everything goes smoothly. Will I still feel like this in October?

INSTITUTE vs APTG

Interesting to see Adam Smith on the new £20 note - he it was who said that when people of the same profession or trade get together, if only for social purposes, it is not long before they start to conspire against the public. Or, as G B Shaw put it more pithily, the professions are a conspiracy against the common man. I thought of this when confronted with the statement from the Insitute about the Westminster guide course which APTG and the Guild are supposed to have endorsed, but which APTG immediately repudiated.

After a few years as a civil servant, I became a guide to get away from bureaucracy - but now I find that bureaucracy is following me into this profession. Briefly (?) the Institute of Tourist Guiding is under pressure to undermine/eliminate the Westminster Guide Course run by City University - particularly from mebers of APTG who do not want a rival to the blue badge course which they feel would undermine their status and position. At first I shared some of these concerns but now I am not so sure.

The reason is that the new Westminster course does not do much more than qualify you to conduct walking tours (which anyone can do - you need no qualifications for these kind of tours which are totally unregulated). It does not include Wesminster Abbey, the obvious site, which only blue badge guides can conduct tours in, so it seems a relatively minor threat to the badge.
The fact that it does not include the Abbey or any other site means that it is not accredited by the Institute as an official course, although that does not necessarily mean it has no right to exist. To complicate matters, it is run by Lucy McMurdo who is on the accreditation committee of the Institute and who thus has a conflict of interests.
Hell hath no fury like a) a woman scorned and b) a qualified professional person who feels his status is under threat. I work mainly in extended touring and should be careful not to dictate to full-time guides what they should be concerned about but the tussle over this course seems to be a million miles from making sure that people have a good day out or extended tour.
This wone will run and run...

ON THE CUSP

Back to guiding for a few weeks after a six day tour to soctland and back. It seems strange to claim that I do two different jobs, guiding and tour directing, but there realy is a lot of difference in the two roles. In guiding you have to make an impression quickly, grab people's attention and keep them stimulated for the day - up to a point: the out of town day trips are often used to catch up on sleep - while as a tour director you have to make people feel welcome and wanted. Things like making sure the middle door of the coach is opened whenever possible and being there to help them off, knowing how to operate a company phone card, organise seat rotation, remain cheerful at all times of day (and night) are what make an extended tour successful.

Basically, being a good asset to the company you work for is the basis of tour directing, while being a good asset to the profession is the basis of guiding.

WE SHOULD BE TOLD

Major embarassment at Changing fo the Guard on Monday when could not identify flags, had to ask (two) policemen and eventually found out they were of Ghama, country I was born in! My excuse is that it was the Gold Coast in those days (before independence) and the flag is different. In fact they were there for the state visit to comem 50 years of independence and (by African standards) reasonable stability. This infor should have been in new Guild/APTG diary bt was not so will suggest its inclusion - all very well knowing that the Q is visiting the Asociation of toilet flushers and handwashers on a particular day but we should be told what the flags are.
Off on tour next week and the main problem as usual will be how to seem to run a reasonably paced tour while still managing to fir in the optionals - can we do the N Wales tour on a day which takes us from Bath to Lancaster via wedgwood and Chester? Can we do an evening out after a day in Cornwall that includes Looe, St Ives and Lands End? Dare we go 'the wrong way' around the Ring of Kerry in order to get to the early banquet at Bunratty, which seems the only option given that we are staying at Kenmare rather than Killarney? Who thought up these itneraries anyway. We should be told.
Actually it was a combination of yours truly, Paul Fleming with Christine 'creative' Upton and the people who choose the hotels in all the wrong places...

BRYSON DOES IT

Just read Notes from a Small Island and Notes from a Big Country after A Short History of Nearly Everything - become a bit of A Bill Bryson bore in recent days. The thing is I feel I can do that as well as he. I think I have a similar turn of phrase and can express infuriation (maybe a bit too polite?) and humour in same way. What he has, which I don't at present, is the writer's professionalsim. He has built up contacts, got into the habit and produces lots of stuff in the fairly sure knowledge that it gets printed sooner or later. He has a dedicated readership and a name and so can write pretty much what he wants knowing that it will at least get noticed. I can write the stuff but the best I get are polite rejections, the worst being ignored.
There is no easy route past this unless I meet him on a plane/train and he takes me under his wing and orders his contacts to take me up as a promising writer. Just have to keep producing, hustling and hope that something strikes sooner or later. Talking of which, back to work...