The private tour guide job, just like any other, has its own advantages and disadvantages. However, everything is relative: the same work feature can seem bad to someone, and to others, it will be good. What are the distinguishing features of this activity and for what kind of people it will be a labor of love?
Is Guide Work Your Labor of Love? Here's Who It's Perfect For
A private tour guide organizes his working process on his own. Nobody mandates how many days of the month he has to work and when to take a vacation. What routes to offer tourists, where to look for customers, and how to advertise his services, all of these issues are also solved by a professional without the chief’s guidance.
This independence of the working schedules and responsibilities created by someone else is a definite advantage of this job. However, not everybody feels comfortable in such conditions, in fact, you have to be responsible for each step.
Communication with people
If you are not a sociable person, and enjoy solitude and silence, this job is definitely not for you. Here you have to communicate much of your working time (excluding gathering of information and a new route creation time). Therefore, the tour guide must have such "work tools" as the right speech and attractive appearance.
The speech requirements are numerous:
- clear articulation and compliance with language rules;
- logical presentation of the content;
- absence of confusing terms and complex language patterns;
- speech expression through metaphors, epithets, aphorisms, and proverbs.
Not everyone can be eloquent without the slightest effort, but that is not a reason to deny the opportunity to become a tour guide. After all the necessary skills can be learned in rhetoric courses.
The appearance of the tour guide should be such to imbue people with confidence and make them want to continue the conversation. The essential components of the image are neat clothes and a haircut. By the way, is not necessary to use business and formal clothing, "casual" is acceptable (even with sports elements). The most important is that the clothes should be comfortable and not restrict movement.
Those who work with people cannot do without the knowledge of psychology. A tour guide should create a friendly atmosphere, resolve conflicts, and understand customer reactions. Yes, you can’t relax on a walk, as the working process requires concentration and observation. Someone believes it's a disadvantage of this job, but someone perceives it as an incentive for self-improvement, so he hones his skill to dress stylishly, be eloquent, and forge relationships.
Physical activity
Here your work conditions have different circumstances, as it can take outdoors at any time of the year. Of course, you won’t take tourists for a walk in a downpour or a snowstorm, but other weather conditions are not an obstacle for walking.
This feature can be perceived as a disadvantage and an advantage: on the one hand, hiking is quite tedious, and on the other, it strengthens the body. If you have no health problems (joint pain, weak heart, etc.), such physical activity will only benefit you.
The tour guide’s vocal cords are subject to considerable stress. The techniques developed for the actors and singers can prompt how to maintain their efficiency.
Continuous self-education
This job makes you fill up your baggage of knowledge all the time. How well do you know Berlin? You will also have to master Dresden. Do you do private tours of Paris? Can you also tell your tourists about Versailles or Fontainebleau? The opinion that is enough to create a route with its story once and not to invent anything else is wrong. Firstly, you need to update the text with new data: archaeologists make discoveries, historical conceptions change, emerge previously unknown facts. Secondly, you can turn your occasional customers into regular ones only offering new excursions. Whether is a disadvantage or an advantage depends on how much you like to learn.
So, who would enjoy working as a tour guide? Those people who are ready to organize their activities with no boss, like to communicate with people, are not afraid to walk and talk a lot, and love to educate themselves.
Read our previous article - From Sydney to Bodrum: Travel Tips for Your Journey
Read our next article - Private Guide World is an online service that joins together tourists and local private tour guides
