Before you become a dive instructor you should know this

Before you become a dive instructor you should know this

Do you want to become a dive instructor?

Reading online, it looks like this is THE BEST dream job you could ever have. Some dive instructors even tell you they are “living the dream”.

I was not living the dream at all during my first year as a dive instructor. I did not find a job, the money was low (I had to travel to my home country to make some bucks) and the jobs offered seemed to involve a hell lot of work and little salary.

Today, I am gonna show you useful tips to understand before you become a dive instructor. At the end, I will also tell you if I think it still was one of my best decisions to become a dive instructor.

Have savings before you become a dive instructor

I had little money left after I did become a dive instructor. That was not a good idea. The first jobs are hard to get. The first payment is usually not the best.

To be honest, it looks like in the majority of industries a newbie is having those challenges. Scuba diving is just no exception.

If you save some cash before you become a dive instructor you won’t have the same issue like me.

The good things about this is that you

• Can focus on getting good dive jobs
• Don’t have to take the first available dive job with crappy conditions
• Won’t be desperate
• Can keep up a fun lifestyle
• Are able to pay your flight home after your first working season
• Can invite your boy/girlfriend for a dinner

Photo by Jimi Filipovski on Unsplash

Have a solid perseverance

Perseverance is not a long race, it is many short races one after the other.

Walter Elliot

I got quite some personal messages from the members of my Facebook group asking for advice on their CV or how to apply. Some sound even a bit frustrated after getting rejected by the first five to ten dive shops.

Before you become a dive instructor keep in mind: The first year can be tough. I mean really tough.

Read this quote carefully and watch the duck:

Photo by bestsayingsquotes.com

It can be normal to send out more than forty or fifty job applications. I have sent out more in the past. I am not talking about mass-emails and one email and CV fits all. These were individually crafted emails and CVs for each dive shop.

But read on to see what works better than emails after you have just become a dive instructor.

Choose your location to start-off

A few tips from my own, sometimes painful, experience:

The first dive jobs you might get the best by being at your desired location. Why?

You can show your

• Motivation better than via email
• Willingness to help out one day
• Personality which is harder to convey via email
• Dress is professional
• Knowledge in diving
• Eagerness to learn
• Perseverance

Also, this is good for you because you can see in real life what is going on in a dive shop. You can see if you like the people, the work etc. Via email, you can’t and that can be fatal for you. Besides that, you can start learning the local language.

At the same time, imagine the perspective of an employer if you apply via distance (from another country or area). If you have just become a dive instructor you have no diving-referees at the beginning. You can not show any work experience and even more important the dive shop owner has a hard time to see your attitude and motivation.

Why would an employer take the risk and offer you a work permit and a full-time contract?

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Timing can be important

Applying as dive instructor during a high season for tourists is usually too late. The good and well-organized dive shops equip themselves with good dive staff months before the high season because the work permits need time to get issued and the new staff needs to be trained.

Sometimes during a high season dive staff leaves unexpectedly. This can be your chance to fill a position but usually only if you are present and known by the dive shop already.

Photo by Brooke Lark on Unsplash

Choose the dive shops to start-off carefully

I have coached new dive instructors who are disappointed because they were rejected after sending job applications to the top level liveaboards or dive shops in their desired areas.

If you are new to an area and/or you have just become a dive instructor be humble. It is unlikely you will get the dive jobs in the top notch 5-star dive shops and liveaboards.

Apply at small shops first, learn the local language and work your way up. That is nowhere different in industries others than diving.

You will join a sales industry

Which is great. I did not realize this for a while actually because I wanted to become a dive instructor to share my passion for the ocean.

But if you want your passion to be contagious, new divers need to continue their diver education, get their own equipment and spend money on dive holidays.

This way they can learn about ocean conservation, equipment and safe diving practices. If they stop diving they probably stop learning about marine life and conservation.

The best way for you to teach them all this in a fun way is when they spend their money with you.

You will work hard

Very likely you will work more hours than in a 9 to 5 job. The dive professional works hard physically and mentally because dive equipment is heavy, diving is tiring and guests can be very complicated. It happens you work ten or more hours per day for six days per week.

In countries like Australia you also do stuff like filling tanks, cleaning boats, cabins and toilets etc.. The diving is only a part of your job.

Photo by Mike Petrucci on Unsplash

This new life will be entirely different from what you know

A lot of people join the diving industry after they have done another job for a while in their lives. They have been good at that probably, but some people, including myself, need(ed) to learn that the diving is different in many aspects.

I thought I know shit at the beginning but I didn’t. So be humble and teachable and it will bring you far further than being over confident and thinking you know everything.

Photo by Ben White on Unsplash

You won’t become rich

One reason is probably that there are way more dive professionals than dive jobs.

Keep in mind with some good sales skills, a side hustle like photography, selling local artisan products, building your own dive tribe like Marlies Wolters from diveoclock.com etc. you can make extra bucks.

Another alternative is to rotate in seasonal jobs as a dive instructor and mountain guide, ski instructor, golf ball diver, commercial diver or the like.

Takeaway

I can’t stress enough to keep in mind what Henry Ford said

Whether you think you can, or think you can’t. You are right.

Show perseverance, be teachable and humble because the dive instructor job can teach you so many skills you will be happy to have for the rest of your life.

Besides that, it is freaking amazing after the first struggles and it was one of my best decisions to become a dive instructor.

Have you had struggles when you started as dive instructor?
Let me know in the comments. I read them all!