What should a guide know and be able to do?

It seems to many that working as a guide does not require special knowledge, skills, and any person can engage in this activity. And only after delving into the intricacies of the profession represented, it becomes clear how difficult it is to conduct excursions, communicate with tourists of different nationalities and be able to find an approach to them.

Until the end of the 60s of the twentieth century, there was no such profession as a tour guide in the Soviet Union. Their functions were performed by amateurs and enthusiasts free of charge. Most often, school teachers, teachers from universities, and museum staff were involved in conducting excursions.

Today, a guide is a person who shows tourists the historical parts of the city. He should not only talk about sights and organize meals, but also be able to properly plan a schedule for visiting museums and cultural sites. It is much more interesting to get acquainted with architectural masterpieces, visit exhibitions, visit galleries and much more with a guide. For comfortable communication with tourists from other countries, the guide must speak several languages.

Quite often, tour guides are confused with tour guides. Many believe that these names speak of the same profession. In fact, this is not the case.

Guide and tour guide are two different jobs with similar characteristics. According to the standard of the profession, they conduct excursions to the historical sights of the city, take tourists to museums, and introduce them to architectural monuments. A guide is a person who is a non-standard unit of travel agencies. His duties include a sightseeing tour of a group of tourists to the sights of the city. But most importantly, he must accompany the supervised foreigners throughout the tour.

From a theoretical point of view, a guide and a tour guide are different from each other. Most often, the guide has great knowledge and broad outlook. But the guides are highly qualified specialists in narrow matters. Some are well aware of the detailed history of the Renaissance, others have knowledge of the cosmic direction. Quite often, guides who decide to change their occupation consider the work of a guide, and vice versa.

The duties of a guide include many requirements that are spelled out in the job description.

1. Search for historical materials with their subsequent study. Guides often spend their free time in city archives.
2. A person must constantly improve his oratory skills, learn new techniques for his stories. To be able to answer questions and, most importantly, not to be afraid of public speaking.
3. The guide must know detailed information about the group of tourists, the time of their arrival at the place. He is obliged to meet them, to make sure that no one lags behind the group. The guide must keep documentation, fill out protocols of events.
4. His responsibility is to develop the most convenient route for the excursion.
5. The guide is obliged to talk with enthusiasm about expositions in a museum or architectural structures in order to interest tourists.
6. He must inform tourists about safety measures and precautions when getting to know the exhibits.
7. The guide is obliged to give tourists an answer to any question, except for personal ones.
8. The duties of the guide include filling out the relevant documents.
9. If a tourist is injured or suddenly feels unwell, the guide is obliged to provide him with medical assistance, as well as call doctors or take him to the nearest hospital.
10. The guide must be psychologically stable and in the event of unforeseen situations that pose a threat to the lives of tourists, be able to eliminate panic and call the appropriate services.
11. At the end of the excursion, the guide must organize the departure of tourists, check if they have documents, tickets, funds.

People who decide to devote themselves to the profession of a tour guide must have a lot of knowledge and skills:

• perfectly know several foreign languages;
• have a higher education in the humanities;
• be able to find a common language with strangers;
• be well versed in the topics of excursions;
• know local history, ethnography, cultural studies and other similar sciences.

There are certain requirements for people wishing to take the position of a tour guide. They must have the talent to correctly express and clearly formulate their own thoughts.

• This person should clearly pronounce difficult words, be able to put stress, maintain the style of speech and not use parasitic words.
• Provide information in an understandable manner without presenting historical data in complex terms. You can not use obsolete words that are out of use.
• To increase the interest of tourists, the guide must present information expressively. It is allowed to use epithets, metaphors and allegories.
• It is strictly forbidden to use words that do not correspond to the literary language.

In addition to professional skills and abilities, a tour guide must have certain personal qualities.

1. Have a great imagination and be able to think figuratively. Possessing such qualities, the guide can describe objects that are at a distant distance, simply by imagining a picture in his head.
2. An important personal quality is bias. People who possess it skillfully convey their opinions to the public.
3. The guide must be eloquent. Such people easily find the necessary words to get out of non-standard situations.
4. Purposefulness is a special quality. This suggests that a person is ready to improve and improve his professional status.
5. The appearance of the guide should be neat, modest, but not repulsive.

To become a tour guide it is necessary to get an education, which is provided at the historical faculties of universities in the specialty "History and Museology". Having received higher education, university graduates pass additional courseswhere they learn the intricacies of the profession. Obligatory subjects for passing the Unified State Exam for admission to the Faculty of History - history, Russian, social studies. In some cases, the guides are people who have completed only special courses. However, their work is not permitted everywhere.

If a person wants to become a professional guide and receive decent wages for his work, he should go through several stages of training.

1. Finish university and receive a document confirming higher education. At the same time, you need to simultaneously study foreign languages.
2. Having a document confirming graduation from the university, you can go to specialized courses for advanced training, working on the basis of museums.
3. After successfully passing the aptitude exams, the guide receives accreditation to carry out activities.

Professional guides are in great demand in large metropolitan areas and resort cities... But don't forget that this is a seasonal job... It is not difficult to get a job in this position, only the bulk of the work with the corresponding profit will fall on the spring and summer. Career advancement is different for each specialist. If you have the necessary experience and a small start-up capital, you can open your own travel agency, where several guides will work.

The salary issue depends on many factors.... Luring tourists from the street, the daily profit can be 2.5-3 thousand rubles. If the guide works for a company, his monthly income, taking into account tips, is on average 80 thousand rubles. Specialists representing travel agencies or hotels under an agreement receive about 2-3 thousand rubles a day. According to their description, this type of work is simpler and more enjoyable. There are few tourists, every second gives a tip. The main thing - obtain a license to conduct such activities... Well, if the guide is sent abroad as an escort for tourists, his daily rate increases by 2, or even 3 times. But the requirements for such candidates are very high, and the competition is felt much stronger.

It is recommended to start a career at the State Museum. Perhaps the first steps in work will seem boring and dull. You will have to walk to different rooms, lead groups of people and talk about the culture of different eras, like a university lecturer.