A healthy padi pro career progression

[Dazs-05]

Hello All, I embarked on a year of traverlling during which time I have found (and fallen) in love with diving, currently advanced and have just completed my 23rd dive.

I am now considering doing my Dive Masters (I have done my research so know I need 40 dives and complete first aid and rescue diver - all in hand)

My question to you lovely people is, what is a healthy and steady development pattern. I look at google and it says DM to IE. I have googled and looked into the side steps you should take rather then just the upwards one but to no prevail. Obviously the specalities cost money and the bill starts to rack up, which is why I'm more keen to do it slow and steady rather then race, but equally being cost effective.

I assume - nitrox, deep,wreck,night specialist would be beneficial,

Please advise me peeps

Thanks

 

[northernone]

What are your goals as a dive professional?

General advice per what you've described already which may differ from some common sales pitches by those selling courses:

Dive lots, hundreds of hours underwater developing the skills you've already learned, ideally in the environment you plan to work, or in worse conditions.

As for healthy progression, minimum standards will get you the exact same instructor rating without wasting money on unneeded steps or unrelated certs. The people skills, job experience and work ethic you've already developed (I hope) in life are what will get you a job instructing, the 'GO PRO' route you choose is a tiny part of why you'd be worth money as an instructor.

Pay for quality instruction when you have the experience to benefit from the added knowledge and training, don't get sucked in to upselling and the expensive hobby of collecting certs.

There are an excess of 0 to hero 'professionals' in the dive industry and if you rush straight to instructor without lots of diving in between training you'll have very little dive related experience to be valuable to pass on to your students.

Regards,
Cameron

 

[northernone]

In direct answer:
Rescue diver/ ERF
Dive master
IDC/ ERF instructor

There are currently 24 Padi 'PROS' for each dive center. No estimate how many job openings per center.

Regards,
Cameron

 

[MichaelMc]

Going pro is a big step to plan for as you just start diving. There is whole forum dedicated to it, of which just one thread is below. A first step is to do a fair bit of diving and get good at that. So a focus on 'how to be a better diver' may be the place to start. Most of the specifics of that will feed into being a good professional, and all of it will give you needed experience.

When (in terms of dive experience) and where should I take the Divemaster course?
Going Pro

Edit:
I’m just a DM candidate, but would think being super super solid in the core stuff would be a must. Which seems like buoyancy and trim, situational awareness, lack of ego issues, rescue/EFR, and understanding physiology. You need to position around divers in the water, being able to back kick well (enough) has been a must for me.
Think of what you need to know to lead dives in your area successfully every time, with all the errors and emergencies the divers you guide can cause. Doing many of those with your buddies is good practice for that.
Night and deep are part of AOW, so they are a given you have to be solid. Nav of course. If your plan is guiding, knowing the area of course. Not sure that translates into classes as much as really good diving and skills work. GUE Fundamentals with out the double cylinders is one path to that, but taking other peoples really well done Perfect Buoyancy could be part of a path as well. Some depends on where you are, boats?, wrecks?, cold?, local hazardous marine life.

 

[Diving Dubai]

Pay for quality instruction when you have the experience to benefit from the added knowledge and training, don't get sucked in to upselling and the expensive hobby of collecting certs.

This quote should be be made a sticky

Its exactly true. While for sure there is a minimum number of dives required to start and exit (60 DM & 100 Instructor) these don't translate to experience or being prepared for the course to gain the most out of it.

Look around on your dive trips and see who you think are good DM's and find out their experience.

Ask yourself these questions. How comfortable are you in the water? Can you hold horizontal trim at a safety stop or swim close to the bottom finding creatures without disturbing the silt? Is your weighting near perfect?

How is your gas consumption? As a DM it's "bad form" to be the one calling the dive because of low air?

Can you navigate? Do you have the confidence to intervene and alter someone's equipment to correct a problem?

Have you started to develop a sixth sense that someone needs watching to prevent something before it happens?

Can you take a look at someone and figure out roughly how much lead they require?

As a DM you will need to give boat safety and Dive site briefs. You'll need to be able to make these interesting and easy on the ear. You'll need a depth of experience and knowledge to be able to answer peoples questions on a whole host of things.

Being a good DM isn't just about a C card it's a mindset it's also about having skills and attributes that the Dive centre?LDS value and need.

This isn't taught on the DM course.

As for being an instructor. Wait until you've completed your DM course. If you cant' get mainly 4/5 for you skill demonstrations then forget it

My opinion based on actual experience, is wait. Get some more diving experience and observe other Pro's. Figure out the good one people and what you'd like to be like from the bad.

There are an excess of 0 to hero 'professionals' in the dive industry and if you rush straight to instructor without lots of diving in between training you'll have very little dive related experience to be valuable to pass on to your students.

This is so true also...

 

[Dazs-05]

Hi all,
Thank you for your replies much to consider. I plan to dive a lot more before I decide to do my DM, this is mainly due to wanting to travel a lot more and decide where to base myself for a couple of years... In a couple of years.

Is it worth doing the specality courses or is this just Padi way of making more money and in effect not worth paying for it.

On a different note and again nothing I plan to rush into any time soon, but I have worked with disabled children for considerable time, so another option is to try and promote diving for disabled children when in the UK, is anyone aware of courses that specialise in being disabled friendly instructor.... or do you become instructor and gain so much experience that it comes natural that way.

Just to clarify I am a realist and these are 10 year goals. By no means am I expecting to achieve all this from a zero-hero course (and nor would I want to) - much prefer to enjoy it at a gentle pace

 

[Diving Dubai]

The fact that you have a skill set of working with disabled children should be of real benefit to you for the future.

As you are in the UK I would also suggest being involved with your local BSAC club. They accept PADI members (I myself hold both BSAC and PADI qualifications for DM & Dlive Leader (The BSAC equivilant) The two agencies offer different but complimentary training.

Certainly BSAC will be able to give you pointers for teaching children with disabilities under the UK legislation. Within club diving you have a massive range of experience and learning opportunities too.

If you were to remain PADI only then the only 2 other courses I'd definately recomend is Nitro and Tec 40 which will give you a good insight into decompression diving (aslo covered under BSAC sports diver and Dive leader) Teh additional knowlege and skills will always be beneficial even if you generally don't use them. If you want to dive in the UK then Drysuit will be of benefit

Other than that if a certain type of divign truely interests you then take the full speciality course. As with any course the instructor can make or break it, choose an instructor that has real knowlege and a passion for that particular aspect of diving.

During you journey you'll start to decide what sort of diving you like and dislike and then follow you instincts.

 

[chrisch]

Don't forget to teach (or Divemaster) in the UK you will need your HSE medical and follow ACoP. As an amateur instructor in BSAC you do not need this (but will not be paid at all).

At 23 dives with all due respect you have barely started. Get the rescue and nitrox courses and dive for a while. If you want a Divemaster card in your pocket to help get some cheap diving whilst on holiday fair enough. However the cost of the DM versus the saving might not stack up. Personally I think it is a waste of time. In my experience most people quit diving after a few years and many of them spend the first year fantasising about instructing until reality hits them. You can certainly survive a while if you can afford to live on nothing, but most people want a regular job sooner or later.

 

[Colliam7]

Is it worth doing the specality courses or is this just Padi way of making more money and in effect not worth paying for it.

As a general statement, I would suggest that all good training helps you become a better diver. But, simply pursuing multiple specialties can really increase the cost of diving, without necessarily contributing to your improvement as a diver. Diving Dubai mentioned Nitrox and tec 40, in particular, and I think those are great suggestions. I would add Deep. And, I would suggest you expand your horizon of training and development opportunities to be considered beyond those offered by any single agency (be it PADI, or NAUI, or SDI/TDI).

I pursued my DM credential not because I wanted to teach (at the time) but because I wanted to improve my skills. I accomplished my goal. I pursued technical dive training because I wanted to dive deeper and longer. But, tec training probably did more for my overall control of buoyancy, trim, finning, planning, for my confidence, for my situational awareness, etc., etc. than any other single training curriculum I have completed.

It is actually quite easy to become a credentialed scuba instructor. It is far more demanding, and requires a considerable amount of time, to become a good diver and good instructor. I don't make that as a cynical statement, by the way, just as an observation that comes from experience. Diving Dubai also posed an excellent set of questions that you should continue to ask yourself, before starting on the path to dive professional. I don't think he was suggesting them as a show-stopper, rather as a self-guide to help you decide when you are ready to formally start DM training. You can start development right away, however, by looking at every dive you do going forward as a training dive, and asking those questions. Using one of his questions as an example, 'Can you hold horizontal trim at a safety stop or swim close to the bottom finding creatures without disturbing the silt? Is your weighting near perfect?', you can use every dive to improve your skills such that your answers gradually transition from 'sometimes' to 'usually' to 'always'.

I have worked with disabled children for considerable time, so another option is to try and promote diving for disabled children when in the UK, is anyone aware of courses that specialise in being disabled friendly instructor.... or do you become instructor and gain so much experience that it comes natural that way.

You might look at the HSA website as a starting point for more information: HSA - Handicapped SCUBA Association

 

[stuartv]

If you want a Divemaster card in your pocket to help get some cheap diving whilst on holiday fair enough.

How does that work? I have a DM card in my pocket and would love to get cheap diving while on holiday. Do I just tell them I am a DM when I sign up for a boat charter and they'll give me a discount?