Tour Guides and Escort Escort individuals or groups on sightseeing tours or through places of interest, such as industrial establishments, public buildings, and art galleries.
Tour Guides and Escort is Also Know as
In different settings, Tour Guides and Escort is titled as
- Art Museum Docent
- Discovery Guide
- Docent
- Guide
- Historical Interpreter
- Museum Docent
- Museum Educator
- Museum Guide
- Science Interpreter
- Tour Guide
Education and Training of Tour Guides and Escort
Tour Guides and Escort is categorized in Job Zone Three: Medium Preparation Needed
Experience Required for Tour Guides and Escort
Previous work-related skill, knowledge, or experience is required for these occupations. For example, an electrician must have completed three or four years of apprenticeship or several years of vocational training, and often must have passed a licensing exam, in order to perform the job.
Education Required for Tour Guides and Escort
Most occupations in this zone require training in vocational schools, related on-the-job experience, or an associate's degree.
Degrees Related to Tour Guides and Escort
- Bachelor in Archeology
- Associate Degree Courses in Archeology
- Masters Degree Courses in Archeology
- Bachelor in History, General
- Associate Degree Courses in History, General
- Masters Degree Courses in History, General
Training Required for Tour Guides and Escort
Employees in these occupations usually need one or two years of training involving both on-the-job experience and informal training with experienced workers. A recognized apprenticeship program may be associated with these occupations.
Related Ocuupations
Some Ocuupations related to Tour Guides and Escort in different industries are
- Travel Guides
- Park Naturalists
- Ushers, Lobby Attendants, and Ticket Takers
- Travel Agents
- Historians
- Reservation and Transportation Ticket Agents and Travel Clerks
- Recreation Workers
- Curators
- Concierges
- Self-Enrichment Teachers
- Entertainment and Recreation Managers, Except Gambling
- First-Line Supervisors of Entertainment and Recreation Workers, Except Gambling Services
- Meeting, Convention, and Event Planners
- Middle School Teachers, Except Special and Career/Technical Education
- Instructional Coordinators
- Anthropology and Archeology Teachers, Postsecondary
- History Teachers, Postsecondary
- Amusement and Recreation Attendants
- Librarians and Media Collections Specialists
- Passenger Attendants
What Do Tour Guides and Escort do?
- Conduct educational activities for school children.
- Escort individuals or groups on cruises, sightseeing tours, or through places of interest, such as industrial establishments, public buildings, or art galleries.
- Describe tour points of interest to group members, and respond to questions.
- Monitor visitors' activities to ensure compliance with establishment or tour regulations and safety practices.
- Greet and register visitors, and issue any required identification badges or safety devices.
- Distribute brochures, show audiovisual presentations, and explain establishment processes and operations at tour sites.
- Provide directions and other pertinent information to visitors.
- Provide for physical safety of groups, performing such activities as providing first aid or directing emergency evacuations.
- Provide information about wildlife varieties and habitats, as well as any relevant regulations, such as those pertaining to hunting and fishing.
- Collect fees and tickets from group members.
- Teach skills, such as proper climbing methods, and demonstrate and advise on the use of equipment.
- Select travel routes and sites to be visited based on knowledge of specific areas.
- Solicit tour patronage and sell souvenirs.
- Speak foreign languages to communicate with foreign visitors.
- Assemble and check the required supplies and equipment prior to departure.
- Drive motor vehicles to transport visitors to establishments and tour site locations.
- Perform clerical duties, such as filing, typing, operating switchboards, or routing mail and messages.
- Research various topics, including site history, environmental conditions, and clients' skills and abilities to plan appropriate expeditions, instruction, and commentary.
- Train other guides and volunteers.
Qualities of Good Tour Guides and Escort
- Oral Expression: The ability to communicate information and ideas in speaking so others will understand.
- Oral Comprehension: The ability to listen to and understand information and ideas presented through spoken words and sentences.
- Speech Clarity: The ability to speak clearly so others can understand you.
- Written Comprehension: The ability to read and understand information and ideas presented in writing.
- Speech Recognition: The ability to identify and understand the speech of another person.
- Far Vision: The ability to see details at a distance.
- Problem Sensitivity: The ability to tell when something is wrong or is likely to go wrong. It does not involve solving the problem, only recognizing that there is a problem.
- Near Vision: The ability to see details at close range (within a few feet of the observer).
- Deductive Reasoning: The ability to apply general rules to specific problems to produce answers that make sense.
- Written Expression: The ability to communicate information and ideas in writing so others will understand.
- Selective Attention: The ability to concentrate on a task over a period of time without being distracted.
- Inductive Reasoning: The ability to combine pieces of information to form general rules or conclusions (includes finding a relationship among seemingly unrelated events).
- Information Ordering: The ability to arrange things or actions in a certain order or pattern according to a specific rule or set of rules (e.g., patterns of numbers, letters, words, pictures, mathematical operations).
- Memorization: The ability to remember information such as words, numbers, pictures, and procedures.
- Time Sharing: The ability to shift back and forth between two or more activities or sources of information (such as speech, sounds, touch, or other sources).
- Category Flexibility: The ability to generate or use different sets of rules for combining or grouping things in different ways.
- Fluency of Ideas: The ability to come up with a number of ideas about a topic (the number of ideas is important, not their quality, correctness, or creativity).
- Flexibility of Closure: The ability to identify or detect a known pattern (a figure, object, word, or sound) that is hidden in other distracting material.
- Originality: The ability to come up with unusual or clever ideas about a given topic or situation, or to develop creative ways to solve a problem.
- Trunk Strength: The ability to use your abdominal and lower back muscles to support part of the body repeatedly or continuously over time without "giving out" or fatiguing.
- Number Facility: The ability to add, subtract, multiply, or divide quickly and correctly.
- Auditory Attention: The ability to focus on a single source of sound in the presence of other distracting sounds.
- Visual Color Discrimination: The ability to match or detect differences between colors, including shades of color and brightness.
- Stamina: The ability to exert yourself physically over long periods of time without getting winded or out of breath.
- Mathematical Reasoning: The ability to choose the right mathematical methods or formulas to solve a problem.
- Speed of Closure: The ability to quickly make sense of, combine, and organize information into meaningful patterns.
- Perceptual Speed: The ability to quickly and accurately compare similarities and differences among sets of letters, numbers, objects, pictures, or patterns. The things to be compared may be presented at the same time or one after the other. This ability also includes comparing a presented object with a remembered object.
- Visualization: The ability to imagine how something will look after it is moved around or when its parts are moved or rearranged.
- Gross Body Coordination: The ability to coordinate the movement of your arms, legs, and torso together when the whole body is in motion.
- Hearing Sensitivity: The ability to detect or tell the differences between sounds that vary in pitch and loudness.
- Spatial Orientation: The ability to know your location in relation to the environment or to know where other objects are in relation to you.
- Gross Body Equilibrium: The ability to keep or regain your body balance or stay upright when in an unstable position.
- Depth Perception: The ability to judge which of several objects is closer or farther away from you, or to judge the distance between you and an object.
- Dynamic Strength: The ability to exert muscle force repeatedly or continuously over time. This involves muscular endurance and resistance to muscle fatigue.
- Manual Dexterity: The ability to quickly move your hand, your hand together with your arm, or your two hands to grasp, manipulate, or assemble objects.
- Static Strength: The ability to exert maximum muscle force to lift, push, pull, or carry objects.
- Arm-Hand Steadiness: The ability to keep your hand and arm steady while moving your arm or while holding your arm and hand in one position.
- Speed of Limb Movement: The ability to quickly move the arms and legs.
- Multilimb Coordination: The ability to coordinate two or more limbs (for example, two arms, two legs, or one leg and one arm) while sitting, standing, or lying down. It does not involve performing the activities while the whole body is in motion.
- Control Precision: The ability to quickly and repeatedly adjust the controls of a machine or a vehicle to exact positions.
- Finger Dexterity: The ability to make precisely coordinated movements of the fingers of one or both hands to grasp, manipulate, or assemble very small objects.
- Extent Flexibility: The ability to bend, stretch, twist, or reach with your body, arms, and/or legs.
- Wrist-Finger Speed: The ability to make fast, simple, repeated movements of the fingers, hands, and wrists.
- Glare Sensitivity: The ability to see objects in the presence of a glare or bright lighting.
- Night Vision: The ability to see under low-light conditions.
- Sound Localization: The ability to tell the direction from which a sound originated.
- Explosive Strength: The ability to use short bursts of muscle force to propel oneself (as in jumping or sprinting), or to throw an object.
- Dynamic Flexibility: The ability to quickly and repeatedly bend, stretch, twist, or reach out with your body, arms, and/or legs.
- Peripheral Vision: The ability to see objects or movement of objects to one's side when the eyes are looking ahead.
- Reaction Time: The ability to quickly respond (with the hand, finger, or foot) to a signal (sound, light, picture) when it appears.
- Rate Control: The ability to time your movements or the movement of a piece of equipment in anticipation of changes in the speed and/or direction of a moving object or scene.
- Response Orientation: The ability to choose quickly between two or more movements in response to two or more different signals (lights, sounds, pictures). It includes the speed with which the correct response is started with the hand, foot, or other body part.
Tools Used by Tour Guides and Escort
- ActiveMap Tour Guide software
- Cell phones
- Desktop computers
- First aid kits
- Laser facsimile machines
- Microphones
- Personal digital assistants PDA
- Tour boats
- Tour buses
- Touring bicycles
Technology Skills required for Tour Guides and Escort
- Adobe Photoshop
- Apple Safari
- Centaur Systems Centaur Travel Business Management System TBMS
- Email software
- Global positioning system GPS software
- IBS Software Services Tour Partner
- Microsoft Access
- Microsoft Excel
- Microsoft Internet Explorer
- Microsoft Office software
- Microsoft Outlook
- Microsoft PowerPoint
- Microsoft Word
- Padlet
- Pear Deck
- RBS GoTour Online
- SmugMug Flickr
- Softrip Travel Software System
- TourTech Systems TourTools
- Word processing software
- Zoom