THE LANGUAGE OF YOU

Your body language is your connection to those who can see and are willing to listen

You want to get the attention of others? Watch your body language!

When we work in the water you can forget the pitch of sound for articulate conversation. You can demand your body language to compensate and overhaul communication and direction.

When the search is on, our survivors may have their ears covered in water or they may only hear muffled sounds. Their level of conscious being may be diminished.

Are you ready for some constructive advice?

Are you asking that compromised person to ‘put their hand in the air’? Don’t be a poor imitator or at least do not give permission to mislead your potential. You deserve to know the difference.

Start thinking about what you are doing and the results, don’t just assume its proper or the best method. You may discover a disappointment in your past assessments. And that is a good place to start!

What you can expect if you were trained behaviorally in that worn out catch phrase is to assist your survivor in starting their own drowning process if they are using their arms to stay afloat. Don’t listen to people who tell you that because it’s a corrupt behavior.

You must do all the work for our survivors, 100% of the action, it is not a shared 50/50 split! Behavior shift of expected effort with a better resolution to maintain your tempo of lifesaving time.

Time stated as the race against drowning.

EXPAND POTENTIAL - DO NOT CRUSH IT

Don’t allow corruption to be an invitation to a person who is trying to survive, lend them hope by your actions, how you behave and what you do next for them in the water is what they need to rely upon.

Give yourself permission to provide humanity with your best measure, not your restrictions. You have the influence of authority and action, use it with compassion, kindness, strength and knowledge.

Study every day, don’t stop gathering knowledge and perspective.

Part of your navigational role is to try your best to get their attention, but not by reckless operations.

When was the last time you went into the water you work wearing a pair of swim trunks or clothing and floated for 45 minutes, alone? Like a survivor.

That is part of the language you will be speaking and we say it like this:

Think like the survivor but act like the boat coxswain.

You captain the delivery of an asset you can both depend upon because you care.

Remember this you tell your story by your actions, ways and deeds. Practice being mindful of your body movements.

Does the Rescue Water Craft appear stable when you move?
Do you place the craft precisely where it needs to be?
Do you make contact with the survivor before your boat or TAD does?

PAY ATTENTION

Remember, what people can see they will respond. Those movements may be simple, tapping your hand against the hull, reaching out to them, touching them, how your face looks.

Think about your facial expressions. What does your face look like to others? You are wearing a helmet, maybe a balaclava, perhaps eye protection, what else? Can they see your eyes, are you yelling?

Film them and study your response and others, practice using your facial expressions as a way to make contact, an impression.

The tone of your voice, simple and direct words. Where do survivors eyes track? What are they focused on? Can they hear you or are they in shock, which words would be symbolic to their soul at that moment?

Our behaviors are a constant work in progress.

That means the love you have for your job, for survivors and yourself are the divine of our purpose.

Do not be afraid, be amazing!

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Posted: December 6, 2019

Content Creator of Rescue Water Craft and Personal Water Craft boating international education standards: Shawn Alladio is the world’s foremost authority and leading subject matter expert. She cares most about her community and the culture surrounding the safety of event service providers and Rescue Water Craft operators, working hard and dedicated towards protecting their reputation, distributing safety information and continuing to train these amazing individuals to the highest standards of care.

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Have any questions? Come train with us and discover what your community is doing to modernize standards, safety and reduce liability!

Caution: Use at your own risk. Please take a qualified Rescue Water Craft training course and maintain proper records and respect all the PWC, RWC, PPE, and gear OEM manufacturer warning labels and cautions.

WHEN YOU DECIDE

When You Want Excellence in Your Operations, You Express Gratitude.

Want some real-life water rescue advice? This is a compassionate question.

To instill excellence in your rescue boat operations you have to give more than the instructor guidance, more than the workbooks and be ready for the water and weather.

This means you need to decide who you are going to be and what you are willing to give.

You need a hunger or a model of inspiration to drive your will towards goals that exemplify ‘excellence’.

That does not mean you take a course and resign yourself to the certificate issued. Many courses hand them out freely without scrutiny that cares about your functionality. Start caring about your performance.

Were you challenged and corrected, measured and critiqued with sincere discernment? Seek out the critics!

You are just beginning to learn- post training, you now have a place to start. You certainly have not arrived!

It’s time to continue taking steps towards navigating your reputation, spirit, beliefs, strengths and fears.

Don’t succumb to the methods of educational or instructive mediocrity or your last class, even mine. Move ahead on a continuum of developing a structured reasoning of water rescue knowledge. Don’t be brand favorited.

Explore fearlessly the things you embrace or ignore. Tell yourself with sincere conviction: I CAN DO THAT

You may allow yourself to be confined and restricted from creative opportunities that hold your potential hostage.

You have to give more. Put in more time. Sacrifice and possibly use additional resources of financial commitment or travel.

GET CONNECTED

Find a trusted mentor. Do they care about your reputation? How does that measure in action and output?

The only life that provides a spiritual and physical balance is one lived with purpose.

Remember this do not seek praise as your justification of excellence. No, refrain from the praise and seek the encouragement of improvement where you are not excelling! Those critical assessments even if they seem harsh to you, if you don’t get it, you are not trainable. You are emotional.

If you are feelings are hurt from an instructor comment, you need to keep practicing till you get it right! Listen to them and don’t waste their time or yours. You must be trainable or you are looking for the wrong results.

If you have selected the field of rescue as a work discipline, whether volunteer or paid staff, you have eclipsed a spiritual calling, it is simply not a job.

It requires of us that strive for excellence a deeper understanding of the fear associated with dire circumstances, the unknown human condition, our courage and bravery and our foremost skills and tools.

We must keep a measure of continued seeking knowledge to maintain that sacred trust.

We are seekers, searchers and problem solvers, we think for two, three or ten. It is not just about us.

WHO IS YOUR MENTOR?

When I teach in my audience, I see the prospective student in front of me. Spiritually I recognize my burden. It is their parents, teammates, agency, children, wife, husband or beloved, their brothers or sisters or those who depend upon them.

It is the manufacturers of the equipment we train with and use, it is their employees, all who laid a hand on the production and we trust their efforts and tools.

There are thousands of people in my classroom. And my ancestors are watching me. Am I a good steward of their trust, faith and determination? Do I wield their failures and warnings and guidance with respect, duty and honor?

How do I determine that? By humility and service, being a servant of the past to move the future.

These students are either there by their own volition or assigned to take my training. They come in blind faith, or with judgement and negative attitudes. How do we move beyond our own prejudices and expectations and arrive at trust?

We earn it by evidence and historical tempering.

We are the most difficult and opportunistic beings alive; we choose every minute how and what we will do.

In training, we cannot be selfish to a fault, we have to encompass all personalities, maturity levels and egos.

That takes trust, genuine influence of your explored and unique soul-and an open mind who is willing to listen.

But the training content must deliver.

I will keep learning. I invite you to join me and thousands of others in the pursuit of excellence as a way of being.

The world needs your competence and abilities. Let’s get busy!

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Posted: December 6, 2019

Content Creator of Rescue Water Craft and Personal Water Craft boating international education standards: Shawn Alladio is the world’s foremost authority and leading subject matter expert. She cares most about her community and the culture surrounding the safety of event service providers and Rescue Water Craft operators, working hard and dedicated towards protecting their reputation, distributing safety information and continuing to train these amazing individuals to the highest standards of care.

__________

Have any questions? Come train with us and discover what your community is doing to modernize standards, safety and reduce liability!

Caution: Use at your own risk. Please take a qualified Rescue Water Craft training course and maintain proper records and respect all the PWC, RWC, PPE, and gear OEM manufacturer warning labels and cautions.

REGIMENTED RISK

Life is Risk Be Ready

Public Safety Agencies that restrict outside professional influencers from the field by those who are doing the work, getting into or on the water and taking the risks to learn the risks at risk level, are holding their program safety hostage.

Many training programs restrict their personnel from being in the proper conditions of water flow for proficiency or from learning from industry influencers. Pride, ego, fear and program doldrums protect this hubris. Does this sound like your department?

When the water is running high, when its flowing, when its cold, when its night or when the surf is up! The times most call-outs occur are during these types of weather and water episodes.

Why would a department not want their personnel fully ready to go? I have witnessed personnel bring up their concerns with their administration and they are strongly admonished for asking. They get put back in their place and surrender to the status quo. Their leadership teaches them ‘don’t ask-don’t tell’.

Programs need to look at the difference between technical work and the need to go where time is of the essence. Simple rescue techniques that allow a team member to execute a fast moving and dynamic situation that is not in their textbook, nature will require it!

Reality avoidance is a huge liability.

GET ON YOUR BOAT

Technical work requires time, survivor(s) are not always able to afford that. There are times you go quicker than the training tempo, but personnel are ready to do so. Because they trained from a modern reality. They are not stuck in the past and they don’t stare at it.

This is really telling in the world of swift moving and surf rescue, where the conditions are not static but in constant stages of evolution.

Who takes those risks? Who takes the bigger risks? Identify those people. Empower them with the ability to compliment the risk. Because safety is not a word or a training manual, it’s a behavior in our world of risk.

Is your team physically fit? Does their PPE work, are they flexible wearing it, are they comfortable moving in the water wearing their PPE and moving through the water, back and forth, in and out, up and down, pulling, drawing and heaving? Ask yourself: Who is a liability and how is that being managed?

Public Safety Agencies should not be competitive against private service providers.

People who do this within the hierarchy of an agency structure must be exposed and removed from public service. They do not care about their teammates and their fear should not become a public liability.

Do not restrict these education gurus from the opportunity to enable agency team members to learn and glean new information and warnings that their team could not afford to learn - unless there was a mishap or a death involved from their own team actions. Why allow this to happen? The answers are laid our clearly here.

The calling for lifesaving lies within the spiritual fabric of an individual, or it’s a void and just a job.

Lifesaving is considered a sacred action throughout history. We gift medals to hero’s and laud their risks. Make sure you are not gifting a medal to somebody merely because they survived not killing themselves during a callout. We don’t need dead heroes!

Stop that negative potential and reprogram your training methodology, mindset and execution now, do not delay.

LAZINESS IS AN ENDING

Consultants and evaluators are the key to program security and safe practices. Unless your program has individuals, who are operating at 4,000 hours annually and specifically gleaning intel, connected with others who are doing so, comparing notes and results based off evidence, your program is at risk!

We will continue to see mishaps, deaths and equipment failures where agencies will say ‘we will learn lessons from this’. When in fact they should have taken the risk to prevent the liability when they knew it existed in the first place. It’s hard to accept the truth. It is even harder to hear it.

It seems impossible to change, but there are those brave few who will risk ridicule to ensure that their conscious is clear.

Does your program need an outside scrutineer to evaluate your program pitfalls? Is your program lazy, lax or lagging? I’m not talking about hiring surfers or kayakers, but professionals who are industry icons, proven and tested by the evidence they support and know the business of risk to protect reputation.

I will leave you with this observation from years of working with public safety agencies.

Do not be afraid of the water you work in. Make sure your personnel are ready for it. Vet your program attendees on physical fitness, and mental toughness so they can be comfortable working in the environment, under pressure.

Stop encouraging personnel to do ‘brain dead’ evolutions that do not allow them to be challenged for reality. Seek out your partners in water safety that are not within your normal scope of contact and listen to them. Research and have your program annually inspected, equipment with minimum carriage requirements and maintain certification expirations.

Review you program and be honest in your assessments of personnel response and functionality. Ensure your budget is in accordance with the need and you put the hours in for security.

Protect reputation. Handle program pitfalls, be better problem solvers, be willing to accept your problems and remedy them before the next call.

If someone challenges your program, celebrate that individual, take up their case.

Do not be afraid. Be brave, because courage is contagious.

Your people want to learn, give them permission.

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Posted: December 3, 2019

Content Creator of Rescue Water Craft and Personal Water Craft boating international education standards: Shawn Alladio is the world’s foremost authority and leading subject matter expert. She cares most about her community and the culture surrounding the safety of event service providers and Rescue Water Craft operators, working hard and dedicated towards protecting their reputation, distributing safety information and continuing to train these amazing individuals to the highest standards of care.

__________

Have any questions? Come train with us and discover what your community is doing to modernize standards, safety and reduce liability!

Caution: Use at your own risk. Please take a qualified Rescue Water Craft training course and maintain proper records and respect all the PWC, RWC, PPE, and gear OEM manufacturer warning labels and cautions.