Seeing is believing; a technique called Vigilance Voice can help your lifeguards identify problems at your pool.

After 17 years of working in the aquatic industry, something as simple as teaching a staff how to scan for swimmers in trouble should be easily achieved. Not so easy a task as it seems. I had a false sense of arrogance because no one had ever drowned at my pool ... that is until June 26, 2002. This day will forever be the turning point for my "false arrogance" and the beginning of my "season of doubt."

On June 24, 2002, while sitting in my office, I heard one long whistle blast. "It must be a fecal incident," I thought to myself, as was typically the case. Then to my horror, a staff member yelled that lifeguards were grabbing the backboard. My secure world came screeching to a halt to see a child at the end of the pool, blue and unconscious, with two patrons performing CPR on him.

Running to where the child lay, I tapped one of the patrons on the shoulder and took over the procedure, but thought the whole time, "Where is my staff?" I proceeded doing CPR, until thankfully, the child took a large gaping breath. EMS arrived soon after, and as I assisted them loading the child into the ambulance, the thoughts of doubt arrived. "What happened? Why didn't my staff respond? Did they even see him?"

I proceeded to interview my staff and came to the conclusion that it was a fluke. This child had been told by his doctor not to swim, he had some sort of a respiratory problem, and if he overexerted himself, he would have problems breathing. My arrogance continued and I thought, "He was only under the water for a few seconds, my guard saw it, she did what she could. The patrons identified themselves as EMTs, that's understandably why they took over." The child spent one night in the hospital as a precaution and was released. My assistant and I concluded there was nothing we or our staff could have done to prevent this incident.

While sitting in the Critical Incident Debriefing with the involved staff just two days later, the unthinkable happened. The door flew open and a frantic lifeguard looked right at me and said, "Terri, it's happened again." My stomach sank. I ran to the deck of the pool to find my head lifeguard holding a bag-valve mask on another child, the paramedics quickly working around him, making the child ready for transportation--life flight for this one. He wasn't breathing and his pulse was faint and erratic. He subsequently spent four weeks in the hospital, two of which he was comatose.

This was the point where I made the realization that I wasn't doing enough. My staff isn't seeing what I need them to see. I had that false arrogance that I was doing everything right, including audits, in-service trainings, providing an active layer of supervision, performing shadow drops and giving AED training.

So how could have this still happened? The responding lifeguard made a comment to me that I will always remember. He said, "I didn't know I couldn't see the bottom." I apparently wasn't doing everything right.

It wasn't until one winter day in 2004 that I stumbled onto an answer.

The Utah Risk Management Mutual Association (URMMA), my city's risk management company, had one of its supervisor trainings. At the session Joanne Glantz, one of the trainers for URMMA, talked about the "commentary drive," a technique Emergency Response Teams use to train their vehicle drivers. The technique requires the driver to articulate to the instructor everything they see as they are driving. It is a simple technique that has been proven to reduce daydreaming and distractions while driving, and allows the trainer to make sure the driver is seeing everything.

As I sat and listened, I realized this same principle could be used on the pool deck. The meeting ended and I raced back to my facility and went directly to the lifeguard on break. I asked him to try talking out loud, saying everything he was looking at while he was scanning on the next rotation for the entire 15 minutes he was on the stand.

He then reported back to me that in addition to time flying by, he was totally focused on what he was looking at. "But, the patrons in the hot tub thought I was crazy!" he said. I laughed, and knew I had an answer.

Jim Wheeler, one of my mentors, describes having the knowledge of what is going on at the pool as having the "big eye." Because of experience, most facility managers have the big eye, and can pick out the smallest detail and determine if it is a threat or not. Pool managers and certain aquatic staff can develop this big eye as well.

With this technique, your staff can develop this big eye, and know that they are truly seeing what managers so desperately need them to see. I have named this technique the Vigilance Voice, because the word "vigilance" encompasses everything we do as aquatic professionals.

The Vigilance Voice is, in the simplest terms, a lifeguard telling what he or she sees. Many things are achieved: training for staff, reduction of daydreaming and distractions, focus on scanning in stressful situations, development of habitually watching all areas of a zone, and most important of all, the assurance that our staff is seeing what we need them to see.

"I used this training at the beginning of the summer to awaken the minds of my guards as to the things that they should be looking for and how to make mental notes of them," says Susan Taylor, aquatic facility operator for the United States Marine Corps in Okinawa, Japan, that takes in more than 22,000 patrons in a five-month period. "Several times during the course of the summer my staff would comment to me that in the hottest part of the day if they turned to this technique, it would help keep them alert on stand."

The technique is simple. Approach the guard, making sure you have the same vantage as they do, and have them articulate what they see on each one of their scans. Make sure to take notes, and pay attention to the things they aren't seeing such as risky behaviors, risky guests, problem areas of the pool, etc. Stay with them for an entire rotation.

Then switch places. Make sure to paint a picture of everything you see. What may be common sense to an experienced manager, may not be to a lifeguard that has just begun their career. Systematically breakdown each area of the zone making sure to speak in words they can understand: tell them everything you are seeing, the top of the water, the behaviors of the guests, the bottom of the pool, the empty spaces, etc. Then switch places again. You should notice a difference in what the guard observes immediately. Make sure to point out the differences and praise them when they do well.

The first time I did this, I was surprised by the things I thought my staff was seeing, but apparently weren't. Even some of my head lifeguards didn't see everything. I have now empowered my staff to achieve, relatively quickly, something that took me years to master.

Other aquatic facility staff have tried this same technique, and discovered equally satisfying results. Cheryl Peterson-Brachle, aquatic director for Omaha, Neb., says that she trained pool managers on how to have staff verbalize what they were seeing. "When the lifeguard accomplished the skill successfully we gave them a little ping pong ball with an eye on it," she says. "The managers were given a bouncy ball with an eye on it when we saw that they had the big eye at their facility. I can't express to you enough how successful we found this technique to be."

This is an invaluable tool for someone new to the guard stand. Better yet, it is reassuring to a manager that the aquatic staff is properly set up to succeed. Maybe most importantly, is that it can help avoid incidences such as those mentioned earlier.

The best part about this technique is that it's free. Just ask your lifeguards, and you will be surprised. You'll get results, and best of all, your staff will see what you need them to see.

Article and photos by Terri Smith