Shotover Canyon Swing, Queenstown

Photo courtesy of Shotover Canyon Swing

Not your average backyard experience, the Shotover Canyon Swing is a high adrenaline experience, set on a purpose built platform on the edge of a cliff 109m/360ft above the Shotover River, Queenstown. Jumpers launch themselves from the platform to freefall 60m/200ft down into the canyon, reaching speeds of up to 150kph until the ropes swing them into a giant 200m arc.

Shotover Canyon Swing’s General Manager Matt Hollyer says the thing his team is most proud of is not necessarily the jump or the swing itself, but being able to give every customer a good time. To do this, he says, means you need good people.

The Shotover Canyon Swing team is made up of 19 staff, from jump masters and retail assistants to drivers/hosts and DVD editors. Matt believes that one of the most important factors in delivering a top quality experience to visitors is investing in staff training.

“Training is a really important part of what we do. For us, training is not just about the functional aspects of a job, like how to throw someone off a cliff, but it’s also how to pass on the Shotover Canyon Swing culture and vibe. Our commitment to treating every customer as special is what makes the experience unique,” says Matt.

As well as learning about the culture of the company, employees are offered ongoing training that is specific to their roles. Matt believes that offering this training on-the-job is vital to its success.

“In-house training is beneficial because it means that our own managers are training people up in a manner that matches the way we operate. The way we do things is pretty unique; you couldn’t learn it at a training course elsewhere,” he says.

“Each customer reacts in a slightly different way when they are out there, so the team needs to be prepared for anything. Training on-the-job means that staff are exposed to a variety of real situations, which helps prepare them for the scenarios they will be facing once they are fully qualified.”

To formally recognise their commitment to excellent customer service, some staff have completed a National Customer Service Award from ATTTO, the Aviation, Tourism and Travel Training Organisation.

ATTTO organises workplace training for businesses who want to up skill their employees, or have them gain nationally recognised qualifications for the skills they already have.

Shotover Canyon Swing’s Operations Manager has also completed training to become a Registered Workplace Assessor through ATTTO.

“As well as being a professional development opportunity for the manager, this means that we now have the capability to have all trainees assessed in-house, which is great,” says Matt.

He believes that this type of professional development is a key factor in ensuring employees are challenged and want to stay with the business.

“With our jump masters, it takes them 9 months to get qualified so we know that we will retain them for at least that long. But once they are through that training the challenge is to keep spinning their wheels and providing them with ongoing challenges,” he says.

“That is one of the advantages of achieving qualifications through ATTTO; once they are through one qualification we can give them another one to work on next.”

Looking ahead, Shotover Canyon Swing hopes to build on the Customer Service Award by offering a National Certificate in Tourism (Excursion Guiding) (Level 3) to drivers and jump staff.

“As well as formally recognising what they can already do, we are hoping this qualification will stretch our staff to think about how and why they do things, and then prompt them to consider how they can improve on that,” says Matt.

“Right now we are looking at how we can tailor the qualification to meet the unique needs of our business. For us, this is about giving our staff the option to gain further training for the job they are doing now, but also the opportunity to gain something that they can take away with them when they move on into the wider industry in the future.”