Lifeguard

The core job is supervision. You watch the swim platform, the pool, the beach club and the water around the yacht whenever guests are in it. You set up swim areas with buoys and lines, check depth, current and jellyfish, and keep a rescue tube, spinal board and first aid kit within reach. When the toys come out you ride the rescue cover, often on a jet ski or in a small tender, while the deck team runs the seabobs, wakeboards and inflatables.

With guests aboard, your hours follow the family. Children are often in the water from breakfast until dusk, and you work closely with the nanny so a child is never left unwatched. With no guests aboard, most yachts expect you to do deck work: washing down, maintaining water toys, servicing snorkelling gear, inspecting PFDs and helping with drills. On the biggest yachts the lifeguard may also cover the gym, the pool plant checks and man-overboard training for the crew.

Captains hire people who have actually done the job. A current pool or beach lifeguard award matters more than anything else, and open-water or surf experience ranks highest. RLSS NBLQ, Surf Life Saving Bronze Medallion or American Red Cross Waterfront certificates all count. Former resort, cruise ship and beach patrol lifeguards do well. Add a PWC licence, a dive qualification or an RYA Powerboat Level 2 and you become much more useful to a deck team that is short of hands.

Few people stay a lifeguard for long. The usual move is into a combined deckhand and watersports role, where your water skills keep their value and you start building sea time towards a Yachtmaster or OOW ticket. Others move into dive instruction, security or close protection work on owners' yachts. A good season with a family who trusts you often leads to a permanent contract, because owners rehire the people their children already know.