Importance of guide retention at heli ski operations

With the heli ski season winding down the staff start looking at what their options are for the summer. Some will continue with guiding work on mountains, rivers and glaciers, others will resume their summer occupations which ranges from construction work to planting trees to fighting wildfires. But once winter returns, ski guides all head back to the mountains. With so many years poured into their training, certification and experience, skiing powder with guests as a career is a well earned reward.

In any seasonal commercial tourism operation, returning staff is an asset. Not only does it help the efficiency of day to day operations, it also lets returning guests be greeted with a familiar face. Here at Last Frontier Heli Skiing, retaining the majority of our heli ski guides, winter after winter, is essential for a few reasons:

Our tenure. With more than 9,500 square kilometres (2.3 million acres) of skiable terrain, it literally can take years for guides to learn all the different peaks, lines and glaciers. Coordinating several heli ski groups at once around transportation and refueling requires some strategic planning to make sure that guests are never waiting too long before their next lift.

Terrain and snowpack familiarity. Experienced heli ski guides live and breath the snowpack, logging daily profiles and weather patterns and always on the look out for buried, unstable layers that could cause a safety concern. Long before guests arise to coffee and breakfast at the lodge, guides have been up for hours checking weather telemetry and gathering for their morning meeting to discuss the options of what to ski that day. These meetings are often steered by lead guides and forecasters whom have spent many years observing the subtleties of the Northern B.C. snowpack and learning the locations of terrain traps and hazards such as steep cliffs, crevasses and boulder fields.

Last Frontier Heliskiing is a family.  Returning staff continually welcome new employees every year and get to know each other very well during their weeks of living and working together in our remote lodge locations. Guides’ responsibilities go well beyond their daily operational duties, making sure that guests come and enjoy a truly unique heli ski experience. Returning guests also feel as they are a part of the extended family, building trust with the guides that have shepherded them through the vast terrain of Last Frontier’s tenure.

From all the staff at Last Frontier – both new and returning – see you next season.