This is something that's been on my mind. I'd just like to get a discussion going about strategies people use to manage task loading. To kick it off I'll share my own thoughts.
let's take this scenario for a common starting point:
You're diving on a large wreck in 100ft of water. The visibility is relatively poor and there is a slight current. You're down to 80 bar and within 3 minutes of the NDL when you suddenly come to the realization that you the upline isn't where you thought it was. You're disoriented, getting a little low on air and you need to leave the bottom. You have to collect your buddy, launch at least one DSMB and upon looking at your buddy he's looking stressed. Amidst the confusion the current is slowly pushing you and your buddy a little over the top of the wreck and you begin to drift a little deeper.
(at this point some of you are thinking "that's not task loading, where's the freeflow, the shark attacks and the failed bungee wings"? If that's you just wait a bit before responding).
In these kinds of situations you can use priority setting to keep tasks organized and do the right things first.
In my case (note: there are 1000 ways to skin this cat). I would apply what I call my A-B-C-D rule. PADI has something called "stop, breathe, think, do" but I think it misses an important step so I use what i think is a slight improvement.
A - Air.
Just stop and breathe in and out while you assess your situation. In this scenario, I would also sign to my buddy to stop and breathe in and out slowly. I may even pat him on the shoulder and give him a big OK sign to put him at ease. Take time for this and make sure everyone is calm before going further. Not controlling your breathing is the biggest hindrance to clear thinking and correct action in task loading and if you let your breathing get faster and shallower in such situations it can even lead to panic. Panic is never good and not necessary in our scenario. You have air. You have your buddy and all your gear is working correctly. Remind yourself of that as you breathe in and breathe out.
B - Buoyancy control.
Just dive. Check your gauges, Check your depth, your NDL, your air and make sure you are neutral. In this scenario I think I would sign to my buddy to follow me and I would look for a good place to launch the DSMB where it would have a clear run to the surface and I wasn't going to get pushed around too much by the current. Sometimes swimming away from the wreck and doing it near the bottom on the leeward side of the wreck is handy but that's another discussion. The point here is to just dive and think about where you want to be. (This is the part that gets missed in "stop-breathe-think-do".
C - Communicate. (in PADI = think)
Strangely, communicating isn't my highest priority. It comes after controlling breathing and controlling buoyancy. At this point I would tell my buddy I want to launch a DSMB. He may also want to launch his but I would communicate to do them one at a time or maybe for him to wait until we've reached our first stop to do it while we're not pushing the NDL's anymore. At this point you're planning and communicating. You could also decide to search again for the up line but I personally would reject ideas that would put us in time pressure if it didn't work. For the rest it doesn't really matter what your plan is but the important thing is that the plan is clear.
D - Do it.
Once you have a plan then just do it. In this scenario, we spent maybe 1/3 of our time breathing and diving, 1/3 planning and communicating and 1/3 doing it. So to finish we launch one DSMB from the bottom and then ascend to 10 metres. Stop at 10 metres just long enough to launch the second DSMB and then proceed slowly to stop depth. Stops are done using the DSMB for stability. In the do it phase you need to go slow move slowly and deliberately. Trying to execute the plan too quickly will actually slow you down. Go slow, avoid mistakes and you will be done faster.
So, that's that. We started with a scenario that may have looked a intimidating. I mean we had a lot to do. We had to process the shock of realizing we were lost, we had to calm down our buddy, deal with the current and avoid slipping deeper, find a spot to launch a DSMB, launch it, get the ascent going and all the while keep an eye on gauges as we communicated the plan to our buddy.
That's lots of tasks but by structuring the approach with A-B-C-D (or stop breathe think do) we organized the highest priority tasks to the top of the list and got it structured so we could move through them in an effective manner.
Having said that, this is my way of doing things. This thread is intended to get the idea across on the one hand but also to see what other people do to organize tasks. So let's hear your solution to the scenario. The stage is yours.
R..
let's take this scenario for a common starting point:
You're diving on a large wreck in 100ft of water. The visibility is relatively poor and there is a slight current. You're down to 80 bar and within 3 minutes of the NDL when you suddenly come to the realization that you the upline isn't where you thought it was. You're disoriented, getting a little low on air and you need to leave the bottom. You have to collect your buddy, launch at least one DSMB and upon looking at your buddy he's looking stressed. Amidst the confusion the current is slowly pushing you and your buddy a little over the top of the wreck and you begin to drift a little deeper.
(at this point some of you are thinking "that's not task loading, where's the freeflow, the shark attacks and the failed bungee wings"? If that's you just wait a bit before responding).
In these kinds of situations you can use priority setting to keep tasks organized and do the right things first.
In my case (note: there are 1000 ways to skin this cat). I would apply what I call my A-B-C-D rule. PADI has something called "stop, breathe, think, do" but I think it misses an important step so I use what i think is a slight improvement.
A - Air.
Just stop and breathe in and out while you assess your situation. In this scenario, I would also sign to my buddy to stop and breathe in and out slowly. I may even pat him on the shoulder and give him a big OK sign to put him at ease. Take time for this and make sure everyone is calm before going further. Not controlling your breathing is the biggest hindrance to clear thinking and correct action in task loading and if you let your breathing get faster and shallower in such situations it can even lead to panic. Panic is never good and not necessary in our scenario. You have air. You have your buddy and all your gear is working correctly. Remind yourself of that as you breathe in and breathe out.
B - Buoyancy control.
Just dive. Check your gauges, Check your depth, your NDL, your air and make sure you are neutral. In this scenario I think I would sign to my buddy to follow me and I would look for a good place to launch the DSMB where it would have a clear run to the surface and I wasn't going to get pushed around too much by the current. Sometimes swimming away from the wreck and doing it near the bottom on the leeward side of the wreck is handy but that's another discussion. The point here is to just dive and think about where you want to be. (This is the part that gets missed in "stop-breathe-think-do".
C - Communicate. (in PADI = think)
Strangely, communicating isn't my highest priority. It comes after controlling breathing and controlling buoyancy. At this point I would tell my buddy I want to launch a DSMB. He may also want to launch his but I would communicate to do them one at a time or maybe for him to wait until we've reached our first stop to do it while we're not pushing the NDL's anymore. At this point you're planning and communicating. You could also decide to search again for the up line but I personally would reject ideas that would put us in time pressure if it didn't work. For the rest it doesn't really matter what your plan is but the important thing is that the plan is clear.
D - Do it.
Once you have a plan then just do it. In this scenario, we spent maybe 1/3 of our time breathing and diving, 1/3 planning and communicating and 1/3 doing it. So to finish we launch one DSMB from the bottom and then ascend to 10 metres. Stop at 10 metres just long enough to launch the second DSMB and then proceed slowly to stop depth. Stops are done using the DSMB for stability. In the do it phase you need to go slow move slowly and deliberately. Trying to execute the plan too quickly will actually slow you down. Go slow, avoid mistakes and you will be done faster.
So, that's that. We started with a scenario that may have looked a intimidating. I mean we had a lot to do. We had to process the shock of realizing we were lost, we had to calm down our buddy, deal with the current and avoid slipping deeper, find a spot to launch a DSMB, launch it, get the ascent going and all the while keep an eye on gauges as we communicated the plan to our buddy.
That's lots of tasks but by structuring the approach with A-B-C-D (or stop breathe think do) we organized the highest priority tasks to the top of the list and got it structured so we could move through them in an effective manner.
Having said that, this is my way of doing things. This thread is intended to get the idea across on the one hand but also to see what other people do to organize tasks. So let's hear your solution to the scenario. The stage is yours.
R..