Starting Out

I've had a few questions about being new to the doors so here are a few gems of distilled wisdom for a new starter.
You can be big and sturdy or small and fast but you must be able to keep your head.
Don't get emotionally involved with the things you come across. Some punters will have traumatic tales, insults will be slung at you, fists will be slung at you. They don't know you, they likely never will. Let it wash past, you react to what you want to react to, don't get wound up. If a punter or a colleague can press your buttons you've given them control of the situation.
Don't be a perfectionist, just get it right and get it to stick.
There are way too many grey areas, too much haze of misinformation and miscommunication to get it perfect. You'll make mistakes, actions will have unintended consequences, situations will change and you won't have control. Accept it, learn the lessons & don't linger on it.
Enjoy the work, it's not glamorous or appealing but if you want to keep at it, enjoy it.
It's a people job, you work in teams, you'll meet a huge number of people. Make an effort to be friendly and you can have really fun nights of it and enjoy coming back. If you're cold and stony, you'll find the reception you get is cold and stony and is that something you're going to enjoy heading back in the next night. There can be all sorts of fun to be had, be a part of it.
It's not for everyone.
It's an odd job, bad hours, no respect, a half arsed management and some shifty characters in every direction. If it doesn't suit you, get out, don't be a bad doorman who doesn't want to be doing it. There's no medal for sticking it out, just accept it and move on.
These 4 should get you through most of it but getting badged and getting started is the beginning of a long steep learning curve.

Oi, No!

One night, busy-ish, the usual blend of little men trying to be bigger, big men with little girls and older ladies looking for thrills. Not a great deal of class to them but not real scum, not expecting too much crazy shit to be happening. I go on a little wander 'round the venue and discover in a fairly high through-put corridor a couple having some heated emotional exchanges. Not tears and pleading but angry stances, air fairly blue from points shouted over each other on both sides.
Not bad for amateur improv dramatics but not what we want in a nightclub. I interrupt, or at least place myself in both of their personal space, and declare it's time they took the argument outside. Neither of them acknowledges the comment verbally but both start moving towards the main door, still screaming over each other. I follow from a little distance and let my colleagues at the door know we're on our way but not in any hurry. No jackets to collect, no friends to say goodbye to, the slow procession to the door continues. I've not been paying too much attention to the type of conversation they've been continuing at full volume.
Just as they reach the door the aggravated lass says something akin to "You're just like Jake" to the aggravated lad. He very explosively snaps and lunges for her. The pair are a pace from the front door pair, I'm a pace behind him, shout out 'Oi No'. One colleague grabs the girl from behind and draws her clear of the oncoming flail of fists. The other lad grabs the nearest arm and tries to pull him out the door. His pull coincides with my surge in momentum and the lad is slingshot into the street. He topples off balance, my colleague sensibly keeps hold and he is slingshot into the wall beside the front door. He splats into the poster promoting another night of discount alcohol and loud music. He then kind of deflates and slumps to the floor. The lass is released and heads across the doorway, looking concerned for her lads state. Looking concerned, she bends down to him, spits on his face, kicks his sprawled legs and struts off smoothly towards the taxi rank. We had a little chuckle to ourselves and waited for the fallen little soldier to raise himself up and make his way on.

Old haunt

I revisited a venue I've not been at for a few years. I used to work there a few years ago, fairly non stop. It's a six night a week doorwork venue. I used to do all six of them with a couple of other lads, only to have the team padded on the hectic nights. This worked well, we knew the venue, we knew the customers, the staff and the barred list.
It was a pleasant, middle of the night venue most of the time. Punters fuelling up but not staying long, not much to appeal to the illicitly chemically enhanced, well observed toilets and alert staff kept the barred list refreshed. I'd like to think we reached a critical mass of drug users, sellers and fools barred so it became bad business to spend valuable time trying to sell to folks who weren't interested.
I revisited for a couple of hectic shifts, being the padding this time. It seems that a good deal of the work we'd done is still there, most customers have fun, drink and move on. What did seem to have changed was the staff, bar and floor, were not on the ball. I'd not worked there in a while and things inevitably change and their purpose shifts. The staff were less clued up on serving drunks, less aware of broken glass, spilled drinks and dirty tables. I'm sure minimum wage has gone up a good old chunk since I was last there. Still got to find a couple shagging in the loo and a couple of lads with summer colds so all's right in the world. That really does say a great deal about how twisted my view of the world and my role in it has become.

Feeling it

The first few good weekends of the summer have arrived. The sunshine of a week last saturday and then the bank holiday pay day weekend brought the first busy nights since the new year. The sunshine, the open beer gardens, the lack of confinement to sweaty, smelly interiors has seen folks out longer, drinking hard for longer days.
For business, it's finally good news, more customers, out for longer, more money spent, lower wage percentages and better profits all round.
For me it means, more muppets to knock back, all day drinkers are not all night winners from a letting in point of view.
More all day all night drinkers, fall asleep more, throw up and fall asleep more, fall over more and get in more drunken brawls.
This all means I've been running around and carrying drunken folks a lot more than I had been recently. I've been feeling old when I get off shift. Time to quit the bulk training, shift to speed, stamina and cv training again. Normally I get ahead of this but this year it's gotten ahead of me, must be old age kicking in, either that or I'm just getting slow.

Really don't

Now I say hello to all sorts of folks, young and old, male and female, pretty and rough. For just about all of those folks, I try and greet them with an "evening" sometimes followed up with an "how you doing?" or an "y'alright?". Not brilliant or witty but sincere on the most part and a good way of establishing some social contact which can stand me in good stead for later in the evening.
If I know the punter, either as a friend, or a regular, they might get a handshake or a "how's it going?". I'm not one of life's great conversationalists when I'm working, at least not within earshot of the punters.
What I really don't want is punters, female or male, hugging, frotting or mounting me as a form of greeting. I've worked gay night enough that this happens from men and women, even at 'straight' venues. It's not my style, it's not very professional looking and quite frankly I'm embarrassed by this ridiculous show. If out socially, this might be acceptable, but even then it'd be unlikely. The running jumping, hugging hump is not an acceptable greeting to any person at work unless you're a disney animal or a cup winning footballer. I'm neither.

Hard Questions

I'm not often asked too many hard questions by the punters. They're normally too drunk or inane to interest me. Every now and again wisdom does fall from the mouths of babes. The usual complement of mentally impaired through alcohol does occasionally include a moment of clarity and insight. Sometimes these cannot be answered with a short concise response or a shrug.
The observation that we can't let you on to the street with your drinks at exactly the point a pair of habitual tramps drag each other and their large bottle of cider around the waiting police vehicle is one of those. No easy answers, just an internal anger at the stupidity of the implementation of some laws and an answer which even as I was saying it sounded more hollow than a robbed out easter egg.

Full speed ahead

Flying into an energetic situation from the front door you kind of hope that it's either a big one, worth the running in from the door or an easy one that someone panicked on and the whole thing is well under control on arrival.
If it's all over apart from the walking to the door, you get to slam the brakes on full, you get a 2 second briefing shouted over the sound system while you find suitable bits to hold the separated parties by as you spin them around and head for the nearest exit.
If you get lucky and it's a blurry carnage of limbs, glass and anger you can use a little bit of physics to your advantage. A large body moving at speed can transfer momentum very effectively. By identifying you first target and your ideal ricochet. With good fortune, good balance and enough space you can splat one forward faster than they think they can move. A little work on the rebound and you end up wrapped around another one before either sees you coming. That's what you want to happen as you start pegging it in from the door.
More typically, you fly in to a find a partially controlled scuffle. No idea what's gone on, no idea who's still fighting, fighting back, holding back or just holding on to their mates. All the lovely momentum is poured away squeezing through a busy club to a poorly accessible corner. Grabbing the nearest limbs and trying to assert control from there is not a winner but it's often the best you get. Add in the few you missed in the round up trying to get in a cheap one as you've both of their enemies arms or try and bottle you as you carry their splattered mate out. Every now and then you get option one, only once in a blue moon do you get the second. Far too bloody often its the third one, all the run, none of the fun.