Showing posts with label leadership skills. Show all posts
Showing posts with label leadership skills. Show all posts

Thursday, February 05, 2009

Cruise ship soap opera



A few weeks back I was related a true story from a cruise ship of how a personal drama evolved to remarkable proportions:

This cruise ship was plying between two countries on a regular trade and she was appointed a new Captain (that I have the dubious honor to know of personally) onboard. The ship was manned by two nationalities and the Captain started telling his countrymen how he is going to replace them all with the other cheaper nationality. True to his nature he immediately won the "most likable person onboard" award as he always manages to do.

As with his simpletons mind he started to "command and conquer" and he promised the Security Officer a 3rd Officer's position as he was qualified for it. Naturally this was just lip service to get him on his "side" and also vital gossip and information of what is going on onboard. This was discovered pretty soon too and did not win any sympathies on the would be 3rd Officer's side.

Next the Captain bedded the Chief Purser (from the other nationality) and fell in love with her and they started a relationship. All looked good for the Captain, he ruled as a dictator and the antipathy grew by the day.

Until the day comes when another new Captain (from the other nationality) comes to relieve him for vacation. As it happens this Captain (lets call him Y) had also had a relationship with the Chief Purser a few years back on another ship. Then during a crew party old feelings flamed up and the Chief Purser forgot her new beau and went back for the old salt.

As it happens the Captain (lets call him X) received at 3am from an unknown number a MMS message with Captain Y and the Chief Purser on a photo in a nightclub sucking each others faces in a manner that don't leave much for interpretation. Being the cuckolded party he jumped out of bed and in his car and started a 600+km drive to where the ship was in port.

Next morning at abt 9am Captain X arrives to the ship and storms onboard and demands to see the security log. He checks the times when Captain Y and Chief Purser has come back onboard. Security Officer that had no sympathy for the Captain X knows immediately what is going on and he sees the agitated state he is in so he calls the Chief Officer to report what is going on. Chief Officer tells him to call the Coast Guard, which he does.

Meanwhile Captain X dashes into the Captains cabin only to find Captain Y and Chief Purser snoozing in each others arms. Captain X is speechless, can't get a coherent word out of his mouth. Soon enough Coast Guard arrives and collects him off the ship.

After Captain X gather his wits he comes up with the million dollar idea to ask the Company to sack Captain Y. The letter from the Captain is taken seriously and the DPA calls the Coast Guard, the Officer who made the arrest gives a slightly exaggerated vision of the incident as he happens to be a friend of the wronged Security Officer.

The Company decides it is safer to kick Captain X off board instead. Was not the first nor the last time it happened to him.

What do we learn from this?
Women onboard are always inviting trouble,
Leadership skills are asked for when big crews are in question,
If you treat people badly - don't expect anything less in return,
Never ever bring your private life onboard and especially not to the management.

Some food for thought...





Friday, November 14, 2008

Yacht crews working

Every man got his duty

Previously I posted a blog about Ships Organisation structure, in this blog I am giving some impressions of how small crews works.

As said earlier, the smaller the crew gets the lesser the ranks are in each department but the job still remains the same (!). Realizing that on the modern yachts the technology is getting more and more advanced the Engineers has on many yachts been reduced to only one person onboard, Officers has been reduced to 1/2 persons and Deckhands maybe 2/3, whereas in the Interior where service is required, they make the bulk of the crew.

When taking the earlier stated fact in consideration, that the work still remains the same the Captain is forced to make different solutions to make the ship "tick". These solutions are many times influenced by the budget he has at his disposal. The cheapest one of course is to eradicate the departmental borders and utilize whole crew wherever needed, each one to her abilities, this is a very special feature in yachting and is a must for anyone wanting to work in this industry. There is no place for "this is not my job" mentality. The crew functions like a big family.

E.g. Major wash down is required after a trans Oceanic voyage, the Owner has decided to arrive the next day so jobs has been scheduled so the interior is cleaned and setup as much as possible before arrival and everybody participates in the wash down of decks and superstructures. After that supplies are being delivered, whole crew helps to carry the lot onboard and assists the Chef and Chief Stew to store it away in nooks and crannies. Everybody works like donkeys in order for the Yacht to look Spick & Span for the Owner when he arrives. Then again if the crew is larger and the Owner is more considerate, he will crew time to prepare and arrives 3-4 days after arrival. Crew works as per their job descriptions and gets a good nights sleep.

The other solution the Captain might do is to use Contractors or Technicians to resolve problems onboard. It also many times depends on the ability of the Chief Engineer of what he can do and the time available. Sometimes it is simply not possible to do without expert help. This applies many times to electronics. Also many machinery may be under guarantee service contracts.

For Deck department the Contractors that are many times used is for major paint jobs, teak deck renewal, bottom cleaning etc. This also depends on how skilled the Chief Officer is in terms of maintenance. A good paint job can be ruined easily with the use of wrong chemicals as well as a teak deck too. The maintenance intervals also depends on what materials are used and what Contractors. As the old saying goes "cheap is not necessarily the best" and once you go cheap you do expensive after, then you got both - cheap and good.

In the Interior they require also loads of items, especially when Guests are prepared for, special food items, beverages, flower arrangements, carpet cleanings etc. Here also Contractors, Suppliers and Shipchandlers are needed. The whole interior is to be detailed, usually as per a set standard by the Owner or Managing Company or the Ch. Stew herself. Here the deck and engine boys can provide little help but they are essential in fixing small items that maybe discovered in the last minute.

The most important person in the crew is the Chef, not only for the Guests but also the crew. If the food is crap nobody will be happy and people will start looking for other yacht opportunities. The whole provisioning part of the boat is very important and it affects the overall spirit onboard.

As conclusion of above you can see that one part is useless without the other. Everybody is necessary onboard, there are no superfluous persons.





Thursday, November 13, 2008

Ship command structure

Ships have a militaristic organization structure going in "chain of command" principle. In Cargo ships and big Cruise ships this organization is quite rigidly followed due to conservatism and on the latter due to the size of crews.

Example of organisation flowchart

Again on Yachts the organization structure is the same but the borders between departments have been blurred due to the size of crew, same can be said of small merchant coasters. The smaller the crew the more teamwork is required to make the boat go, therefore sometimes a Deckhand could be washing dishes and Stewardesses could be doing lookout duty, on big ships this would be unheard of. Also the cohesiveness of a smaller crew is greater than a big crew, i.e. the Chief Stewardess could ask the Deckies to wash the deck instead of the Chief Officer (shame on him).

But, back to the organization structure I think everybody knows that on top is the Captain, as the saying goes "Captain onboard and God in Heaven". Even legally it is not possible to have anybody else to be responsible for the ship than the Captain, this is clearly stated in every governments maritime laws. Therefore it is the Captain who goes and explains what went wrong in court and sometimes also takes the flak for it.

Well, then to continue, below the Captain is usually 3 characters, namely the Staff Captain (Chief Officer), Chief Engineer and Hotel Manager (Chief Stewardess). Sometimes there might be also a Radio Officer but he is mostly relegated to history nowadays due to advanced technologyz. These 3 persons represents the department head for the:

1. Deck department;

2. Engine department;

3. Hotel (Interior) department.

In big Cruise ships there may be additionally a Security Dept and Surveillance Dept but I won't delve into these any further.

The Deck Department is lead by the Chief Officer and he has usually below him at least a 1st Officer (if not then we're talking abt a very small boat) and the bigger the vessel gets the more Officer's he has, the responsibilities being separated to Safety, Maintenance, Security and Navigation. Below the Officer's there is usually a Boatswain (Bosun) sometimes followed by a Carpenter, then, Able Seamen, Ordinary Seamen and Apprentice's. The difference from Apprentice to Boatswain is mostly years of experience onboard as well as necessary courses to be taken for the qualification.

The Engine Department is lead by the Chief Engineer and has usually below him a 1st Engineer who is then followed by other Engineer's depending on the Machinery onboard. Below the Engineer's there is traditionally a Donkeyman, Fitter's, Motormen, Oilers and Wipers. Same applies here too as in Deck department, for higher rank depends years of experience and education level.

The Hotel Department is lead by the Hotel Manager and depending on the size of ship loads of people below and I won't even attempt to explain it here. On yachts the Chief Steward has a row of Stewardesses, a Chef and sometimes a Sous Chef (2nd Cook) as well as a Laundryman.

In the olden days the radio telegraph or "sparky" formed his own department but has now been replaced by electronic boxes.

As for how the crews work onboard and different working situations I will elaborate more on that in my next blog :)