Recently came across this as the job requirements. Is there anyone else working on this BOAT. I mean IS HE SUPERMAN?
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Looks like an average day for a tanker chief mate, minus some of their other duties not listed here! Aside from the navigation stuff I suppose, which gets delegated to the 2/MâŚ
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And then in the afternoonâŚ
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Nonsarcastic: I donât understand the question. Yes, thatâs looks pretty standard as a job description.
Remember that âensureâ and âdirectsâ is not the same as âdoes.â
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The better management skills, people skills & knowledge of the job a Chief Mate has the easier it is for them. Iâve work with a few CM who made it look easy. Training a good crew makes it easier for the CM too.
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Yep. A CM who is a good manager can delegate a whole bunch of that stuff and make life easier for him/herself.
The q was real simple, given an 8 hr bridge watch, a min 4 hrs OT equates to 120 hrs of day work in a month. The paperwork itself takes up a lot of your day which u slide in on watch (u shud not be at the computer).
Been there, done that so the management part is hogwash especially with SIU - we all know they work from their rooms, take 45 min brakes, walk slower than a toddler and love to discuss during work hours ⌠lol but that is not being discussed.
Been there done it on the tankers also⌠U DO NOT KEEP A BRIDGE WATCH ON THE COASTAL TANKERS - DAYWORK. PCTCâs and BOX Boats on trips that last 45 days, uâd want to splice those ropes as well out of boredom.
This looks more like a firing document⌠as in it is not âensuredâ and âdirectedâ or âwhateveruwantocallitâ or âmanagementâ, you are responsible so u r fired. All seen it - Maersk CM.
Shore side is different .
Have seen C/Mâs give such written docs to serve as âGOTCHAâ's for the lazy ABW.
This is typical FOC management standard as far as ch/mate job description is concerned.
Here is V.Ship job description from 2015. Pls note that since that time there were some new regultory items added that surely did make the list of chief mate duties longer. ( cybersecurity and other shit)
Some managements ( i have 8 manuals) add to the duties of " environmental officer" what in other managements is assigned to cheng.
The typical approach of some technical managements is that almost all extra duties rest on deck department keeping engine department busy with ârestingâ . I am talking about container ships regarding above. In all companies /managements from my experience the technical department both on shore and from on board considers the ISM/SMS as chiefly the deck department shit show .
Under such circumstances I usually took over the duties as ships security officer to relieve chmate at least partly from this gulag factory routine and relieved him from 16-20 bridge watch in coastal intensive legs.
Proposals for changes/improvements in SMS master;'s end of contract review were always ignored. as aften the shore side office slackers had no nautical representation in the office like marine superintendent or similar . .
Chief Officerâs Job Description.pdf (32.2 KB)
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I donât know if you ever looked at the job description of Chief Engineer, unlimited or limited, but itâs nearly the same. If anything breaks & it canât be fixed itâs the CE fault. But speaking from experience, using the SMS/ISM program, regulatory agency maintenance program & company policies, thereâs dozens of ways to CYA, kick cans farther down the road & place responsibilities on others. Itâs a big game. But all of it is better than the Masters role & responsibilities. Thatâs the guy who almost always goes to jail & gets their name in the paper. Just blaim the captain, all mariners know thatâs always the easiest out.
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Surely Your ass will be kicked but even if your beloved m/e conks out and as a result I loose some boxes overboard the standard question spread through the office is : who was the master of this ship. May be in your beloved , cozy J.A . bubble it is different . I am talking about my experiences and surely there were different.
Not only that, makes every person of their team smarter, more valuable & ready to move up when the time comes. Over 3/4 of the jobs in that description ISNâT the CM direct job. Theyâre just the timing belt that makes the deck machine runs smoothly if they do it right.
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Exactly, who is the supervisor of the CE, who writes their evals, who allows them to stay on the vessel, who oversees their requisitions for parts for the MEâs, who is the highest paid & demands/requires the most respect on board? You mo-foâs want it, you got it? Shit hits the fan, crew & office knows where to point. Iâm engineroom side & always thought the CM position is better than Master any day of the week. 2M seems best of all IMO.
The best thing about being the CAPT is not being the CM. CM role is underpaid and undervalued. A whole lot of things are going to unravel without a good, all encompassing CM, let alone an average CM who can at least keep up with their own real tasks plus all the other BS of VGP, CBT for crew/drills and training, EMBARC HORSE SHIT, any company that actually pays OT for which wkly sheets must be submitted and checked, etc., and on and on.
Sure, it ultimately doesnât have the âbuck stops with youâ accountability of Master, but itâs still the busiest (and quite often) the most mentally taxing job on the ship.
Worst part of Capts job (seems like it never changes) is the inevitability of some drama in the galley turning into a taxing drain that may ultimately only be resolved by firing people⌠and then youâre sailing short for god knows how longâŚ.. but being CM is still worse.
And 2/m is no where near as easy as it used to be.
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Exactly with one exception.
My experience as chief mate encompasses minibulkers, handysizes/maxes , gen cgo, MPCs, semi containers and containers.
As master containers and one stunt on MPC handysize with special cargo( windmill bases) to US Columbia river range and back with grain to Japan.
Chief mate job especially on containers is the worst job imaginable. At sea 12 hrs including watch keeping and in port only the sky is the limit with working hrs. It is an effing labour camp routine and with master not giving a shit abt your condition one may be really exhausted with visible accumulation of fatigue due to lack of rest depending on the route and rotations.Coastal legs are nightmares. Even with 2 mates and imagine 1 mate only or even 6/6 like i had on minibulkers.
The exception i mentioned above is that on the ship, he may deal with only one idiot above him, whereas in the case of master one has to deal with hordes of idiots from shore. 
.That is the only advantage that I can see. .
Can you imagine the faces of Bernhard Shulte top management when in the presence of his majesty Dr.Shulte ( the flesh and blood real owner of his assets) during one of my briefings i dared to say the following .
You may afford to employ two complete idiots on your ships. The first idiot is the master and his close second is the chief engineer. This of course on one condition , which is the rest of the deck officers and engine officers are savvy and fully competent and professional.
In my 1982- 2024 sea adventure i have seen and experieced things difficult to imagine but true reality shows.
Master and cheng close buddies - drinking buddies that is , disappearing after last port and showing up 30 days later. Only chief steward new they were alive evacuating empty bottles from both their saloons
We made it in 8 months Europe -China - Europe run , returned happily home with this two idiots dressed with their all gullshit and golden buttons , uniforms and what not, to meet the management representative in the home port with enveloped bonuses for a succesfull voyage of uninterupted drinking. Have been around man and seen some real big time shit in my life.
Cheers
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Damn, SAND PEBBLE, I donât want to work on any ship where ANYBODY is demanding/requiring respect. I only demand and require NOT to be disrespected. Same as I am sure you do. I donât give a shit whether Iâm respected as long as get paid what Iâm supposed to get paid.
I obviously canât speak for where you work, but one of the biggest problems I see these days is the amount of disdain and disrespect coming from the office towards the CE and CAPT. Often times they think so little of the 1AE and CM they wonât even expend the same negative energy upon them.
Being CAPT / CE doesnât mean anywhere near as much as used toâŚ. sad.
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Normal. That is why many people stay 2/M for life, they donât want to go through that and the testing. Once you are in that position it becomes routine, the learning curve is up to the individualâs skills. At the end make the Captain look good.
Why, because thereâs no chart corrections to do and they have to actually work on deck now?
Well, someone has to be familiar with the bridge equipment, when oftentimes the other mates (and sometimes the Master) arenât. Weâve always had to work on deck.
One of my best moneymakers was a ship in which the Third Mate and I performed many of the CMâs deck and hold inspections.
The French and the Germanâs for a while experimented with combined tickets. In the case of the French it was very hard to get chief mates. The preferred position was second engineer (1st assistant engineer). It paid the same as chief mate.
Now days the only person you can find to delegate to is a bloody mirror.
Scrutiny by the company and PSC over all encompassing details of passage plans from dock to dock and updating of all kinds of electronic nav pub records as well as ECDIS charts/licenses, and shorter and shorter port calls during which you have to get the bridge reset for the next transit, etc., have, IMO, made the job a lot less desirable than it used to be. Granted, we could probably say that about every billet.