[I]Technical manager or superintendent is a different job than fleet manager. I think I said that. Fleet manager, vessel manager, DPA, whatever the company calls it, is usually the one in charge of the operations of the vessel. And this person is usually a Master. The technical superintendent is usually an engineer and they are in charge maintenance, Class issues, yard work, and regulatory issues that are technically oriented.
Do you think this not the case in most companies?
[/I]Ok ,Sean will reply on this one last time, because i can see you’re a confused. I will tell you the trend and that is the reality. Usually a very large fleet is divided into fleet 1 and 2/ 3… Each fleet has technical superintendents who are the PICs. They are in charge of interacting with Vessel ‘command’ and we refer that to include the Chief Engineer also. He (the PIC) is the one that manages the day to day activity.
We do have Personnel departments in different countries. We have Captains there heading those departments. Hiring crew and stuff and they report to what we call the Technical Head Office in another different Country. The Technical Office is where ‘everthing’ about the Ship fleet operations and trouble is managed from. Everything. But the Tech HO is reporting to a small Office in another country, where the Owner sits. The Owner has a small advisory team.
For all practical purposes and emergencies, all 40 ships in our fleet report to the Tech HO. Unfortunately they are all Engineers. In our Company even the DPA is also a C/E, and so is the CSO. We have added around a dozen ships in the last year and a half, being built in China, Japan and Phillipines. We station for overseeing the buildup Engineers again. Takeover crews we only call C/E, 2/E and sometimes E/O around 2 months before. The Master and mate we bring in around 15 days before. A few days before sea trials.
I travel Singapore, HK, Mumbai, Dubai very often. I see the world fleet as it is. It’s almost the same in every other office. There is a reason why i started this topic, that shore based management styles are conflicting with onboard management or rather the Command based management style. While we have reconciled and changed quite a bit, we are unable to bring in such changes. The reasons we can see quite a bit here. That there are a large number of people in positions of ‘Command’ who are not capable of being receptive to new ideas. Let alone conjecture actual change.
A Ship is basically nothing but Steel, Cargo, Machinery. Every operation on board is an Engineering operation. You cannot do anything of significance on board without the need of an Engineering system. Yet if you can see the tragedy replays in many replies on this thread. Dismissal as a ‘blackbox’ to outright namecalling. And then lastly a revelation for the Command:
Communicate with the Chief Engineer first. He is critical. More critical than the Chief Officer, because, in a crunch, you can do that man’s job but not the Chief Engineer’s. Start building trust. What are his problems? What are the machinery and manpower issues? Is he finding enough time for preventative maintenance? Any safety or other issues? Anything broken down now? Waiting for important spares? Are things good at home?
If this is what is being ‘taught’/ suggesetd and reminded to the Command to realize what is critical, i would be every bit correct stating, the present ‘Command’ do not realize how ships really run and he engineering and human criticality factors in place, so important and essential to comprehend. This statement should not be some revelation.
It should NOT be the ‘best’ article read on Chief-Master relationships. It reflects the starkest and saddest reality: That Masters have not realized how important the Chief Engineer is to the operation of the vessel, and they have to be reminded and exhorted to something which should be the very basic 101 of those who are responsible in running ships.
The ‘Command’ System is indeed interfering in safe operations as many Masters, don’t really consider the Chiefs 4 stripes equivalent to theirs and feel more dependent on their dept side on the Second in ‘Command’ who feels he is equivalent to the Chief Engineer. When a C/E blasts out in frustration at a mate, most Masters inevitably support the mate. He ends dishing out a CR thats utterly idiotic and vindictive on the Chief. Fact is some of our best Chiefs get the worst reports from the Masters.
This is repeating across the Industry. And there is frustration, we cannot retain Engineers. Many times we are desperate and end up paying a much higher salary to the Chief than the Master, because of the demand and supply situation and then big ego headaches on board again. We increase Masters salary too, hitting the bottomline inconsistent with the demand and supply economics that markets need to run.
My idea was not to deride. But to bring reality home, closer to what truth really should be. And in the process interact with the professionals who might be the key to a better response and improvement in the Industry.