Shortage of Seafarers: Analysis and Retention Strategies

This project proposal analyzes the issue of the shortage of seafarers in the maritime industry and suggests retention strategies. It includes literature review, data collection, and health and safety documents.

Running Head: SHORTAGE OF SEAFARERS
Project proposal on Analysis of the Issue of the shortage of seafarers
Name of the Student
Name of the University
Author Note

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Table of Contents
Project Title.....................................................................................................................................2
Aim and Objective...........................................................................................................................2
Literature Review............................................................................................................................2
Data Collection................................................................................................................................5
Health and Safety Documents.........................................................................................................5
Conclusion.......................................................................................................................................6
Reference.........................................................................................................................................8

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Project Title
The undertaken research is about study the rationale behind the shortage of competent
seafarers and paths to retain them in the company for the longer period of time. The company
owns an offshore support vessels that is situated in Singapore. The research will identify the
challenges in employing experienced and qualified seafarers.
Aim and Objective
The aim of the project is to find the cause behind the shortage of experience seafarers and
ways to retain the qualified seafarers in a ship owning company.
The objectives undertaken during the course of the project will be as follows:
 To find the reasons behind the shortage of experienced seafarers in the company.
 To find strategies to retain the existing employees.
 To recommend ways to provide better experience and facilities to the existing and new
seafarers.
Literature Review
According to Mathebekase (2018), the competitive world has the scarcity of skilled
personals who perform their duty with utmost determination and contribute to the betterment of
the economy. In any company the skilled workers are the real assets rather than the products or
services they are developing. This paper states that the struggle of finding skills employees in
any field is an issue on the global level (Mathebekase 2018). In the modern world the online
platform of social media is considered to be the best place to retain the talented worker. The
maritime industry is not aloof from this crisis too. The economic globalization have facilitates
the transition in the aspect of employee retention. Author provides the statistics of the seafarers’

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deficit in global ships which is about 16,500 in 2015 and it can go up-to 147,500 by 2025. South
Africa being a developing country has 3,650 km coastline, the goal is to retain the existing talent
and acquire talents through the medium of technologies. The focus is on employee recruitment,
company branding, employee attraction, retention, provide motivation to join the industry and
several other aspects. However, Tsai and Liou (2017) has said that in earlier days the global trade
was mostly form the transportation of sea borne. The shipping industry was the main source for
the development of the economy. With the improvement in the economy the young generation
denied of joining the shipping industry (Tsai and Liou 2017). The developed countries were
facing the shortage seafarers as well as the experienced one are difficult to find. The case of the
Taiwan seafarer shows the reason of not choosing a career as a seafarers as they have to stay
away from their family for a very long period of time. The recruitment of the seafarer have
acquired a large cost in the whole process with the proper training. The focus of the company
were more on increasing the efficiency of the administration and acquire the seafarers as the
assets of the company (Papachristou, Stantchev and Theotokas 2015). The seafarers were
recruited with the constraints of education, knowledge, experience and performance in the
recruitment drive. The best of them were selected for further training process. The seafarers were
motivated on the regulatory basis to perform better and gain knowledge in their area of expertise.
In these ways the companies were developing their manpower into effective, efficient and skilled
assets of the company.
As per Bagoulla and Guillotreau (2016), the global seafaring market was experiencing
the shortage of labor. The industry of maritime is based on the global level as well as their
activities are also based globally. The working condition of the seafarers are not favorable in the
developing countries, the rules and regulation applicable on the life style of the seafarers are not

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in favor of them. This has been a root cause for the shortage of the workers in this very industry.
The market for the seafarers have experienced several changes, it starts from the impact of
globalization till the emergence of innovative technology in both the developing and developed
countries. The traffic observed in the seaborne was mostly in the Malaysian assembly, Germany,
Costa Rica, Singapore, Thailand, etc. (Bagoulla and Guillotreau 2016). The labor productivity is
seen to be in the increasing order by the changes in the economy and technological aspect of a
particular area. The shipping industry has the direct effect with the economic development with
the country. The manning cost is based on the global levels as the services provided by the
seafarers are not limited to one region.
One of the important aspect that is required in the working environment of Seafarers is
that their job satisfaction. The performance of the seafarers can only be observed by the
performance. The retention process can also be facilitated by providing the required satisfaction
of them (Kaizemi 2017). As the main issues in any shipping industry these days are the shortage
of the skilled labors, so the prime concern is that how they can be retained? According to Yuen
et al. (2018), the involvement of the government has been beneficial with the introduction of
several campaigns like “Day of the Seafarer” and “Go to Sea”. The initiatives from the
government side can promote the campaigns better and motivate the young generation with
skilled and innovative minds to join the services of sea and participate in contributing to the
enhancement of the global economy (Yuen et al. 2018). In order to attract them some branding
strategies are propped by the author which are inclusion of awards, employment benefits,
improve the image of the industry, hike in salaries, etc. In contrast to this Fei and Lu (2015) have
stated that the most important practice in attracting towards this industry is the already existing
seafarer. They are most skilled and knowledgeable workers that can take the company to its

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highest peak (Fei and Lu 2015). The advantages observed from retaining the already existing
employees is that the cost of providing training, accommodating are avoided which are high in
this industry.
Data Collection
The availability of data are of two type one is the primary data and the other pone is the
secondary data. The primary data has two division in it those are qualitative and the quantitative
method. The data collection methods for conducting the undertaken research will consist both the
qualitative and the quantitative approach. The qualitative data collection is about understanding
the insights, motivations and reasons. It is totally a non-numerical approach. The sample size is
mostly small. The process that undergo this method are document revision, several journals,
articles and researcher papers will be used for references and then the research will be framed.
For the quantitative methods a set of questionaries’ will be developed and distributed to the
Engine Officer and the Junior Dec to obtain their opinions regarding the shortage of seafarers.
Then group discussions will be conducted where the Engineers and Senior Officers will be
involved to prove an in-depth knowledge of the activities and opinions of the employees. Later
on a survey will be conducted among the junior rank employees to compare the result obtained
from the group discussion.
Health and Safety Documents
The presence of all the health and safety documents of the seafarer is required. The basic
requirements of the health and safety prevention for the shipping industry employees are as
follows:
 The environment for the employees must be hygienic and safe from any diseases.

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 The ships that are the working place of the employees must be equipped with all the
necessary devices for emergency health situation.
 A committee must be formed for regulating the safety measures in the company.
 Risk management strategies must be present on the ships with all the statistical data.
 The seafarers must have all the documents of the policies of the company related to their
health and safety procedures at the time of boarding the ship (Nguyen et al. 2014).
 The proper implementation plan for occupational accidents, diseases and injuries on the
ships.
 The unsafe working areas and situation must be acknowledged before boarding the ship
by the committee.
 The safety and health committee must have regulatory meeting at specific intervals.
 The regulations of Control of substances Hazardous to Health (COSHH) must be present
to the seafarers (Caesar, Cahoon and Fei 2014).
 The risk assessment results must be made available after every session.
 The proper conduction of ethical practices must be documented and signed by the
seafarers.
 The medical certificates of the seafarers must be presented at the time of on boarding the
duty site that is the ship.
Conclusion
Therefore, it can be concluded that the increased number of shortage in the availability of
skilled seafarers are a huge back-draw for the shipping industry. The aim and objective of the
research will help in finding the result of the research. The literature review section has clearly
shown that this situation has emerged in the new era due to various reasons of dissatisfaction,

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changing technologies, etc. Thus the retention strategies of the already existing seafarers are also
getting stronger. The need for the skilled personnel are important to regulate in the undertaken
shipping company. The data collection is expected to be beneficial as it consist of several
variations to compare and contrast of the views and opinions of the existing employees. This
research will help in understanding the need of the seafarers of the company and provide an
insight to facilitate the retention process.

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Reference
Albert, M.N., Lazzari Dodeler, N. and Guy, E., 2016. From a seafarer’s career management to
the management of interwoven sea-and shore-based careers. SAGE Open, 6(1),
p.2158244016634146.
Bagoulla, C. and Guillotreau, P., 2016. Shortage and labor productivity on the global seafaring
market.
Caesar, M.L., Cahoon, S. and Fei, J., 2014. Challenging the current paradigms of seafarer
training and careers. IAMU AGA 15 Looking Ahead Innovation in Maritime Education, Training,
and Research, 27, pp.348-356.
Fei, J. and Lu, J., 2015. Analysis of students’ perceptions of seafaring career in China based on
artificial neural network and genetic programming. Maritime Policy & Management, 42(2),
pp.111-126.
Kaizemi, S., 2017. Challenges of recruitment and retention of skilled employees in a Namibian
bank (Doctoral dissertation).
Khan, N., 2018. Does Training & Employee Commitment Predict Employee Retention?. In
International Conference on Management and Information Systems September (Vol. 21, p. 22).
Li, K.X., Yin, J., Luo, M. and Wang, J., 2014. Leading factors in job satisfaction of Chinese
seafarers. International Journal of Shipping and Transport Logistics, 6(6), pp.680-693.
Mathebekase, L.M., 2018. Critical analysis of the attraction and retention of seafarers: a case
study of South Africa.
Nguyen, T.T., Ghaderi, H., Caesar, L.D. and Cahoon, S., 2014. Current challenges in the
recruitment and retention of seafarers: an industry perspective from Vietnam. The Asian Journal
of Shipping and Logistics, 30(2), pp.217-242.

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Papachristou, A., Stantchev, D. and Theotokas, I., 2015. The role of communication to the
retention of seafarers in the profession. WMU Journal of Maritime Affairs, 14(1), pp.159-176.
Tsai, C.L. and Liou, Y.W., 2017. Determinants of work performance of seafarers. Maritime
Business Review.
Yuen, K.F., Loh, H.S., Zhou, Q. and Wong, Y.D., 2018. Determinants of job satisfaction and
performance of seafarers. Transportation research part A: policy and practice, 110, pp.1-12.