The Chief Officer is basically a day-to-day man, directly concerned with what actually is and letting those higher up the food chain worry about the future If recently promoted, you will have moved from junior officer to senior officer and, apart from a larger cabin, should have an office, or at least a desk, and a dramatic shift in responsibility Theoretically, you are Chief Officer because those operating the ship deemed you worthy and knowledgeable enough for this position In reality, it may be that there was no one else around! Regardless of the 'how', here you are and the successful operation of the ship is considerably dependent on you Given adequate manning, the proper equipment, good departmental officers and a supportive Captain, the Chief Officer's job can be the best job afloat Unfortunately, very few will have the manning levels required to maintain and operate the ship properly and efficiently Your equipment could be poorly cared for Your department could be of poor ability and your Captain not as you would wish But it is your job to surmount these obstacles and ensure that the ship is efficient In all aspects where you have jurisdiction Regardless of what you walk into, you are still the Mate of the ship and your success will depend not only on your abilities, but also your attitude It is a position that requires you to lead from the front For any problem not involving the engines, you are the person that others will come to and, in some mysterious way, you are expected to solve it You are the fixer and you must all you can to keep the job moving Inevitably throughout this book, your relationship with the Captain will frequently be referred to In the past, I have heard Chief Officers say that they "didn't care what the Captain thought as they worked for the company not for him" Do not make this grave error You work for the company through him and, if he were to decide, his seniority may mean that you might have to start looking for another job Don't forget the other Captains in the company are his colleagues and quick e-mails can assure you of a hot reception on the other ships in the fleet You will feel the scrutiny of your presentation and actions The greatest asset to the position of Chief Officer, apart from confidence, is common sense You are not required or expected to have every finger a marlin spike, or have an affinity with parrots or rum If you your best for the Captain and the ship, you will be the Chief Officer most companies and Captains want to have running their ships 2 Your Company II you have the luxury of your choice of company or ship type, think carefully about the experience you want to gain in the pursuit of your future career If you intend hanging on a few years to get your Master's certificate or get a few more years experience and go ashore, by all means jump on a cruise ship and have a last few years of fun On the other hand, if you are interested in increasing your seamanship experience and professional abilities before choosing your seagoing career path or looking for promotion to Master on ability, you should look further afield Don't be wary of trying something different as this is the time that you will really begin In Immerse yourself in your profession Of course, you cannot go immediately onto a sophisticated ship such as a gas carrier as Chief Officer without previous experience and the necessary cargo endorsements, but there is nothing wrong In signing on as a second officer for a few voyages In other words, don't be too anxious to become Chief Officer if you would like to move around for a while Strangely enough you can, without any previous experience, go onto what are recognised as the most dangerous ships afloat, ie bulk carriers Be very careful! Capesize bulker - No previous experience required - apply within Another question that will affect your choice of ship is what you want out of your career If you want financial rewards and to enjoy yourself on leave rather than seeing the world, then tankers or gas carriers are for you These are like floating factories, generally owned by well-regulated companies with good leave and pay conditions but rigidly controlled from ashore On the other hand, if you want to live a lifestyle like that ashore, have fun and be paid for it, then cruise ships are for you If you want seamanship, promotion on ability, the chance of adventure, or at least a more interesting way of life and to see the world, then the companies operating differing ships on worldwide trades or the specialist areas such as support ships, salvage and ship delivery might be your choice Obviously there are many more types of ships to consider All I am suggesting is that, these days, the company is not from birth to death While in the past they could choose you, at the moment you can choose them Make the most of this as it is unlikely to last We must now assume that you have some familiarity with the job you are going to Promotion from within will have been the easier course as you and the company are known quantities, although this can work both ways Regardless of the company, they all operate from a head office, although whether you ever see this depends on your position where you are employed If the head office is thousands of miles away you could be employed through a regional office, or you may live on the Indian sub-continent and be employed by an agency, in which case you will be flown directly to the ship It is to be hoped that the company will have looked at your CV and found the experience that they wanted, but not depend on this I remember being sent out to a deep sea tow with no experience whatsoever When I pointed out to the company that they advertised the experience of their crews, their answer was, "what the charterers did not know would not hurt them" and that I would pick it up on the way I arrived at the ship to meet a Captain quite rightly irate at my inexperience, and was faced with a brand new inch tow wire still wrapped in burlap and with no eye splice, and the tow starting in 24 hours We pulled the tucks through with a ton winch, even putting in a Liverpool tuck, served and parcelled it and away we went I am pleased to say that, after a few incidents when I was more a hindrance than a help, all went well and when we uncoupled the splice it was as good as new In other words, I got away with it What happens on your next trip could well be a surprise The moral of the tale is to be sensible If the company or agency employing you is sending you out to a job that you have never done or been trained for, and if that job could cause danger to life by your lack of knowledge, look elsewhere I w a s stupid to have gone on a deep sea towing ship as Mate without experience ни I might well have felt the same anger as that Master if I had been in his position However, if you are told that you are joining a container ship but find yourself on a heavy lift vessel, there is not much you can except explain the position and hopefully lean heavily on the Master There are companies that tend to engage in social experimentation, almost as if their seafarers were animals in a laboratory New equipment must always be accepted, new methods often go together with new ships, but too many seafarers suffer trying to implement social policies that not work, causing problems, both professional and personal, on the ships Looking back over the years, I remember the disaster of joining all the crew and officers in one bar in a well known tanker company Another company tried abandoning uniforms and the title of Captain, instead using 'ship manager', yet another failure At the moment, a tanker company is trying 'dual command' and a large company is attempting to ban alcohol Both of these experiments are causing problems with administration and morale Find out if your company is relatively conventional in leaving well alone and if your responsibilities are the traditionally accepted ones, ie that you are the responsible head of the deck department If you discover, for example, that the Chief Engineer is in charge of all maintenance and you are responsible to him, you must decide whether or not you need the job badly enough Check your contract and make sure that your medical care and repatriation are taken care of and clarify the compassionate leave policy if there is one Find out what currency your pay is in In these days of fluctuating currency rates it is far better to have your pay in your own home currency at an agreed exchange rate, so that your pay remains steady throughout your employment You will have some tell-tale signs about the quality of the company before you reach the gangway It might seem a small point, but find out the standard of hotels the company puts their senior officers in There is a good chance that you will have some time in a hotel when either joining or leaving the vessel, and you don't want to find yourself in a dockside doss house It is also a very good indicator of how they regard you If you know the company's policy, when the agent on arrival takes you to a mud hut by the railway track instead of the Holiday Inn, pocketing the difference, you can threaten to contact the company This is a widespread racket, with shipping companies often being blamed for treating their crews badly when it is a corrupt practice worked by the agencies Occasionally even the agency doesn't know what their employees are up to I was once sent to join a ship and taken to a grubby little hotel and told that this was the standard one The shipping company concerned was a decent one that would never have ordered this so I installed myself in a better hotel and next morning joined the ship On advising the Captain of what had happened, and after hearing the complaints from other officers who had suffered the same experience, he advised the company of the situation They found that they were being billed for far superior hotels and immediately started proceedings that uncovered a large-scale racket being worked by the employees of quite a large agency Finally, get the personnel manager's mobile number so that, if anything goes лито during travel, you can contact him immediately