During the 2023 SAFETY4SEA Limassol Forum, Nicholas Rich, Group Technical Manager – Systems at Bernhard Schulte Shipmanagement (BSM), pointed out that complexity increases the need for training.
In 1997, the ISM Code was introduced with the purpose to make shipping safer. Since then, evidence shows that shipping is safer, accidents, injuries and losses are down. ISM Code also introduced procedures to the shipping industry, providing an international standard for the safe management and operation of ships and for pollution prevention. If anything happens, one of the first things we do is to write a procedure.
There are lots of different sources that give us input into the things that are not going right on our ships. These make us write more and more procedures which consequently add complexity. In fact, the problem is that many procedures introduce a complex system; thus, we need more training.
What we did back then before the ISM code was invented?
We have been using the crew experience on board to train new people. The more experienced crew members train the less experienced crew members. It’s a type of training called ‘Sitting next to Nelly’. This is a term used to describe on-the-job training where a trainee is not instructed by a qualified trainer but instead is expected to learn how to do the job by observing someone who has been doing the job for years.
Today, we don’t do ‘Sitting next to Nelly’ training on board. The reason is that we don’t have consistent experience on board and the crew generally don’t have time to train each other. This is why we have the training officer, training master and training chief.
We do training on top of full day job. What results do we expect to see from that?
Hands-On training on board is the best way of training. On top of a full day job it’s not going to be as effective as we think it might be. And what happens when we change the crew? All the training we’ve delivered goes down the gangway. Now suddenly, it’s a whole bunch of new people on the ship that haven’t had this training.
Delivery of training is seen as the final ‘fix’ to a problem but overlooks the constant change of crew that erodes any benefit from the time of first crew change. So, we could evaluate how effective our training is. Every model for evaluating the effectiveness of training, uses time. It may be difficult, complex, expensive, hard to implement, hard to derive reliable data so companies tend not to go down far this route.
One method proposed is reaction, learning, behavioral changes, and results (Kirkpatrick, 1959); it is often seen as simplest and easiest to apply but has many detractors in academia. An alternative suggests a combination of satisfaction, learning performance, individual performance, and organizational performance can be used. However, no consistent approach hs been agreed on since all models use time in some way to determine effectiveness.
In addition, we change our crew on a regular basis. So (in the industry) we can’t evaluate effectively the training we give, because we don’t have our crew in one place for long enough. Because we have a crew shorfall, we have a loss of experience in our seafarers and because we have a shortfall we tend to promote people quicker. When we promote people quicker they haven’t got as much experience. Of course, a lack of experience increases the training demand, because we try to compensate for a lack of experience by training people. (This is the discussion point of this presentation)
Do we have solutions?
We could increase crew size which used to work in the old days, except owners won’t pay for it. We could put minimum periods of service between promotions that will be useful, but as soon as we do that, someone is going to say, “I need this Rank and I haven’t got anyone with the experience, can I have a dispensation?” We could simplify Management Systems, introduce an ISO standards for Management Systems or we could do autonomous ships to take the crew out altogether, solve the problems and introduce about a thousand much more complex ones!
Above article has been edited from Mr. Nicholas Rich presentation during the 2023 SAFETY4SEA Limassol Forum.
Explore more by watching his video presentation here below
The views presented are only those of the author and do not necessarily reflect those of SAFETY4SEA and are for information sharing and discussion purposes only.
