When we first speak with our new customers and ask them why they choose Green-Jakobsen, the answer is clear. It is ultimately down to our proven ability to work through all layers of an organisation to the benefit of all.

To sustain high performance, any idea or behaviour must be discussed, evaluated and adjusted on a regular basis and since our topic is safety, we need to address it before anything goes wrong.

This is at the core of our approach – it is authentic, down-to-earth and above all honest, and it has worked across many different maritime organisations, cultures and nationalities.

"Seafarers and shore staff from so many different cultures need different learning approaches. Green-Jakobsen’s local instructors focus on the methods that worked best in each culture"

Include the people who are part of reality

For far too long, the belief has been held by owner-operators that safety precautionary measures prepared as detailed procedures in an office – sometimes thousands of kilometers away from the vessels – is how they keep our seafarers safe.

To understand the grotesqueness of this belief, try and read the following situations:

On board the vessel ‘Safe Sailing’ the company has ensured that the crew has the best mooring procedure in the world, logically structured based on the OCIMF MEG 4 describing all the lessons learnt from other mooring operations.

With the best of intentions the company has instructed the seafarers to understand the procedure and the crew has done their best to do so. But while involved in a mooring operation the crew experience the following conditions: it’s raining, two of the crew members are wearing glasses and finding it difficult to see much, from the terminal some very bright lights are blinding their view and the officer in change is suffering from fatigue. Two of the crew have never worked together before and on top of that, one of the AB’s involved is angry after a discussion with one of superior officers. Do you think that the procedure will prevent that these factors influence the safety of the crew? 

The answer to the question is of course a very loud ‘NO’.

Make the crew capable of managing risk

The only way that crew will remain safe are by their on-going reflections, evaluations and adjustments, regardless of the procedure. When the map (procedure) doesn’t reflect the landscape (reality) it is the landscape that decides the actions.

If vessel crews are incapable of managing the risks themselves that occur as they evolve, what were believed to be safe operations at the office can end up as a catastrophe.

To help companies overcome these difficulties, Green-Jakobsen’s biggest focus is to help management explain to their employees how each and every person can move towards a specific, desired work-related safety behaviour and at the same time give the employees the tools to become accountable for their own and colleagues’ safety.

Empowering crews and improving dialogue with Safety Delta

Basically, many seafarers may act safely. However, in order for them to start actively contributing to the safety culture by influencing others, self-confidence is key.

But self-confidence doesn’t come easily. It is something the individual seafarer builds over time.

An effective way to support this process is to empower the seafarers. And this is where companies can do something: they can implement processes and tools that empower the crew and make them feel confident in their own safety behaviour. This is where Safety Delta comes in.

See how major shipowners are pointing at the crew to identify how safe they feel on board and what they can do for themselves:

With Safety Delta, the frequency and quality of dialogues about safety are increased both among crew on board and between ship and shore. Through open dialogue, safety awareness gets firmly put on the agenda of crew, officers and shore staff alike.

Empowering people on board the vessel also has a positive effect on the ship-shore collaboration. Instead of the office dictating the vessel what to do, Safety Delta can run autonomously on board, enabling crew to decide what needs to be improved.

Through continuous ship-shore dialogues, the office can then gain insight into the safety culture on board as experienced by the crew.

Safety Delta is designed to empower seafarers: It gives the vessels the ability to measure and improve their safety culture.

Crew members from all ranks participate in dialogues about safety and identify relevant areas of improvements. Through this process crew are motivated to speak up, share insights and ideas.

This may sound obvious, but we have seen this really making crews feel empowered and it builds their confidence to speak up and contribute to a positive safety culture.

SAFETY DELTA is the motor running our safety programme – Green-Jakobsen adjusted it to meet our needs
Alfredo Mella - Head of SQES, Vetting & Claims, CSO at Humboldt Shipmanagement
How can we help you?

"Safety cultures are dynamic, fluid and continuously changing, and to manage them safely reflective human minds are required."

Erik Green
Erik Green
Managing Director and Partner
Copenhagen

Would you like us to call you?

Follow the flow of inspiration - Subscribe to GJ Academy
loading...
Thank you for your Subscription

Contact