New big yachts Captains, Engineers and crew.

Many of the owners of the new yachts already owned a yacht so just upgrading. As to finding crew if you don't have it, there are logical progressions in the professions. It's much like other jobs. A Master for a 300' boat, may have previously been a Master of a 200' or may have been second in command for a while on a 300'.

Many of the jobs on a yacht require extensive training, including formal education, and experience. Captains and Engineers. Chief Stew positions while not having the same educational and technical requirements have huge challenges in managing people and meeting the needs of guests. Chef's have unique demands as they have to prepare foods the guests want and must be versatile.

The credentials of many industry professionals are amazing. These are not tag a long a while and luck into position type situations.

Much depends on the position and the person doing the hiring. Only one of our captains has a college degree and her major for it was accounting. However, we have two engineers with both undergraduate and graduate engineering degrees.

It is first the license(s) necessary for the job position, asked for by the type of ship, yacht or boat, period. Without no chance. Then it is experience in this position and the appearance of the canditate. As we say, you have to be able to pass the "face check" in the appropiate manner. At first, the guys or girls are taken, which are perfect for the position or job, you must really want this person for the job. Then come the ones that may be less perfect but still more than acceptable. Just being sufficient for the job will not bring you on a large yacht. Filling job positions on larger yacht with good payment is always "identifying the best candidates".

The problem is, that there are many yachts with ownership from different nationalities that are always looking for crew (means there is a lot comming and going on their yachts) and there are crews from many different nationalities. As an owner or yacht manager, you have to be very careful, which nationality you accept and in what mixture. And as a crew you have to be very careful on whose yacht you step or even work. Some nationalities and cultures just dont mix. This is no racism, not at all, this is practical experience, both in commercial shipping and yachting. No names, but I think you know what I mean.

We do not care for age, nationality, cultural background (with very few exeptions ), gander and "beauty", as long as the paperwork meets the requirements, we can accept what we see and the candidate gives us the assurance, that we can invest in him or her (training, upgrades and effort).

Happy crew means a happy ship but an unhappy owner can not make his crew happy and this crew will not act like a perfect swiss clockwork.

Just my 2 (Euro) cents

If the boat is of a decent size someone will be employed to handle this onboard these days.

Absolutely some basic accounting knowledge is helpful to a Captain. It's a business entity she's responsible for managing. It's not just captaining the boat, but it's administration of the entire operation, just as others on board are department heads. The challenge for a Chief Stew isn't cleaning, serving, or laundry, it's managing, coordinating, directing and training a staff. One critical area that yacht managers-Master, Chief Engineer, Chief Stew-probably get too little training (as do most managers in business) is personnel, from interviewing to hiring and then all the way through.

Like most professions, this is a complex one and there are a lot of responsibilities in a lot of different areas. There are a lot of people who might be good at performing the basic tasks themselves but will fail in management positions on yachts. The higher the position, the more you depend on the performance of those under you.

Oh, and for anyone who doesn't think accounting comes into play, I could refer them to a yacht owner who is under a continuing audit by the IRS on his payroll reporting and taxes and documentation of expense reporting. The now-former Master was being quite uncooperative so the IRS took a hard stance and got a lien for the maximum they might owe. The new Master is cooperating with the IRS to reconstruct and figure out what the actual liability is.

On bigger boats there is another body between Chief Stew and the Captain , this is the Purser who is responsible for keeping the records of leave entitlements, the filling
in of discharge books, certification expiration's etc. as well as making appointment's, reservations ashore, arranging cars and so on as well. It helps immensely if these people are multi lingual on a well traveled boat.

Thanks for adding that.

Well said. A good link between the Bridge, deck crew, Eng and interior staff is a must on bigger boats. A liaison through all areas of the running of the boat is a great boon to the crew and owner.

In the old days it used to be the Captain's wife who did a lot of this, but as crews have enlarged. now a dedicated officer is the best way.

Plus, as asked for by class, bigger yachts have a land based management office. This does not have to be a dedicated office for each yacht, it can be a handling or yacht management company. Today, larger yachts are permanently managed, preplanned and watched from this office. Bunker and provisions are booked, berths are reserved and a lot of bureaucracy can done in advance. Data link via satellite including engine other machinery trend monitoring and the web make things much easier. Some skipper believe, they are under remote control .

This purser, or called paymaster on commercial (cruise) ships additionally takes a lot of workload away from the ship handling officers. This adds to safety.

If you knew some of the stories I have heard about some of the management co's in yachting you would agree with them.

I have heard a few stories about yacht management co's myself. Not only from the captains point of view but also and even more from the owner perspective. Especially one pretty famous company located in Port Hercules. That is the reason, we operate the boats in our family through our own YMC.

What I personally like is the "total carefree package", Luerssen for example is advertising. The owner just says, where and when he wants his yacht. Crew, bunker, provision, berth, maintenance and repair all cared for. For the owner of a single larger yacht with no personal background in the industry and no plans for charter, a pretty good setup. You would be surprised, how many large Luerssen yachts are operated like this. It is definitely cheaper and more carefree than being blackmailed by one of those pirats on the cote d'azur or half way up the river Thames .

But much more stories are around about those Ship Pursers or as we used to call them, the Paymasters. In the earlier days, we had several combined cargo / passenger vessels in our shipping company. Either in tramp navigation or on scheduled service, mainly on routes to South America. On these ships, the Purser became the gray eminence. All strings came together in their hands, they resided like Gang Leaders in their office, no deal amoung the crews and with land offices and agents went without their knowledge and most of all without them being bribed or taking commissions. With shortwave radio as the only means of communication with his ship, the owner / operator had no means of closer control on his ship. You had to trust your Captain, your paymaster and your local agent. If only two of them worked together, you had no chance.

We had one Purser in our shipping company, which retired after 25 years on our ships, due to wealth. No joke at all, due to wealth. He was able to make so much "black" money besides his pretty good payment, that he bought a large hotel in Switzerland cash. Neither our lawyers, nor our authorities, like the German tax department, could naile him for anything. A real pro .

Your last paragraph describes some carry on that used to be common on yachts and probably still is it is just better hidden. Having been told how whats described in your second paragraph is in reality I would hesitate to say it was cheap or carefree.

The term cheap is relative, maintaning or owning a 200 ft+ boat is generally speaking not cheap at all , I would say.

You are right, the total carefree package with all options, from what I have seen, is pretty expensive. From the owners I have talked to, not much negatives were mentioned about the carefree part of the contract, so I could not tell. And I am not talking about Al Salamah or other royal yachts. I only talk to normal mortal people .

I was just talking about cheaper and more carefre than .......! If owners meet, you hear stories, you won't believe. If only half of them are true, one could think, why should I ever own a large boat or as you keep saying, never anything bigger than a little boat on a trailer with an outboard engine for fishing.

We have a saying in Europe: A yacht is a hole in the water, to throw your money in.

Btw. KIWI, Hole in the water is a nice Sauvignon Blanc Wine from the Waihopai Valley, New Zealand.

A hole in the water, surrounded by wood ( or FRP or Alum or Steel ) into which one throws money.

This saying seems to be in world wide use .



Then it must be true.

That would have gone well with the wild pigs I shot there years ago. I might have to return there on my next sojourn to the South Island just to see how the combo is in reality.