> COOPERATION
‘There's a lot of mutual respect on board’
He works at the office of Jumbo Maritime, in a department with only women. She sails on heavy cargo ships, in crews with only male colleagues. How does that work in practice? Cees van Tilburg and Maaike Boudestein think this is a nonsensical subject. Doing your job professionally, that is what it is all about.
Cees van Tilburg (age 57): “As crew coordinator, I arrange the boarding and relieving of our seafarers, i.e. so that they start a new term after a few weeks of leave and vice versa. As soon as a seafarer is ashore, we have an end-of-voyage meeting. Then we talk about what we have come up against, things that are happening on board, that sort of thing. I have been working at Jumbo Maritime for forty years, it was my first employer. In my department, I am the only man, and my supervisor is also a woman. It makes no difference to me at all, what matters is that you do your job well. This applies at the office just as much as on board. If you happen to have a colleague with whom you do not get along so well, you have to be professional enough to do your job. Do I take into account who gets on with whom on board? Officially, no, but if I know that colleagues really don't get along and I can schedule them separately, of course I do. Fortunately, it is rare.”
Maaike Boudestein (age 39): “I have been working for Jumbo Maritime since 2009 and have since risen to the position of first officer. Very enjoyable work in my opinion. Every day is different: the view, the cargo, working in the port and at sea. I always sail on different ships, with a crew of fifteen to twenty, depending on how big the ship is. It is important that we listen to each other on board. Space is limited, you have to do the work together. The well-known pitfall, of course, is that someone will try to get their way on the basis of rank. In everything we do, everyone has their own task, but the agreement is that everyone can halt the process if they don't trust it. Whether you are learning the ropes or a captain, we listen to each other. There is a lot of mutual respect on board. The fact that I am usually the only woman on board is not important to me. That has nothing to do with my profession either. I am judged by my work, and whether I do what I say. That is what counts.” ←
Jumbo Maritime is specialised in heavy lift maritime transport and offshore installations. The shipping company has eight vessels, about 350 seafarers and 120 office staff and transports everything worldwide that does not fit into a container. The seafaring Jumbo Maritime employees build up their pension at Bpf Koopvaardij. The office staff have a defined contribution pension scheme with insurer Aegon.