This article was first published in the Spring/Summer 2016 issue of International Cruise & Ferry Review. All information was correct at the time of printing, but may since have changed.
Victoria Shipyards has earned a reputation for providing nothing but the best when it comes to refits – both in terms of expertise and customer service. “Every time we have a ship in we have to raise our game – the business is so intense,” says Joseph O’Rourke, the company’s vice president and general manager. “We like a challenge – there’s nothing more satisfying than stepping up and getting a job done against the odds.”
Victoria’s recent work on Princess Cruises’ Ruby Princess illustrates exactly what O’Rourke means by this. “The winds were blowing more than 30 knots for pretty much the whole ten days,” he says. “Especially with scrubber installations, this has a huge impact. We were fortunate the wind died down enough to get the work done.”
The key to success, says O’Rourke, is to not pass any of this stress on to the customer. “We communicate well, plan to the nth degree and make sure we take the time to totally understand the work required,” he explains. “It’s our job to make clients feel totally at ease.”
Indeed, staying calm in the face of adversity is something that Victoria is well versed in. “There’s no question that it’s a testing environment in which to operate,” O’Rourke says. “We have the constant challenge of dealing with a variable workload. It feels like we only spend five minutes of each year being at the correct level of manning that we need. The rest of the time we either have too many people, or not enough. So the ability to maintain a good core group of people and keep them busy, and then the ability to stretch, using both internal and external resources to hit the market peaks that happen once or twice or year, is crucial.
It’s clear, then, that flexibility is key. “One day a person may be working on the tools, another day they may be working as a supervisor, then they move back to the tools again,” O’Rourke explains. “We do a lot of manpower projections so that we can spot where the peaks and valleys will occur and plan accordingly.”
Predicting how markets will evolve is also important. “We have a saying in the industry that ‘maintenance work can be deferred, but it can’t be denied’. For example, in the oil patch in the US there’s a lay-up of vessels. At this point in time there won’t be any maintenance as budgets are tight. But it means that in a year or two there will be a surge. We have to be able to adapt to this and get skinny in the slow times and be ready in the busy times.”