How do you achieve confidence in uncertain times?
2020 was a year that no one could have predicted. At relatively short notice, the world was thrown into lockdown because of the COVID-19 global pandemic. For an industry that operates 24/7, the need to conduct business as usual was more important than ever. Aside from ensuring our own teams and people were set up to operate from home as quickly, safely and efficiently as possible, the need to stay in close virtual contact with our clients was paramount. Given the fast-moving global changes and the impact these would have on shipping markets, our global objective was to ensure our clients had the right information in a usable and actionable format to enable them to make the right decisions at the right time. In short, it was business as usual.
Our teams created regular and bespoke reports and hosted no less than 20 interactive webinars to ensure colleagues and clients alike remained up-to-date on the latest trends, movements and insights. Webinars were available both live and on-demand to ensure accessibility across global time zones. These also gave participants direct access to our experts through Q&A and group chat technologies to maximise engagement and knowledge share.
As well as our internal experts, we also invited external partners to provide full and comprehensive coverage on certain topics.
Subjects covered varied from shipping finance and maritime law changes to building offshore wind projects and improving emergency response preparedness in the Offshore industry. We also covered technology adoption and smarter shipping at ports, as well as our deep dives into specific markets.
The programme then extended further, ensuring we were reaching our communities and continuing to engage them in shipping and offshore industry development, helping them to understand the changing world around us. As part of our partnership with Maritime UK, we reached out to the student population and next generation talent who undoubtedly felt the pain of recruitment freezes and lack of face-to-face contact with peers during the pandemic. We ensured our Maritime Masters programme continued to run seamlessly using a new virtual format, which included three supported learning sessions and interview advice sessions with our Talent Acquisition team.