A dialogue card game about the working environment secured Esvagt a place among the nominees for Danish Shipping’s DEI Award. The dialogue cards are intended to strengthen well-being on board, which is directly linked to safety at sea.
In mid-August, Danish Shipping presented its annual Diversity Award for the fifth time, which for the third time went to tanker shipping company Hafnia. Among the other two nominees, Esvagt was selected on the basis of a very special initiative focusing on well-being, dialogue and the prevention of bullying and harassment.
The shipping company, which provides a number of services and ferries personnel and components between offshore installations for both wind, oil and gas in the North Sea, has thus developed a set of dialogue cards for use on board the ships, based on realistic dilemmas from everyday life at sea.
»We have created these dialogue cards to give our seafarers a language, and as a way to the interactivity we want to have between the employees on board. It’s important to have a common attitude towards what entitles a good partnership, what is accepted behavior on our ships, how do we help each other, how do we take care of each other,« Head of Recruitment & Training at Esvagt, Tina Halkjær Nielsen, says.
This pleases Chief Human Resources Officer at Esvagt, Nick Vejlgaard Ørskov, who in his function has a strong focus on the well-being of employees at sea. This applies partly from a financial perspective, because high employee well-being leads to lower staff turnover, but first and foremost from the human perspective.
»The most important thing is that you can feel safe in your workplace, whether you are tall or short, male or female, regardless of religion, skin color and so on. And this is directly related to safety on the ships, because if you have employees who are not safe at work, who don’t dare speak up, and if you don’t have a culture where you help each other, then it is 100 percent statistically proven that people are more likely to get injured,« he emphasizes.
»And safety is our core product at Esvagt, so having control over our own employees' working conditions and safety is the starting point for us to also be able to keep track of our customers' conditions,« Nick Vejlgaard Ørskov adds.
Strengthens working environment and safety
The dialogue cards, which Esvagt launched just over a year ago and have now rolled out across all of the company's 43 vessels, originated from a project for a web-based solution where all employees had to undergo an anti-bullying and harassment course. This has then been further developed into a physical card game that seafarers can literally get their hands on.
Rolling out the dialogue cards to the fleet, Esvagt has deliberately not included rules for when and how the deck should be used. In addition to basic instructions, the card game has only been accompanied by an open suggestion to the crew to break out the cards when time and energy allow for it.
»It just becomes much more vibrant when you sit with other people and have a dialogue. You can get some funny angles and hopefully also a good laugh or two out of challenging each other a little, and not least a chance to talk things over,« Nick Vejlgaard Ørskov says.
The fact that people talk about their experiences –the good and the not so good alike – is one of Esvagt's central targets with the card game. "Speak up", as Nick Vejlgaard Ørskov says, address issues and curb potentially unpleasant situations before they occur.
And the cards have been extremely well received among seafarers. One of Esvagt's captains, Kenny Khotwongsa Jørgensen, points out, for example, how the dialogue cards are 'a small thing that can really change the lives of many people.'
"For me, it's easy to see that we've broken down an old taboo around the psychological safety of crew members, because we now have an open forum where we can talk about things. It undoubtedly strengthens our working environment on board,« he says.
Great inspiration for others
At the Danish Shipowners’ Accident Insurance Association, director Christina Bustrup greatly appreciates the efforts of both Esvagt, Hafnia and UNI-Tankers, the latter being the the third nominee for the DEI Award, as well as the association's other members.
»A tool like the dialogue card game that Esvagt has created is a great example of how a shipping company can think outside the box and put well-being and safety on the agenda with a slightly alternative approach. And the good reception tells me that it’s something that can inspire others in the shipping industry as well,« she says.
