According to Spinnaker’s recent Maritime HR Association salary data, technical staff make up 58% of the Technical & Marine, Safety & Quality job family – with 41% of those found operating at the Professional / Superintendent equivalent level.
Base Pay
Technical vs. Marine salaries are similar at Junior / Trainee level but at all over levels Technical staff receive, on average, 10% more.
Technical Superintendents in Singapore, the USA and UK have seen a steady increase in median base salaries since 2014, however the picture is a little more stagnant when looking at Marine Superintendent pay in these locations.
Bonuses
When it comes to bonus payments, again technical payments outperform marine at most levels.
The LNG industry pay the highest bonuses at Professional level but at all other levels the Tanker industry pay the highest.
Once again, Oil Major and Commodity Groups payments outperform shipowner and shipmanager payments at all levels.
Demographics
Only 12% of incumbents were reported as female, which is a reduction of 2% compared to last year. Only 0.5% of female incumbents were reported at our highest job level (Head of / Director) compared to nearly 75% working at Junior / Trainee level – an increase on 67% reported last year.
Recruitment insights
Oliver Mason, Principal Consultant on our Technical recruitment desk says “The ratio of Technical to Marine Superintendents is roughly 3 or 4 to 1, so they’re harder to find. At the moment we’re finding that there are a higher proportion of Masters looking for work than Chief Engineers, but Masters are more likely to do operations and commercial roles as well.”
Liam Daly, Senior Consultant for Technical recruitment echoes this. “I’m finding that many more Masters and Deck Staff are looking for new roles at the moment. And something I’ve noticed in 2021 is the rise in these candidates from the UK.”
More information
Since 2005, Spinnaker has provided the most comprehensive and reliable worldwide annual survey of shore-based salaries in the shipping industry.
To find out more about Spinnaker’s salary benchmarking for both shore-based jobs and seafarer wage costs, contact Helen at [email protected].
