Voyage operations face persistent challenges that undermine efficiency and profitability. Two critical issues dominate the landscape: the proliferation of departmental silos that fragment decision-making and an overreliance on email communication that creates bottlenecks and information gaps. In this article we explore the interconnected problems that prevent shipping companies from achieving optimal coordination across their commercial operations, leading to costly inefficiencies and missed opportunities in an increasingly competitive maritime market.
Functional and Structural Silos
Silos exist in every organisation. Functional silos emerge naturally as departments focus on their own priorities such as finance, operations, chartering, claims, each making decisions based on their domain expertise. On their own, silos aren’t necessarily a bad thing; they create accountability and focus.
But problems arise when these departments don’t coordinate or communicate their actions. Without shared context or consistent data, decisions are made in isolation. What seems efficient in one department may create costly knock-on effects in another.
Structural silos compound the issue. In some organisations, rigid hierarchies and outdated workflows discourage cross-department collaboration. Teams operate within their own structures, rarely encouraged, or enabled, to share insights or align with one another.
Interdependency between departments is essential, especially when managing something as complex as a commercial voyage. Without cross-functional collaboration, information flow breaks down, mistakes multiply, and the overall profitability of a voyage is put at risk.
An Overreliance on Emails
Email remains the dominant form of communication for most voyage operators. It’s used to share voyage updates, exchange documents, and coordinate decisions between departments and with external partners.
While email offers flexibility, it also creates inefficiencies. Information is often buried in long threads, missed by key stakeholders, or delayed in reaching the right person. This leads to poor coordination, slower decisions, and duplicated efforts.
“Email is still the main form of communication between departments involved in the commercial aspect of a voyage. This not only slows down decision-making but also increases the risk of errors and misinterpretations, which is a major concern for voyage execution and commercial accuracy.” Paolo Vaccaro, Head of Tanker Operations, d’Amico Group, Singapore.
Some tools like Sedna have made strides in organising email traffic and automating workflows, while Microsoft Teams, Slack, and even WhatsApp have created faster communication channels and are widely used in the maritime industry. But these tools often exist outside the core voyage systems. They offer speed, but not always context or traceability.
In the absence of a unified platform, email becomes the glue that holds fragmented systems together. But it’s a fragile solution prone to overload, missed actions, and reduced transparency.
Email fills the gaps between disconnected tools, but it’s a poor substitute for shared systems and structured collaboration.
The industry’s reliance on fragmented communication methods and siloed operations represents a significant barrier to operational excellence. While departmental specialisation serves important purposes, the lack of integrated systems and structured collaborations creates unnecessary friction in voyage management. Success in today’s competitive shipping environment requires breaking down these barriers through unified platforms that enable seamless information workflow, real-time coordination and transparent decision making across all stakeholders involved in commercial voyage operations.
Bento, F et al., (July, 2020) Organisational silos: A scoping review informed by a behavioral perspective on systems and network
For further insight into the areas highlighted in this article, download our thought leadership report, Orchestrating Efficiency, created in partnership with GeoServe
