Superyacht sectors calls for a ‘best of both worlds’ approach to crew recruitment

Faststream Recruitment Group, a leading maritime recruitment agency, has announced a growing requirement to source yacht crew from outside the superyacht sector to cope with increasing demands.

According to the brand, the increase in production of superyachts over 100m has led to a call for a more sophisticated approach to recruitment from managers and owner’s representatives in order to source suitably qualified crew. Those looking to recruit in higher-ranking positions, where the need for commercial qualification is stronger, are therefore beginning to run into difficulty when it comes to hiring the people that they need.

Ben Darnton, managing director of Faststream said, “As we’ve seen on the commercial side of maritime for many years, the more specialist the candidate, the more difficult they are to source. It creates a war for talent, similar to what’s been seen in other areas of the maritime market for many years.” 

With the superyacht sector traditionally providing a very niche area for crew recruitment, recent growth in the 100m+ sector has created an environment that is more similar to that of the mainstream maritime recruitment market. According to Faststream, this trend is being driven by the need to find engineers and officers with commercial COC’s. 

Darnton continued, “We’re getting more and more requests from captains and yacht managers who want to recruit crew from commercial passenger vessels, which is a good example of how our client’s requirements are changing. 

Our clients are looking for us to be the best of both worlds by sourcing the best candidates with yacht experience, as well as qualified candidates from outside the yacht world. Whilst we have access to thousands of these potential candidates, there are very few who will actually make the move; they are already in jobs and are in strong demand. Their employers in the wide maritime industry face their own skill shortages and are working hard to retain and attract the same talent for their ongoing fleets; we are in a war for talent.” 

For more information, visit Faststream Recruitment Group.