Captain Jeanine Drummond

In her own words

I was introduced to shipping by a neighbour and family friend who was a marine engineer. I was around 15 and keen on pursuing travel and adventure after leaving high school and thought that would involve a role in tourism. But our family friend showed me another possibility and took my parents and myself on a tour of the ship he worked on. Before that I had little awareness that the maritime industry even existed. Some 98% of our cargo is imported and exported by ships and maritime transport and yet to the general public it is an invisible industry, unless there is an incident.

I secured a cadetship with ASP Ship Management and thought it was a great way to go to university, be paid a little to study and to travel.  ASP Ship Management had a variety of different ship types, so during my four-year cadetship I was able to work on tankers, container ships, and bulk carriers on all different trading routes. My first ship was the Australian Venture and it took me literally around the world in three months. It was quite an adventure for an 18 year-old at sea. Once I completed my cadetship I worked as Third Mate with bp overseas for six months before joining Teekay Shipping where I progressed my career from Third Mate to Master over the next seven years.

Over that course of time at Teekay there were secondment opportunities to work in their Sydney office, when I was a seafarer and home on my leave. I initially went into a purchasing role for six weeks and found it extremely interesting. From then on, I kept saying yes to opportunities to roles back in the office when on my leave and that took me to Vancouver and Singapore and gave me exposure to the company’s global operations in shipping as well as their commercial businesses. I became well versed in a variety of different aspects of the industry, and I loved working on my leave in different roles and different countries because it felt like a holiday to be honest. It definitely provided great experience, lifestyle, and career progression - all compressed into my 20s and early 30s.

But I didn’t want a permanent shore role during that time in my life. I always looked forward to going back to sea and I continued to do that until I sailed as Captain on product tankers running up and down the east coast of Australia to the offshore industry with Woodside. We brought a new build Floating, Production, Storage and Offloading facility from Korea to Exmouth and it was incredibly interesting being one of the Captains for a project of that scale and size.

My next career move led me into the port sector as a tug master in Gladstone when I was starting my family. I was still able to drive a tug until seven months pregnant and went back when my baby was three months old. During this time, I learnt how to negotiate because there weren’t policies around health standards or parental leave for tug masters other than the provision of one week paid leave that a Dad would get. In fact, when I told my employer that I was pregnant he asked: ‘when do you want to finish?’. I said: ‘I don’t want to finish. I am just getting started!’ We then worked out arrangements for me to accrue leave and return in a part time, flexible capacity which was fantastic. I think my experience helped improve parental leave for men and women in this workplace, and better support for young families where partners are working.

Next, I transitioned to a shore-based tug master role before moving into consulting in Gladstone when the LNG projects were taking off and I was able to help a new towage provider start up in the Port. This fuelled my interest in port regulations and operations, which led to an opportunity with Ampol (then Caltex) working all around Australia.

I then joined the Port Authority NSW as Acting Chief Operating Officer and Harbour Master in Sydney. I was the first person in the Harbour Master role to work from home one day a week and I was keen to demonstrate how well it could operate for the organisation. It was pre covid and flexibility was not widespread. I progressed into the Deputy Harbour Master and General Manager Operations role in Sydney before being appointed as Harbour Master in Newcastle.

After nearly three years as Harbour Master and close to a decade of doing 24/7 operations roles, I wanted to work in more family cohesive hours and channel all my experiences into my own business providing marine consultancy services to organisations with values and goals aligned with mine, around people, ESG, decarbonisation, and innovation.

Recently I became Chair of the Australian Maritime Safety Authority and am also a Director of the Australian Maritime College (where I first studied during my cadetship) and a Councillor of the Australian Mariners Welfare Society. These organisations are focused on three issues I am passionate about – marine safety and environment protection, education, and welfare.

Standing out to steer change

Throughout my career I was the first women in many of my roles. There were only small numbers of women in senior leadership in Australia’s maritime industry and they often felt like unicorns to me because I knew about them, but it was only later in my career that I actually got to meet them.

When I started in maritime, it was a very rough and tumble environment. I wore mainly overalls and boots which were both too big for me but helped me to blend in with the male crew. I also adjusted my behaviours and I learnt very quickly to swear. You had to fit in with the social construct on board, and you got good at it. You laughed at the offensive jokes, or slights or slurs happening because you were young, inexperienced, a minority on the ship and you didn’t have the knowledge, tools, or power to speak up. You knew to survive you needed to fit in, and then you become part of the problem.

Right now, it is totally different for me. I am very senior in the industry, and I have the power, knowledge, and skills to call out those behaviours and empower younger women and men coming into industry to not accept the unacceptable.

I love seeing women in our maritime workforces bringing 100% of their whole selves to their workplaces today. While I tried to not bring attention to myself throughout my 20s, it gave me an understanding of the value of inclusion and for people to be free to be authentic and respected in their workplaces. If I hadn’t had the experiences I had during my career I wouldn’t be here today doing as much as I can to improve diversity across the maritime industry and in particular increase the number of women coming through the ranks.

Getting men on board

We need to work hard on the education of all leaders and anyone with direct reports in the industry on why diversity is so important because I feel that maritime literally missed the boat on the discussion around Diversity, Equity and Inclusion (DEI). It was always put in the too hard basket! I believe if there was more education the leaders – and it is still predominantly men in these roles - would have the confidence to speak up for gender equality and diversity on all accounts in their workforce. This would be the most effective way to disrupt and accelerate change.  We also need to think outside the box and not rely on traditional pathways as the only way for people to progress to senior roles; we need to present alternative routes to maritime opportunities and careers on ports and vessels.

My advice to young people in the industry is to say yes even though you may not be ready for an opportunity and it may appear a bit scary. It’s better to talk yourself into something, rather than out of it. Also, a lot of people don’t like the word ‘networking’ but it is critical.  I really encourage people I am mentoring to target industry events, conferences and social networking opportunities and break it down into simple steps and commit to introduce themselves three times in the room.