I am from Ukraine, Odesa. I started my career on container ships as a deck cadet a bit more than 5 years ago. In 2018 I joined Celebrity Cruises and currently, I am 2nd Officer there.
I’ve always enjoyed being a bridge officer and I do not imagine myself working in another field.
The worst experience that I had was actually coming from shoreside, while I was searching for the job. Firstly, it was hard to find a company to accomplish the cadetship. In 2017 my employer was facing difficulties, which made me search for companies again and being a female significantly reduced the number of available work opportunities.
Many companies refuse to hire women or even worse, they do hire them but do not take them seriously and cause difficulties when the time comes for them to step up.
If it was up to me to improve this sad situation, the best way would be to provide a certain obligatory percentage of female employees of all ranks and as well to control/ensure that it is being followed.
Having a higher chance of being employed, more talented and determined women would come to work in the maritime industry.
It doesn’t matter if somebody tries to prove us wrong. We should never give up and always be passionate about what we do!
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