Inaugural award winners

Tuesday, March 12 - 2013

V.Ships Leisure is honoured after being unveiled as the first recipient of a brand new award.

International classification society RINA Group has awarded its first Best Management Scheme certificate to the business unit following a thorough review of its operations.

The innovative goal-based scheme recognises excellence in management beyond the requirements of statutory rules and codes such as ISM, ISPS and MLC 2006.

Paolo Moretti, General Manager, Business Line Marine, RINA Group, said: "The aim of this scheme is to give shipping companies a goal-based framework against which they can assess and continually improve management in key areas.

"It also gives them a public independent recognition of their management standards. We have developed the standards and worked with V.Ships Leisure on the pilot certification. It gives me great pleasure to award them the first certification under this new scheme.

"The process has helped V. Ships Leisure identify areas where they can improve their already very high standards of management efficiency, which is part of the aim of continuous improvement built into the Best Management Scheme."

The award assesses the management and owners of shipping enterprises against goal-based standards covering ten areas of management.

They are:

• Management, leadership and accountability 
• Recruitment and management of shore and ships personnel
• Technical management
• Safe operation
• Management of change
• Incident investigation and analysis
• Environmental management
• Emergency preparedness and contingency planning
• Health, sanitation and hotel services
• Security and piracy 

Andrea Zito, CEO of V.Ships Leisure, said: "We provide a vast range of services to the passenger shipping industry.

"It is important to us, and to our clients, that we can demonstrate the highest standards of management at all times.

"By working with RINA against structured goals and criteria, we get a clear and independent view of how we measure up. That keeps us on our toes, gives us a road map for continuous improvement and gives our clients confidence."

RINA is a multi-national group which delivers verification, certification, conformity assessment, ship classification, environmental enhancement, product testing, site and vendor supervision, training and engineering consultancy across a wide range of industries and services.

For further information about the organisation visit: www.rina.org