Crisis also create opportunities for those who demonstrate resilience. Those who remain able to deliver in uncertain times, communicate honestly, and secure their fixtures during those times build long-term trust and gain a decisive competitive edge. This article presents practical strategies for resilient chartering and highlights the critical role of efficient information management. Relevant data can be identified earlier, and incidents can be accurately assessed, enabling the right decisions to be taken.

Crisis day-to-day in chartering: 
The forms of resilience that matter

Charter professionals cannot prevent global crises, but they can influence how they manage them. Demonstrating resilience in the face of significant challenges means three things: being prepared and well informed, recognising and deploying alternatives, and having the right crisis-management toolkit to act calmly and reliably under pressure.

These examples show that purely reactive behaviour exposes you to speed and flexibility tests. The most essential prerequisite for crisis resilience in chartering is proactive thinking and preventive action.

Resilience success strategies:
How to emerge stronger from crises

Speed of response and reliability are assumed in chartering at all times. Even during crises, chartering professionals must remain composed, prioritise facts and communicate transparently.

Clarity and decisiveness are crucial. Other high-risk environments provide useful parallels. In the space industry, for example, crews train intensively for the unexpected: from system failures to isolation in space. Developing the same traits needed in chartering: clear communication under pressure, precise decision-making, team cohesion and a readiness to learn from mistakes. These form a strong foundation for resilience when it matters most.

Resilience is not accidental; it is built through systematic development of skills, structures and strategies. The objective is to remain operational, solution-focused, and robust under stress.

We present five practical tips to strengthen resilience in crisis mode.

1. Think in scenarios!
    Prepare contingency and response plans for the most likely crises, such as technical failures, reroutings or crew issues. Define escalation paths and responsibilities to enable fast, safe and coordinated action.

2. Keep contracts flexible!
    Draft charterparties so they can be adapted in critical situations. Clauses on force majeure, off-hire and deviation should clearly allocate risk and leave room to act when conditions change abruptly.

3. Spread risk!
    Diversify across customers, trading areas and vessel types to avoid being stressed on multiple fronts simultaneously. Diversification delivers important stability in daily chartering.

4. Manage your energy day to day!
    Long hours and cross-zone calls are part of the job. Establish routines that sustain focus under sustained pressure. Whether through clear prioritization, short breaks, or consistent handovers to colleagues, resilience is developed in everyday practice, not in workshops.

5. Reflect regularly!
    Ask yourself continuously: Where do I stand on resilience, and how can I improve? This allows you grow as a person. Perhaps this checklist will help you: 

Maintain the overview: 
Your information management is key

Lack of transparency is often the single biggest problem in crises. Losing the thread reduces decision quality and can quickly become a major issue under pressure.

But: You can actively influence this! How you collect, process and use information is within your control. Digital solutions such as seabo help preserve situational awareness: they show at a glance where vessels are, which route risks exist and which fixtures require priority attention. That saves search time, reduces errors and gives you an informational advantage when dealing with customers. You gain a practical work tool that speeds up processes and supports calm, fast decision-making in critical moments. The result is greater clarity and focus when every hour counts, less stress and more confidence in your decisions.

Our essence: chartering today is continuous crisis management across many different scenarios. Those who are prepared, control their information flow and remain clear-headed and decisive under pressure stay operational, even when multiple issues coincide. That combination of oversight, flexibility and mental strength determines who gains a market advantage and who ultimately earns customer trust.