Work-Life Balance Among Cruise Ship Crews

The concepts of work-life balance are a popular and in nowadays one of the most extensively discussed areas in organizational management as a consequence of its association with individual benefits, e.g. prevent burn-out, and organizational costs. The core aim of this study is to examine the impact of the unique working and living environment of cruise ships towards the physical and emotional exhaustion of their crews. In order to explain these, the study investigates traditional theories of Maslow and Herzberg, considers real life experiences of current and former crew members and takes a look on the most common statements of work-life balance. Although a lot of research work has been done in this field there seems to be a need to extend those to seafarers. In this paper a quantitative research approach has been used to expose knowledge about which factors influence, and to what extent they influence seafarers' well-being in terms of the balance between work and life. 171 current and former crew members participated at an online questionnaire and four additional interviews have been conducted. Significant results were found throughout the study and its results indicated that even though some recreation facilities regulated by ILO, and provided by the cruise companies do already exist, there is a high need to continue developing practices to positively influence the relief of stress in order to ensure a balanced relationship between work and life at sea. Chris Schaedel was born in 1986 in a small town in Thuringia, Germany. After his A-levels in 2005 he traveled for a year through Asia and Australia. During that time he did several sailing trips along different coastlines and fell in love with the 'Ocean-Cruising'. Chris successfully graduated the study course of International Cruise Industry Management at the University of Applied Sciences Bremerhaven, Germany, in 2010. This 4yr Bachelor-program included a study-semester abroad at the Hawaii Pacific University in Honolulu, in the field of Tourism Management, as well as a nine month internship onboard a luxury cruise vessel. He participated at the 2nd International Cruise Conference in Plymouth, England. In the year 2010 he started his 'ocean going career' onboard a German cruise ship.