Shipping management courses are seeing higher enrollment rates every day. Part of the reason for this is the increased consumption all over the world. The other part is the unavailability of everything everywhere at once. Consumerism is on the rise and India based on population alone is the second-largest consumer market in the world.
About 70% of the value of India’s entire trading is done via marine routes, frights and containers loaded onto carrier vessels. Ships might not be the quickest route but they sure can carry a lot more load at once compared to flights. With that said, it shouldn’t be surprising that 95% of trade volume is carried out by ships too.
Of course, there are quite a few skills required for the job too. There are hundreds of varieties of goods that are shipped to and from the country. There are industrial orders and personal shipments. What you buy on E-commerce websites that are not sold domestically- sometimes is shipped over literally. There are about 199 ports in India, 12 of them being core/main ports.
Shipping management is a great career choice. In order to get oneself primed for entering the industry with the right knowledge, shipping management courses are necessary. They’re carefully structured and course content is chosen in a way to give the most useful knowledge about the shipping industry.
There are a few pre-requisites to entering the degree and certain skills that are required to truly make the best use of the course- let’s take a look at them
Education, Qualifications and Skills
Having a comfort level with numbers, paying close attention to the detail and an understanding of the nuances of the shipping industry are important skills. As are great communication skills, a curious and learning mind along with strong foundational skills in commerce. To an extent, a comfortable relationship with a workplace near water bodies such as oceans is needed.
Along with these skills, the ability to work in heavy-stress work environments and efficient load management ability are required as a part of the job. Proper knowledge of corporate laws, rules, and regulations along with Shipping rules and regulations and customs is an added bonus. They should at least be known on a foundational level.
Shipping management courses are postgraduate level and require a 60% aggregate score in 12th standard and a bachelor’s degree to qualify. The bachelor’s should preferably be from a business management stream or financial/commerce stream. STEM fields, in general, are preferable- but there is no cap on what streams are allowed for entering the master’s degree.
Both direct and entrance test-based enrollment is possible in these degrees and the course lasts about two years. If a good B-school is to be pursued a national entrance exam such as CAT, XAT, MAT, etc. needs to be cleared with a good result first.
It follows a general semester system and the course fees range between one lakh rupees per year to as high as fifteen lakhs depending on the B-school of choice. There are distance learning and postgraduate diploma in management as alternative options to an MBA available. But an MBA certainly is preferred by the industry as it meets all the standards.
Future Prospects, Job Profiles and Salaries offered
Port and Terminal Management, International Maritime Transport, Port and Shipping Industry Accounting, IT Applications in Port and Shipping, Maritime Economics, Ship Agency Management, Warehousing and Inventory Management, Ship Brokering and Chartering, Port and Shipping Financial Management and Port Planning, Liner Management are great options.
Supply Chain and Logistics for Port and Shipping, Marketing Enterprise Management, Marine Insurance and Law, Marketing of Shipping Services and Maritime HSSE Management, etc. are also key sub-fields to find work in.
Shipping manager, operations manager, senior shipping manager and port manager, etc. are key job profiles at differing levels of experience. The aforementioned domains of work overarch most of the industry and corporate jobs so the employment prospects are broad.
The average salaries offered at entry-level are 3-4LPA. With about 5 years of experience, or what can be considered mid-career level, the salary scales up to 6-8LPA. The late-career salaries go as high as 8-10LPA. There is obvious job security and the career progression is somewhat smooth.
