The Ulysses Project

The Research Project

Captain Nikos Kirkilis, marine personnel manager for Thenamaris, launched the Ulysses Project in collaboration with Hogan and ICAP on October 4, 2019. Lasting for two and a half years, the project consisted of personality assessment and feedback sessions, as well as job analysis research.

Personality Assessments and Feedback

The Ulysses Project was intended to explore two distinguished profiles: the deck management level, which includes masters and chief officers, and the engine management level, which includes chief engineers and second engineers. The project aimed to collect data from a minimum of 200 deck officers and 200 engine officers. All of Thenamaris’s management-level officers from tanker and dry cargo fleets were invited to participate in the study by completing Hogan’s three core personality inventories.

Thenamaris chose to develop a team of internal Hogan facilitators very early in the project, and several people completed Hogan’s foundational training and certification workshop. This enabled buy-in from top management. In addition to completing Hogan’s foundational certification workshop, the marine personnel performance and development team attended Hogan’s Advanced Interpretation and Advanced Feedback workshops, which gave them the knowledge to understand the nuances of the assessment results and offer meaningful, actionable feedback to each participant in private, one-on-one sessions.

Overall, 501 management-level officers completed the assessments, and to date, more than 350 feedback sessions have been conducted. All of the assessment results and ensuing development conversations were kept confidential to protect the privacy of the participants.

Job Analysis Research

To better understand what personality characteristics would likely help Thenamaris’s leaders be successful at sea, Hogan conducted job analysis research.

First, Hogan’s experts needed to better understand the responsibilities and abilities necessary for leaders at Thenamaris. To achieve this, the ICAP team facilitated a series of focus groups with a multinational group of officers. Hogan also collected job performance data for the participants. Next, Hogan used the Job Evaluation Tool, or JET, questionnaires to identify the personality characteristics, values, and competencies most relevant to the officers’ jobs. Finally, Hogan conducted a criterion-related validity study to confirm which characteristics would have the greatest impact on job success for the officers.

The Outcomes

The Ulysses Project was a one-of-a-kind study of seafaring leader personality, and the immediate outcomes were numerous.

Personality-Driven Development Discussions

Thenamaris discovered that Hogan’s personality assessments provided an opportunity for more in-depth yet efficient development discussions. Overall, the Hogan assessments and the feedback sessions were welcomed with enthusiasm and appreciation by the participating officers, many of whom saw value in the process and were eager to commit to development based on their results.

The highly positive testimonials from numerous Ulysses Project participants reflect the overall success of the effort. One chief engineer reported that he was impressed by the practical, real-life examples given during his feedback discussion: “I gained better insight and knowledge of how to manage my actions, and I understood that it is more important what others think of me rather than what I do. After the discussion with Yannos and Kostas, I was able to understand how to take advantage of the findings and try to apply them in my day-to-day life, even before joining my next vessel.”

For many of the officers, the Ulysses Project marked the first time in their careers that they’d received personalized feedback. A master remarked on how refreshing it was to receive meaningful constructive feedback: “Not so many people, especially seamen, are willing to be profiled and to receive information about not only their good qualities but also their not-so-favorite ones. In these stressful days, we do not have so much time to stop and look at the mirror honestly, so getting some feedback for our image, as seen from a different perspective, is refreshing.”

Several others shared feedback on how comfortable they felt during their feedback sessions and commented on their expectations for how useful the collective Hogan results would be for improving individual and team performance throughout the company.

Gaining New Insights

In addition to the astoundingly positive reception, the Ulysses Project offered a series of valuable new lessons around talent management.

Officers with certain personality characteristics struggled with the misalignment between identity (how they see themselves) and reputation (how others see them). Fortunately, Koudounas and Neamonitakis’s advanced Hogan certification had prepared them to navigate these conversations with patience and sensitivity. They knew that individual differences play a strong role in how people receive their assessment results. Plus, having completed the assessment and feedback process themselves, they understood the importance of showing empathy to the officers they debriefed.

Another key lesson learned was that the Hogan assessments—specifically the HDS—shed light on seafarers’ shortcomings that had previously gone undetected or overlooked and thus unaddressed by management. Using Hogan’s personality scales adds an additional lens and extra layer of scientific data to describe how people behave under stress, which is vital in the shipping industry. Naturally, these discoveries were a call-to-action for Thenamaris to further strengthen its talent development strategies.

And the last major lesson? Thenamaris’s talent team wished they’d begun using Hogan’s assessments sooner. Using Hogan’s personality scales as a lens, the team had a new understanding of how people behave under stress, and they were able to decode previous stressful events and moments of crisis.

Data-Driven Talent Decisions

The results of the job analysis research showed that deck officers who were resilient, skilled at building and maintaining relationships, process focused, data oriented, and valuing teamwork were 18.3 times more likely to be in the top 20% of performers. They were also 5.7 times more likely to be safety-conscious and 3.1 times more likely to manage their teams effectively.

Among engine officers, the most important characteristics tended to be resilience, a diplomatic communication style, initiative, and an authoritative, top-down approach to leadership. The most important values were teamwork, quality, and data-driven decision-making. Engine officers with these qualities were 5.8 times more likely to be in the top 20% of performers, 2.4 times more likely to demonstrate a high level of technical skill, and 5.4 times more likely to demonstrate strong people skills.

The Impact on the Business

The results of the Ulysses Project are already helping Thenamaris more effectively support officers in their ongoing leadership development.

Empowered Seafarers

Seafarers who received feedback can now identify how their behaviors are driven by their personality characteristics. For example, a master scoring on the 90th percentile on the Learning Approach scale of the HPI recognized how this element of his personality drives his pursuit and application of new knowledge. He shared an example of a time when he learned a vegetable preservation technique from a cooking show and later taught it to his chief cook steward, helping the vessel enjoy fresh vegetables even at times when their replenishment was challenging or impossible. Receiving personality feedback was a huge step forward for Thenamaris’s seafarers in knowing themselves and managing their reputations.

Strengthened Trust

The feedback process helped strengthen the trust between the seafarers and the company. During the personalized feedback sessions, sensitive matters were discussed with trust and honesty from all sides. This encouraged seafarers to share more freely and more confidently. Conversations were had about individual career development, teamwork, collaboration, and even purely operational matters that might have otherwise gone unaddressed.

The trust and partnership fostered by the feedback process are likely to have a positive impact on seafarers’ commitment and loyalty to Thenamaris in the future.

Improved Teams

Using the results of the Ulysses Project, Thenamaris can optimize the crewing process with data. By facilitating compatibility among team members’ personalities, Thenamaris expects to see improved cooperation and better overall team performance. By investing in leadership development, Thenamaris can more easily create high-performing teams.

Improved Succession Planning

Realizing the value of Hogan’s personality assessments, Thenamaris decided to offer the MVPI to all cadets. With a short feedback discussion about their values and drivers, cadets jumpstart their professional careers. They get to explore the compatibility of their personal values and those of Thenamaris, right at the earliest stage of their careers. Most importantly, encouraging the cadets to develop strategic self-awareness enables them to begin preparing for their futures as leaders—and that was the objective all along.