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Kurt Sansone
Malta Shipyards CEO Peter Moore did not mince his words in an email message sent to all senior managers at the dockyard, chiding them for their “arrogant Malta knows best” attitude and warning them that if they had it their way they would be “booking” the ‘yard’s “funeral.”
The email, leaked to MaltaToday, was sent on 18 August under the subject heading, ‘Enterprise Duration.’ It lists 10 points and contains a number of damning statements addressed to the shipyard’s senior managers.
Contacted about the contents of the email, Peter Moore told MaltaToday that the memo was an internal document. “It should not find its way in the public domain,” Moore said.
He added it was a pity that whoever decided to disclose corporate information did not feel “either duty bound to improve his performance or to demonstrate any loyalty to the company that employs him”.
The contents of the email jar completely with what Investments Minister Austin Gatt had to say on Friday in a statement expressing satisfaction at the new contracts secured by the shipyards for the months to come.
Gatt said the securing of four different contracts demonstrated that “Malta Shipyards Ltd is able to compete effectively in an increasingly competitive international market.”
Only two months earlier, the Shipyards’ CEO was telling his managers that competitors were “eating them alive” and that Malta’s credibility in the market place was at an “all time low.”
While on Friday Gatt said that good performance in the months to come was essential “to maintain a reputation for quality and delivery within a set timeframe,” Moore was playing a totally different tune two months earlier.
“Productivity improvements to date are at best minimal, at worst nil. Negative attitude abounds in bountiful measure in all production departments – we are beaten before we start,” Moore wrote in his message.
On Friday, Gatt was all praise for Malta Shipyards’s management for lining up the new jobs saying that this was “the beginning of a new road” for the beleaguered drydocks. These words are soothing when compared to the harsh tone used by Moore in August when he accused senior managers of having a bad attitude.
“The market is dictating the durations – we will not sell one man hour with our arrogant Malta knows best attitude and everyone else is wrong. The world does not dance to our tune – we have to compete or die. The way you guys want it you are booking the funeral,” Moore charged.
In addition, Moore demanded that production management rise to the challenges of the market and respond “positively not negatively.”
Making reference to the perception at the dockyards that he is naïve, Moore added: “I am not demanding the impossible – neither am I commercially naïve or stupid even if some of you think I am. The easy days are over. We either compete or go out of business.”
Moore ended his memo on a terse note: “Get the message guys, it’s the only one you will keep on hearing.”
Responding to questions by this newspaper, on Friday Moore reiterated that Malta Shipyards are moving through a period of change but a number of individuals within the company are “severely limited in their ability to cope with change.”
Moore said these individuals were “firmly rooted in the practices of the past” and “pursuing activities and practices designed to fight against progress.”
The Shipyards CEO did not mince his words in the reply sent to MaltaToday, even if the tone of the answers did not match Minister Gatt’s more positive message. “European shipyards are going through a very difficult and testing time. The market is very difficult and our competition is more efficient and effective than we are.
“The shipyards will survive only by their own efforts. No one owes them a living or any longer able to guarantee their survival,” Moore told this newspaper.
The CEO insisted that executive managers will continue to increase their efforts to ensure Maltese shipyards “not only survive but succeed. This is not a one way street it requires the full buy-in of all employees to make it happen,” Moore concluded his seven-point response.
kurt@newsworksltd.com
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