Cruise Ship Recruiting Agencies

[sievep]

I just had an experience with an agency that recruits stage managers for Royal Carribean, etc.

I applied, they called me about three months later to set up an interview with the recruiting agency.  They had, during that time, lost my resume, so I resent it.

The interviewer did not call me on time, but someone else in the company called me two hours later to reschedule me for the following week, at which point I just passed on the interview entirely.  I felt like my time had been wasted, and I questioned the wisdom of having someone representing me who couldn't be bothered to call me on time. 

Has anyone else had successes or failures dealing with these agencies?  Why not just apply with the cruise line directly?

[KMC]

Hi Sievep,

The reason you don't apply with the cruise line directly is basically the amount of work that goes into a "newhire" and also the different countries we hire from.  Cruise lines basically hire from every country under the sun, and it is much easier for the newhires to go through a hiring partner.

For every newhire that joins a ship, they must have a passport, some type of physical, appropriate documentation for that cruise line, agreement to company policies, uniform, etc.. etc...  There are also (understandably) quite a bit of questions from newhires about what life is like on ships.  In our field we get asked by techs all the time if they should bring their tools, etc...  Basically it's easier for the newhire to have a liaison or someone to "hold their hand" all the way to the ship if need be.