Where are we heading, Josh?
So, Jason, you're coming to the end of your two-year tenure as chair of CLEA, and we'll be... You don't have to tell me. You had a lot on your plate, including a CEO transition and a lot of things that were happening in the industry. As you reflect on that two years, what are some of the high points as you see it and things that you've actually enjoyed being part of or differences that you think we've made as a community?
Sure. Well, up until like the past couple weeks, the share price was a big high point. But I look, I think that when you look at it over the past couple of years, watching our industry accelerate, and not just in terms of accelerate in terms of the recovery post the pandemic, but it's also how it's accelerated in its relevancy in travel. Most of us here have spent our collective careers convincing people of what a cruise is. A lot of people look back to very legacy leisurely, and in reality, this industry has created for so many different segments these incredible vacation experiences, and now it is very much a key consideration in any vacation planning happening around the world. So to me, that's a massive accomplishment for the industry that we are really fully relevant in the travel space. The other thing that I'm super proud about is how we're all just so focused on the broader stakeholder group. We have an incredible responsibility to improve our footprint on the planet. We take that responsibility very seriously, and we're all collectively finding ways to lessen that impact. We're continuing to collectively invest in the different destinations, making sure there's fair balance in the economics as well as the social impact that is occurring in all these different communities, and also taking on the responsibility of how do we continue to diversify where our ships go to lessen some of the concentration that can occur in some of those locations. So I think we all have a high sense of responsibility in how we're operating all around the world and also how we're working very well as an industry to make that broader impact.
Well, thanks Jason. And of course, as you step back from one chairmanship, for those who may not know, Jason has assumed a new chairmanship because apparently you must be chairman at all times of something. So Jason now assumed the title of chairman of Royal Caribbean Group. So I hope you'll all join me in congratulating him for that. So, Jason, when I was on your recent inaugural, I saw a one-on-one discussion with you and Richard Feain, and a lot of the discussion was really more generally about leadership philosophy and how important people are to the success or failure of a large company. I was wondering if you might share some of your own thoughts about that leadership in general and how you integrate those principles into the way that you actually operate your company day-to-day.
Sure. Well, first I think in order to do anything well in life, you have to have an incredible team. I think sometimes there's this weird or warped world where people think that everybody works for the leader, and I think in reality, if done well, the leader and the leadership teams are really supporting the organization to fulfill its greatest destiny. I think we've always in our DNA had a very strong culture of dreaming, a culture of innovation, and a responsibility to make sure with all of that that we're not just producing art, we're producing also financial returns through that innovation. But that all comes into the fibers of hiring the best athletes, which I think we wake up every day trying to do. Make sure those athletes are evolving, becoming great leaders inside the organization, making big impacts, and having them have a high sense of accountability and responsibility because you can't micromanage. We have over 100,000 people. To think that we were able to do that, and I also very much realize that even in the good times and the bad times, when you have the right people surrounding you, you end up on the right side of history. I think that's how we've always been as a company. It's why we have so much respect and admiration for our people. It's weird in this world of AI and everything, there's always this obsession that we're going to replace all these people and so forth. If you're in this business, you know that the magical moment is when our guest and our crew connect, and our crew understands what our guests are looking for and they bring those incredible wows and delights and memories to life, and that's irreplaceable through technology. You can enhance it through technology. I think we're also very focused on how do we move everybody to do higher purpose activities versus maybe some of the collecting of data and harvesting of data versus how do we make better decisions.
Jason, if I could talk about maybe the shipboard staffing element of that, worldwide. As you all know, I have a lot of experience in the shipping industry overall. There is currently in shipping overall a shortfall of 90,000 certified officers seeming to go to sea right now. In our industry, we also have competition for the hotel staff, which really I think delivers a lot of that experience that you're describing. What sorts of things have you found successful in recruiting the right hotel staff and having them actually be able to deliver that guest experience every single day that you're describing?
Well, first of all, I think as an industry, we've all established incredible culture and guest service expectations that kind of breed the next generations, which is why I think we all have incredible loyalty whether it's on the deck and engine or the hotel side for our people. So there is always a level of competition, but you don't see a lot of people moving from one line to another. I think that's because employees want to be treated with great respect and appreciation. They want to be invested in. They want to have career opportunities. For us, we're growing at about 5% a year, so we have one or two ships at least every year coming out. It provides promotional opportunities for them, so they think that they're growing. They also want to work for purpose-driven companies, and I think they believe in the purpose. I get the pleasure of visiting our different brands. They all have distinct personalities, and you just see incredible loyalty and appreciation for what those brands are and what they represent to the guest as well as to the organization. We have very low attrition in our brands. It's even lower than it is shore side. So I think it comes down to culture and it comes down to respect, and most of all is trust. They trust us, our guests trust us. As long as you have trust, you typically win that game.
So, speaking of trust, I often talk about safety. I can't help it. I've been in the marine safety business for the better part of my entire career. We don't get extra credit for that. In fact, we don't talk about it that much publicly because we don't want to remind people of the things we're doing in the back of the house. But I think certainly you fully appreciate how important safety and safety culture is. Could you say a few words about how you actually get the right safety culture to be in place, fine-tuned, and evolving over time within your organization?
