Careers

An important note to those wishing to work with us:

More and more our business is a global business.  While people interested in working with us may want to move to Eastport, most of what we do can be done collaboratively with you, no matter where you are in the world.  You can even be living aboard a boat and traveling around as long as you can access an Internet connection.  We have divided the jobs and business opportunities into non-location specific and local sections. We have also added a section on businesses which we would like to see started locally which we can use the services of.

Non-Location Specific Collaborative Work:

        Yacht Designers (Experienced, graduates of Yacht Design School, or as near equivalent as possible.)
        Yacht Draftsmen
(Experienced, or at least one third of the way through Yacht Design School.)
       
Yacht Design School Instructors & Teaching Assistants (STRONG NEED.  Graduates of Yacht Design School, equivalently educated, or with complementary skills)
       
Web Site Developer (VERY MUCH NEED YOU!  Must be willing to work in the Windows environment, using the free Microsoft Expression Web or the other more advanced Microsoft "Visual" development software.)

        The above four job categories may be filled by people anywhere in the world provided they are trained in the use of Rhino in marine design work.  Other possible jobs would be:

        Endowment Builders (We need the help of people with expertise and thoughts in this area.  We hope this year to start building an invested endowment so that the instructors can be paid by the endowment return.  This would allow us to grant scholarships and not turn away students who have trouble paying the tuition.  We also want to endow a materials test lab at Yacht Design School, which will use the endowment's return to acquire test equipment and software.)
       
Technical Writers (If you have an area of real marine expertise don't worry if you can't write, we have editors who can clean up your work)
       
Columnists (Daily liveaboard logs, topical columns on the lifestyle, opinion pieces, detailed information on cruising particular areas, sketch charts)
       
Yacht Broker or Brokerage Listing Secretary
  
     Liveaboard Catalog Manager
        Art Promotion Manager
        Logo Sales Manager
  (Develop and market apparel, mugs, YDS class rings, etc. which are very much in demand and will help build our endowment)
       
Virtual Reality Developer (Producing renderings and animations for promotion and instruction)
       

Local (by preference) Work:

        Librarian for Student Library (This library will be on line and will make possible research online plus ordering both in print and out of print books)
       
Marine Materials Test Lab Manager
   

Businesses You Can Start & Possibly Market Through Us, Eastport Location Preferred but Not Required:

        Kit Boat Production Manager (Serious cruising boats of our design, from double paddle canoes to 36' ocean voyagers)
        Model Kits Production Manager
(Kits for models of our designs and historic serious cruising yachts)
        Boat Restoration Specialist
(See jobs below for expansion possibilities)
       
Charter Manager (A very particular type of charter company for customers with a serious interest in boats)
        Cruise Schooners (We probably are not much help marketing for this business, but we have already assisted one such business which has two schooners)
        Kit Boats Parts Production
        Kit Boats Hardware Production
        Kit Boats Sail Production
        Marine Materials Test Lab
        Sailmaker
(Strong local market for sail repair and canvas work, with nearest sailmaker about three hours drive away. Thus good base income)
        School of Sailing and Seamanship
        Instructors for "The Boat School"
(This would not be working with us, but the school is expected to be expanding and will need more skilled instructors.)
       
Promotion and Fund Raising Position (This is needed by the local marine trades development corporation quite urgently)

Locating Marine Businesses in Eastport, Maine:

        Of course being on the coast of Maine gives instant world wide prestige to a naval architecture firm or other marine venture, but why Eastport?  This is a very beautiful area with an excellent unspoiled environment ideal for people who want to be outdoors.  Marine and land wildlife is plentiful.  In Eastport, on a beautiful piece of property, is The Boat School, which can set up courses to teach your potential employees the skills you need.  A local marine trades development corporation is available to help businesses find business assistance, financing, investors, and workers.  The people of this area have a very good work ethic and housing costs remain much lower than the national average.  There is a good high school in Eastport, the Washington County Community College in Calais, and the University of Maine at Machias a modest distance away.

Special Note for Liveaboards:
        Many liveaboards prefer to work part of the year and travel on their boats part of the year.  If you are one of these, please talk to us.  It might be that we could arrange a career sharing situation with someone else so you could work here six months and cruise six months.

General Skills:

All people wishing to work with us should be skilled in as many of the following as possible:

Touch typing
Microsoft Word
Microsoft Excel
Microsoft Access
Microsoft Outlook
Microsoft Expression Web or Visual Studio
Microsoft Publisher
PayPal
Adobe Acrobat
Rhinoceros(r)
Flamingo
Penguin
Bongo

General Information:

There can be a good deal of security in associating with an established business like us.  Many work with us for a time even when their goals are to eventually establish their own business.

Several non-drafting areas of responsibility can be combined for more income until such time as they get too big for one person to handle. When any given package of areas becomes too big for a single person we allow them to split off whatever areas they are less interested in and give them to another person as soon as we find one, thus maintaining focus and enthusiasm.  Further if anyone working with us finds themselves tired of the work they are doing and wants to try something else they may find another person working with us who also wants to exchange areas of responsibility.  Normally we will try to accommodate this exchange of work.

Other than the Yacht Designers and Yacht Draftsmen job categories there are no predetermined lists of skills for any of these jobs.  Naturally previous experience in any of these areas is valuable.  We will say however that anyone expecting to work with us on any office work who cannot touch type will be looked at with some unease.  We find it difficult to take seriously anyone who wishes to work in an office and won't invest in a program like "Mavis Beacon Teaches Typing" and take a couple of weeks to get up to speed on typing.  General familiarity with computers and the component programs of Microsoft Office Professional is also essential.

In this town there are a high percentage of highly independent people. The people who work with us are no exception. Many are second career people or young retirees looking for something interesting to do. It has therefore been necessary to structure ourselves around an independent contractor model with everybody getting a 100% incentive based personal income stream defined as a percentage of some larger stream. This has worked well for those who are very creative, self-reliant, self-starters who prefer a large degree of responsibility. Personal income is limited only by the volume you produce. Those who work at least a 40 hour week should earn good money. Draftsmen who are not already very skilled should expect it to take at least a year to build their speed to the point where they are earning really good money.

Many people cannot handle this degree of responsibility for their own work and income. Therefore anyone interested in working with us should carefully examine whether they really would be happy with this sort of work environment.

People should realize that this is a beautiful quiet small coastal town in the midst of a beautiful system of bays and islands with all that is implied by the description. If this is what you like and yearn for, that is fine. If you crave shopping malls, night life, and excitement you will not be happy here.

With the help of these guidelines we have collected a group of extremely interesting and intelligent people working with us, who are very happy with the experience.

Do feel free to talk with us at any time about our operation and the tiny city of 1,642 people that we live in.

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