
Who we are is about what we believe and do.
We believe Gandhi’s statement: “Be the change you wish to see in the world”.
The NPO, PROJECT CONNECT, established on May 27, 2015, offers a rainbow of opportunities to young professionals in-the-making to help jump start their careers in the shipping industry they have selected. We facilitate the sharing of resources through professional assistance where needed and have placed over 50 candidates in shipping companies in the last years, via our online CV Database, the first one in Shipping, and referrals.
PROJECT CONNECT is an influencing force, contributing to the cultivation of Greece’s next generation workforce; many Founding Members of reputable shipping companies & the maritime cluster share our vision of offering work experience to “young professionals in-the-making”, in order to sustain the excellence in the Greek Shipping Industry!
In January 2019, PROJECT CONNECT successfully implemented maritime knowledge in Greek elementary schools for the first time, through the Cypriot educational program "Adopt a Ship". By 2020, 33 classrooms from 16 public and private schools have been communicating with 26 seagoing vessels’ masters from 14 shipping companies. By 2021, 57 classes of 33 public and private elementary schools have been communicating with 48 seagoing vessels' masters from 24 Greek shipping companies. In total, "Adopt a Ship" program is branding the Hellenic Shipping Industry in 1300 pupils.
We envision a changing-for-the-better future Greece, by sustaining one of its top resources, the Greek Shipping Industry Success Story. We support the “can do” mind set and the aim for excellence that has built it. We instill this mind set into the next generation workforce, who shall ultimately reinforce Greek Shipping’s competitiveness in the international arena.
We all must be part of this change.

To enhance opportunities for youth employability in Greece by offering internships and placements in ship operations departments and in vessels, where the new entry will absorb expert know-how and experiences from the “brain bank” (managers, captains and principals) and develop skill sets.
“Each one of us is a link in one united chain. Let’s ensure we are strong and linked tight.” Irene Notias
The chain created by Ms. Eva Divari, is symbolic as a chain is absolutely just as vulnerable as its weakest link and it just needs one link to crack for the whole chain to fail. As shipping industry is just a link in a chain of innumerable candidates and shipping companies. If a link in the industry chain breaks, there will be nothing for the shipping industry to work on. Therefore, “strongly” educated candidates imply a “strong” shipping industry.
The Chain, our logo, is by Artist Eva Divari who has travelled on ships all her life. Each individual employee is like a link in a chain. If one link brakes, the entire chain is broken. Let’s ensure that each "link" is strong and the chain is tightly united resulting in strong and healthy companies able to compete in the international arena.
Co-founders, Irene Notias and Angeliki Livanou, believed in Demosthenes statement, "It is more difficult to preserve than to acquire" ("Χαλεπώτερον το φυλάττειν του κτήσασθαι") and that the only way to sustain shipping companies is to properly prepare its next generation workforce. At the same time, most young job seekers' expressed to them their sense of hopelessness at finding internships and jobs and believed that it was because they didn’t have a connection in shipping. So, Notias and Livanou, while supporting meritocracy, decided to become “The CONNECTION” for them.
They investigated why the low hiring rate and support of young personnel in the shipping industry and being business owners and managers themselves, they understood that although there was a need for fresh manpower, young job seekers lacked work-experience, know-how and admin skill sets enabling them to offer support to their employers.
They successfully persuaded their clients and friends to consider offering internships and entry level jobs basis the above statement. Thru an organized HR guided method, they created the 1st online CV Database and were joined by HR expert Efharis Perpinia soon after, becoming Shipping’s 1st HR Hub for young people.
Ms. Notias & Ms. Perpinia's Interview @ Maritimes during their Shipping HR seminar / Posidonia 2014
IBIA endorses PROJECT CONNECT


The Why Story to Project Connect

The Why Story to Project Connect
“Starting in 2010, schools and shipping students, and even mothers were reaching out to me to help locate jobs in shipping companies, even abroad. It happened that my business was already established as a representative company and recruitment agency and our General Manager, Angeliki Livanou thought to interview these job seekers. She used her HR skills and placed a few candidates successfully. Meanwhile, I would make calls and send e-mails to encourage ship owner clients to take on students for their own benefit to sustain their businesses, as well. I saw that they were always short staffed. So, we used our vast shipping network to help place more systemically. Afterall, the economy was stuck because no one had jobs to stimulate consumer spending, an integral part of a healthy economy. And I was particularly concerned with the youth’s anxiety and desperateness due to no one hiring them. It was like a whole generation of humanity being frozen. So, we interviewed and placed several candidates and decided to create a division in the company called “Connect” Human Energy Resources. We called it connect because during the interviews, most students expressed hopelessness of getting a job in shipping because they believed they didn’t have the necessary “meson” or connection. We told them this was not the reason but in any case they could consider us their “connection”. We received over 300 CV’s from students searching for jobs and internships. It was getting to be too much to handle, since we had full time jobs too, so we put up the first self-service Online CV database in 2015.
We thought to give shipping students a chance to meet and listen to the shipping community first-hand and so on March 9th 2016, over 200 students and 20 shipping companies’ heads gathered and connected. Seeing the students smiles and excitement at the opportunities they were given there was worth all the trouble and disruption from our own work. We also saw the misdirected belief systems and confusion that the students were experiencing. In April 2019, we organized a self-improvement seminar on how they could be successful in Shipping by adopting a new mind set and understand the work expectations of an employer, with renowned motivational speaker, Dr John Kalogerakis. Since then, as we hoped, other companies like ours sprouted creating even more advanced activities that enhanced the goals. Project Connect was the first movement in Greece of shipping people voluntarily building a bridge to connect shipping students to shipping companies. Since 2016, it has placed over 40 students and grads in internships and jobs. And currently has evolved to providing maritime education in both private and public grade schools of Greece through an international educational program called “Adopt a Ship”. We just want to offer help to those who ask for it and try to satisfy needs.”
“We have gathered pretty much all of the shipping industry’s sectors to support our efforts so we can be one voice. One voice to the students who are trying to make it in shipping and one voice for Greek shipping industry to sustain itself by together cultivating the new generation workforce with same high standards and excellence of the brain bank of expertise seamen and shore personnel and managers that built it.“
Thank you to all and in gratitude and joy,
Irene Notias

Media about Project Connect and Adopt a Ship
