Graduate Journey With Joe Stead

Joe joined Suttons in 2018 as part of our graduate scheme and jumped straight into the fast-paced Operations department. Initially working as a Transport Planner for the South of the UK, he became acquainted with our drivers and the legislation around chemical logistics. Following this, he moved into customer facing imports and exports for the European Short Sea business, where he gained a broad understanding of the demands of the industry as well as being able to further his customer service experience.

After just over a year and a half Joe moved into a Business Optimisation Analyst role, specialising in business efficiency in our operations and implementing new processes to allow Suttons to grow in the market. His time spent in Operations stood him in good stead for this role as it allowed him to develop solid insights into the day-to-day running of the business and could draw on that to influence his decisions in this new role.

Joe was able to further develop his skills from an International perspective by visiting and spending time in our European office in Antwerp. On multiple occasions, Joe travelled to Antwerp to work with and learn from colleagues based there.

When COVID-19 disrupted our industry, Joe lent his support to our US office based in Holmdel New Jersey in order to keep things running smoothly during the transition to remote working; allowing him to take the skills he had developed in our UK and European areas of the business and advance them further, with experience in one of our largest international regions.

Joe is excited to begin his new role as Commercial Analyst to learn about the commercial side of the business. The skills he developed working in operations will be invaluable in his new role where he will be helping to implement changes to the business that will allow Suttons to achieve future goals. 

By being able to develop in multiple departments alongside both long-standing and newer members of the Suttons team, across many of our international regions, Joe has been able to progress his career within Suttons and take the next step in his graduate journey.

Michael Cundy Managing Director – Suttons Tankers, is Joe’s mentor and is really proud of the progress he has made, he said “It’s been great to see Joe’s development within his time at Suttons and I’ve thoroughly enjoyed being a mentor to him. He is enthusiastic and always looking to learn more about the industry which has enabled him to progress so well in such a short space of time. Through working in various different departments, Joe has a really broad knowledge of the business and has applied himself to build invaluable relationships internally and with customers.”