Newly appointed chairman of the Port Authority, Suresh Gangapersad was keen to be identified as the new broom that would be sweeping through the operations of the authority.
Describing many of the issues facing the Port Authority as "misbeliefs and misconceptions," he was keen to implement all the currently popular buzzwords regarding organisational management and change regimes, pointing to "a lot of scope available... to manage our assets and the way forward" regarding the real estate under the state agency's management.
He also plans to "sit down and rethink and examine operations" with stakeholders at the Port of Port-of-Spain, anticipating improvements "without affecting workers."
As for the challenges of the inter-island ferry service, only recently returned to regular service, Mr Gangapersad plans to improve operations there as well, to "get more utilisation out of these vessels" and to "really take up the fixed costs of the ferries."
It's certain that Mr Gangapersad, who previously served as the Port Authority's deputy chairman, has a plan, and one informed by his previous service on the board, to implement these ambitious goals. But at the authority, the best of plans have proven to rarely survive their docking with the reality at wharfside.
Before the management of the Port of Port-of-Spain can consider exploiting the assets under their care, there remain the long standing and well-known challenges facing the service, security and efficiency.
The Port Authority got to a rocky start under the People's Partnership Government, leading to the firing of chairman Clive Spencer in October 2011, just eight months after he was appointed.
By 2012 new equipment for handling containers was being deployed and the SWWTU was calling for more training for workers to handle the new gear. Serious discussion about the introduction of container scanners began in September 2013 after the embarrassment of successful seizures of drugs in shipping containers, including one in May 2013 which uncovered 96 kilogrammes of marijuana with a value of $7.2 million stuffed in cargo barrels.
Efficiency and security at the port will not be improved solely through the implementation of new software solutions and the upgrading of equipment.
Engaging an eclectic mix of staff in the process of achieving the bold goals of the new board is likely to prove a challenge. The ports of T&T may be striving for a new level of professional engagement with their stakeholders, but there will be challenges in raising the port's game beyond political concerns to meet the considerable expectations of the international shipping community.
The challenges that face the Port Authority are many and varied and will not be solved by management speaking, no matter how impressive and the new leadership is still to articulate a strategy that will meet the deeply entrenched reality of the dock's unique culture.
Mr Gangapersad and his board must also be ready to respond to pervasive and unrelenting efforts of inventive drug traffickers to use the port's facilities to move large shipments of illegal narcotics to the United States while meeting the considerable challenges that shippers continue to face in getting the service they have long been hoping to experience at nation's ports.