President, CEO of TransOceanic Shipping Co. puts emphasis on family

New Orleans CityBusiness, Oct 27, 2003 by Ellen Boyer

And just two weeks ago, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers awarded TransOceanic a contract to transport cargo to help rebuild Iraq's electrical and power infrastructure.

The drop in value of the U.S. dollar earlier this year helped boost export profits, Rusovich said. That momentum should continue into a favorable 2004, he said.

Cheap labor

The world wasn't always Gregory Rusovich's oyster. He started working full time for his father after college although he wasn't exactly pleased with his pay.

I told him I needed a raise, but he said it wasn't time yet. So I told him I was quitting and he said, 'Fine, you quit,' Rusovich said. Two weeks later, there was no phone call. And there was no income, so I tried to get my job back. Six months later I got the raise. My dad didn't buckle, even to me.

Gregory Rusovich was good at balancing father-son and boss- employee relationships with his father, says older brother Mark Rusovich, 47.

They had a very loving relationship, he said. That's very critical in a family business. So many get ripped apart, especially this size company.

Father and son took a strong, hands-on approach to the business, said Rick Castaing, the company's Houston-based executive vice president and 31-year TransOceanic veteran. They are always accessible to our clients and other management issues you would expect in a family owned business.

His mother, Marilyn Rusovich, has been a quiet adviser in the background.

I'm not a business woman, and if a woman is not a business woman, the best thing she can do for her husband and son is just stand by and be a sounding board, she says.

The tight family relationship had other perks, too.

Sometimes a family company has an advantage because they can set an agenda and make decisions quickly, said Gene Schreiber, managing director of the World Trade Center. Let me tell you, TransOceanic and the Rusoviches are second to none when it comes to going after business. If they sniff some business halfway across the world, they're going to be out there to pounce on it.

TransOceanic's tone

Basil Rusovich, who passed away in July, set the tone of the company, and Rusovich strives to maintain it.

Years before the elder Rusovich's death, there was talk of moving company headquarters to Houston, which had started taking more business while the exodus of Louisiana's oil and gas companies into Texas continued.

Basil Rusovich and son kept the company's corporate, finance and human resources headquarters in Kenner, but they moved TransOceanic's operational headquarters to Houston. Seventy-six employees remain in Kenner with 154 in Houston.

(We've) kept (the corporate headquarters) here because of our deep roots with the community and our family, Rusovich said. That's OK for a private company but a public company would have to go.

The Houston and New Orleans offices haven't always gotten along as well as the father-son leadership team. In the early 1990s, there was a lot of strife between the two offices.

They operated as separate companies with a lot of unhealthy competition between them, said senior vice president Larry Weischwill, who is based in London and handles operations in Europe and the Middle East.