UPDATE: As Work Force Ages, Oil Majors Use Tech To Retain Knowledge
March 23 2009 - 1:09PM
Dow Jones News
Major oil companies are looking for the solution to the work
force crunch in their employees' electronic trail.
ConocoPhillips (COP), Chevron Corp. (CVX) and BP PLC (BP) are
encouraging employees to use handheld computers, interactive Web
pages, blogs, social networks and other media to store information
on how they make crucial decisions or resolve problems at the
office and in the field.
This new generation of options allows companies to partially
solve one of their biggest challenges: the retirement of half of
their workforce over the next 10 years. The shift allows employees
to more efficiently communicate on a large scale, as well as
archive knowledge and reduce training costs, the companies
said.
San Ramon, Calif.-based Chevron is already seeing the benefits
of a 2005 move in which it swapped the pencils, clipboards and
spreadsheets that refinery field operators used to record the
performance of mechanical equipment for mobile devices in which
workers digitally capture data.
BP rolled out a similar system last year and said it expects the
new technology will result in $150 million in annual savings for
its refining and chemicals businesses, including training
costs.
The Houston-based ConocoPhillips has developed about 100 online
knowledge sharing networks, which are used by about 9,500, or 28%,
of its worldwide employees to post questions and find answers from
colleagues.
"What we have done is to work on a system behind the scenes to
capture their experiences," said Dan Ranta, director of knowledge
sharing for ConocoPhillips. "We are literally taking the knowledge
from their heads and putting it out there for people to go back and
rediscover."
Slow-Changing Culture
The U.S. energy industry's fortunes are increasingly tied to
companies' abilities to bridge the gap between new employees and
graying generations retiring at a fast pace.
These companies laid off millions when oil prices plunged in the
1980s, scaring a whole generation away from the oil patch only to
find themselves with a reduced, aging workforce in the midst on a
new oil boom.
Neither the recent drop in oil prices, which have fallen from
all-time highs above $147 to about $50 a barrel recently, nor the
economic downturn's havoc on retirement plans, are significantly
affecting the decision by veterans to leave the industry, according
to a recent survey commissioned by consultancy Accenture and
Microsoft Corp.'s (MSFT).
Thus, oil companies and large producers - which despite the
current crisis will need a slew of new workers in the long-term -
are resorting to initiatives ranging from energy-focused high
schools to lure young talent to using new technology to hold off
the demographic time bomb.
But the effort requires cultural change that is hard to achieve
quickly in a conservative industry, said Claire Markwardt, a
Houston-based partner with Accenture.
The survey shows that face-to-face, phone and e-mail are still
the most common forms of collaboration in the energy industry and
traditional tools like physical documents are the most prevalent
means of knowledge capture. Most oil and gas professionals reported
spending at least one hour each day looking for information, a
potential loss of $485 million per year among industry engineers
alone, according to the survey.
"Most oil corporate cultures are generally accepting but not yet
giving priority to adopting new social media tools," said
Markwardt.
Knowledge Flowing From Houston To Offshore UK
Paul Muir, a young chemical engineer working for ConocoPhillips
in Aberdeen, U.K., could be a poster child for solving pressing
problems with social networking tools.
He needed to gather detailed information on combustion equipment
used at a company platform in the North Sea in order to obtain a
permit to operate. Equipment vendors were slow to respond, so Muir
decided to post the question in one of ConocoPhillips' online
business networks. Within a few days he received many replies -
including one from Ron LeTard, a Houston-based engineer with 37
years of experience. LeTard's advice ensured the permit was
submitted successfully and on time, Muir said.
This happened in 2007, but technical professionals faced with
similar problems around the world can seek information and
expertise from their peers the same day or start an online
discussion on the topic through a network and make quicker, more
informed decisions, ConocoPhillips's Knowledge Sharing Director
Ranta said.
"One way to amplify the impact of workers is to break down the
information silos that impede collaboration," said Craig Hodges,
the U.S. energy and chemicals industry solutions director at
Microsoft Corp.'s, which provides knowledge sharing software to oil
and gas companies.
"In essence, creating an oil and gas world without walls," he
said.
-By Isabel Ordonez, Dow Jones Newswires; 713-547-9207;
isabel.ordonez@dowjones.com