Zee Beam News

06 September 2007 - Upstream OnLine - The international oil industry is struggling to find skilled workers needed to drive a boom in exploration and production activity spurred by record oil prices. Faced with skill shortages and an ageing workforce in some key jobs, oil companies are trying to attract new blood by tapping university graduates and school-leavers. But executives say companies must be much more proactive in recruitment to attract graduates who now can pick and choose from a myriad of career options and see the oil business as an old-fashioned “dirty” industry. A shortage of highly-specialised professionals including sub-sea engineers, geoscience experts or reservoir engineers has caused painful cost rises for oil companies, even though many are now earning nearly $70 a barrel for oil. The scarcity of staff with specialist experience has led to companies poaching from each other. "The industry does tend to pick its own pockets in terms of talent," said Mark Carne, vice president at oil and gas company BG Group. "We all recognise it's particularly pressing," he told Reuters. Industry analysts blame the skills gap on staff leaving the industry when times were harder amid lower oil prices and not returning when things pick up. The younger generation may be turned off by oil's image as a heavy, sunset industry, industry executives say. "The demographics of the industry are changing," said David Lesar, chief executive of US oil services company Halliburton. "It's no secret that the average person in the industry is now in their mid-40s, statistics show." A survey by Oil & Gas UK, published in April, found the average age of the total workforce on the UK continental shelf was 41 years, while some categories were younger. The problem of an ageing workforce is particularly an issue in North America and Europe. But some in the industry believe the problem has been exaggerated. "Offshore, the ageing workforce is a myth," said Chris Allen, a director of Oil & Gas UK. There are plenty of applicants for new apprenticeship schemes and graduate entry schemes, he said. "The North Sea is at capacity, but we don't have a problem attracting people offshore." Tom Botts, executive vice president of exploration and production at Royal Dutch Shell in Europe, said skilled staff in sub-surface engineering and reservoir and well engineering were in particularly short supply. And in the UK there are not enough students on engineering courses. "We need to get into the schools because just getting them out of university is not enough," said Botts. In contrast, India, Russia and China are churning out thousands of petroleum engineers, industry executives say, so hiring local staff in these regions can be part of the answer. Lesar said the majority of Halliburton's workforce overseas was drawn from local workers. Halliburton will hire 14,000 people this year, adding to its existing staff of 50,000, showing that people wanted to come into the industry, he said. But a survey of oil and gas operators and related contractors in the Aberdeen area, the UK hub for the North Sea oil industry, found nearly 90% of contractors were looking for new staff.