Reply to: How does one get into the oil and natural gas industry? (20yrs in Financial Services)

[alphadog]

I worked in O&G for a number of years. I got into it through a friend who was working in it. I would recommend you do the same, forget about useless certificates, etc. Basically you have to be recommended into it from someone inside, on a project that is desperate for bums on seats. You will probably have to go in at below market rates initially.

As others have said, O&G isn't particularly booming, so it's not an ideal time to sneak in the back door. If you can earn 900pd in FS, assuming that's outside IR35, you're doing very well financially as it is. If you're looking for a low tax jurisdiction, can't you just do FS in the middle east?

Offshore wind was booming over the last few years, but is currently in the process of hitting a brick wall due to inflation and higher financing costs, etc.

[Lance]

I learnt the perils of documentation the hard way in my first stint in pharma. I still remember sitting down with the IT Compliance Manager at the start of my project to go through the list of 80 odd project documents that would be needed during its lifecycle. I found the whole process so energy sapping that after my second stint in pharma I decided not to ever work in the industry again.

Similar experience in FS at a bank. All the compliance and sign off processes took longer than actually implementing the project from start to finish (6 months vs 5 months.) After the Architect on the project had gone through about 25 meetings to discuss the solution design, it's amazing anything ever got done.

documentation is a good thing...
Too many companies, including F&S and pharma, have insufficient, poor, out of date, or just plain inaccurate documentation.

Governance procedures that require documentation before proceeding with a project is good practise.

[edison]

In Pharma / O&G site work practices are very specific, same goes for documentation, especially test docs, if you've never dealt with it, you will have a hard time doing it / organising it / planning it and assessing how much time things take. This is why previous experience is needed as I doubt anyone will be happy to explain why a permit to work is required to complete a 15min task when the chap who's responsible is already there on the rig and nothing's been arranged.

I learnt the perils of documentation the hard way in my first stint in pharma. I still remember sitting down with the IT Compliance Manager at the start of my project to go through the list of 80 odd project documents that would be needed during its lifecycle. I found the whole process so energy sapping that after my second stint in pharma I decided not to ever work in the industry again.

Similar experience in FS at a bank. All the compliance and sign off processes took longer than actually implementing the project from start to finish (6 months vs 5 months.) After the Architect on the project had gone through about 25 meetings to discuss the solution design, it's amazing anything ever got done.

[Lance]

Middle East is probably still active in O&G,

Indeed. But only extraction and processing.

elsewhere it is indeed a dead industry.

Dead end. Not actually dead. It's still running but it will cease over the coming decades. Whilst there is money still to be made it's a shrinking pool of money and the skilled people already exist.

Renewables are currently growing massively in Europe, although there's signs that it's not a very crazy-money-making industry (in fact companies are loosing money on projects), so I wouldn't be surprised if that also dies at some point unless propped up by govs.

It will be propped up if it cannot make money. But I'm not sure that it's loosing (sic) money in reality. A few energy companies went bust that were offering renewable sources but they went bust because of the energy crisis of the last 2 years. Those that generate are doing just fine.

[dsc]

I'm not sure why the desire to get into a dead-end industry.

Renewable energy sector would be a far wiser move. And whilst the offshore aspect of that industry has a lot of commonality with O&G the rest is just another utility industry.

Middle East is probably still active in O&G, elsewhere it is indeed a dead industry. Renewables are currently growing massively in Europe, although there's signs that it's not a very crazy-money-making industry (in fact companies are loosing money on projects), so I wouldn't be surprised if that also dies at some point unless propped up by govs.

[TheDude]

I'm not sure why the desire to get into a dead-end industry.

Renewable energy sector would be a far wiser move. And whilst the offshore aspect of that industry has a lot of commonality with O&G the rest is just another utility industry.

I think the OP assumes they can get juiced into ridiculous Middle East expat rates.

[Lance]

I'm not sure why the desire to get into a dead-end industry.

Renewable energy sector would be a far wiser move. And whilst the offshore aspect of that industry has a lot of commonality with O&G the rest is just another utility industry.

[eek]

I've contracted in the O&G (and biopharma) industry with no prior experience. It's a case of being in the right place at the right time: immediately available, meet all the other criteria, have some other experience (e.g. have prior experience in the software or horizontal domain) that they need right now.

+1 - it's about being the best (1 of max 3) options available at the time in an agents eyes.

Given that there are a lot of O+G workers on the market at the moment it's going to be hard to get into the shortlist.

but otherwise as you say the best person will be deemed to be in order:-

1) person with exact experience in the same industry
2) person with similar experience in same industry
3) person with exact experience in close industry
4) person with similar experience in close industry
5) person with exact experience in other industry
6) person with vague experience in same industry
7) person with similar experience in other industry

So you can see why if your experience isn't perfect / in the industry you won't get past the gormless gatekeeping agent.

[merseygrit]

I've contracted in the O&G (and biopharma) industry with no prior experience. It's a case of being in the right place at the right time: immediately available, meet all the other criteria, have some other experience (e.g. have prior experience in the software or horizontal domain) that they need right now.

[jamesbrown]

Don't underestimate the reasons for "keeping it in the family" that have nothing to do with the work being done to a high standard. The reality is that the very best people move relatively seamlessly between industries and do the work to a high standard in all contexts, but there's a lot of incentive for crap people and crap agencies to avoid that

[dsc]

My perspective is that not EVERY role needs industry experience, and a bit of pragmatism would actually allow people to move around and gain the exposure / experience they need without causing the next Piper Alpha incident.

For sure that is true, but as usual it's just easier to keep O&G people within the O&G industry, Pharma people in Pharma etc. most skills are transferable but also remember that there's a hell of a lot of OGs in the industry, people who've been in it for ages and truly believe that you need industry exp as it's such a hard thing to learn...Then on the other hand you have softies who push untested changes to site "cause something looked wrong" without realising it stops production, so

[NotAllThere]

Like all closed shop industries (FS, O&G, Insurance, Pharma, Nuclear, Aviation, etc etc) you need experience to get the job. Occasionally you get a company who realise that you don't need to know how the industry works in order to bleed a radiator and they let you in. Once you're in, you then milk it for all you're worth.

There's one Pharma company near me that insists that, apart from entry level positions, candidates must have worked for them before. Quite bonkers.

[ladymuck]

In Pharma / O&G site work practices are very specific, same goes for documentation, especially test docs, if you've never dealt with it, you will have a hard time doing it / organising it / planning it and assessing how much time things take. This is why previous experience is needed as I doubt anyone will be happy to explain why a permit to work is required to complete a 15min task when the chap who's responsible is already there on the rig and nothing's been arranged.

I don't doubt it for a second and I wouldn't want a safety critical task to be done by someone whose last job was cleaning toilets in Wetherspoons. My perspective is that not EVERY role needs industry experience, and a bit of pragmatism would actually allow people to move around and gain the exposure / experience they need without causing the next Piper Alpha incident.

[dsc]

I see so many adverts where the spec is something I can do in my sleep and then there's the killer "must have [industry] experience". I try anyway and am always told, you look great but you've not worked in FS, Insurance, Legal, etc etc so they won't consider you.

I agree that the majority of work needed doesn't require me to know the ins and outs of a given industry but I have yet to get past the agent gatekeepers who claim otherwise.

In Pharma / O&G site work practices are very specific, same goes for documentation, especially test docs, if you've never dealt with it, you will have a hard time doing it / organising it / planning it and assessing how much time things take. This is why previous experience is needed as I doubt anyone will be happy to explain why a permit to work is required to complete a 15min task when the chap who's responsible is already there on the rig and nothing's been arranged.

[DoctorStrangelove]

the closed shop mentality/idiocy.

One out! All out! What about the workers?

Oh.

Sorry.

Wrong sort of closed shop.