Some interesting trends have emerged recently in oil and gas industry employment and training.
According to analysis by Rystad Energy of certain oil field service industry sectors with the highest percent change of employment, the primary driver of employment is shifting to offshore from shale plays.
“Increased activity in onshore shale basins such as the Permian in the US held employment in the oil field service industry steady from 2016 to 2017,” the independent energy research and business intelligence firm noted. “However, the offshore industry has now taken the lead, gradually increasing the overall headcount of the top 50 oil field service companies from 2017 to 2018.”
Doubling down
Matthew Fitzsimmons, vice-president on Rystad’s oil field services team, said the change is a “clear effect of the increase in offshore sanctioning.” He said, “We expect offshore commitments to nearly double from 2018 to 2020 and sustain high levels of spending over the next 5 years.”
The demand for offshore services, Rystad calculates, will reach $442 billion in 2025, nearly double the level from 2018.
As the offshore market continues to gain momentum, the tides are now turning, Rystad noted. “Companies greatly exposed to the offshore industry struggled with the financial realities of reduced activity in 2015-17, resulting in a cumulative workforce decrease of 31%.”
Now, however, “four of the top five oil field service companies with the largest workforce change from 2017 to 2018 were primarily exposed to the offshore industry,” the firm said.
As an example, Rystad noted that among the smaller companies with a focus on the offshore business, Norwegian shipping company Solstad has nearly doubled its workforce from 2017 to 2018. This, it says, is “a significant staff ramp-up which bet on the long-term improvement of market conditions.”
Drilling contractor Seadrill, another example, saw similar employment growth, up 15%. Seadrill “has seen some recent contract award success with Saudi Aramco and Equinor,” Rystad said. “However, their 2018 yearend headcount is only 100 people more than after massive layoffs in 2016 and remains just over half of what is was as in 2014.”
Fitzsimmons said, “We expect Seadrill’s hiring need to continue through 2022, as the markets the company is exposed to will continue to grow, offering contracting opportunities.”
As these offshore service companies continue to ramp up their hiring, they will be faced with similar challenges.
“Our informal interviews with OFS company leaders across the offshore industry all echoed a common challenge: how to bring experienced personnel back into the industry amidst current growth, and how to attract new talent,” Fitzsimmons said. “History would show that to bring back experienced professionals into an industry, higher wages will be required.”
Advanced training
In addition to hiring challenges, workers’ advanced training will also come into play.
This month, the Engineering Construction Industry Training Board (ECITB) launched the UK’s first training course for industrial drone operators in Aberdeen. Developed by Texo Compliance, the ECITB-approved Industrial Drone Operations Training Course was created “to ensure that the next generation of drone operators attain and develop the skills and knowledge they need to operate safely in heavy industrial environments that have specific operational hazards and constraints.”
ECITB said, “The past 10 years has seen increased use of unmanned aerial vehicles in the industrial environment and, as more and more industry sectors see the advantage of reducing risk, time-saving, and reduction of cost in areas such as infrastructure inspection, their use has quadrupled in the last 2 years.”
ECITB CEO Chris Claydon said, “ECITB plays a key role in developing industry-led standards and qualifications to meet the needs of the workplace and enable our industry to compete globally.”
Claydon said, “Drones are increasingly common across engineering construction sites from monitoring and surveying to checking wear and tear on installations, such as offshore rigs and wind turbines.”