Iincreasing profitability from operations management

Key Words: Business improvement | Employee Sentiment
Situation:

A large energy provider on the East coast of Australia consisted of an operating unit with over 1000 coal seam gas (CSG) wells and 6 major compression facilities totalling a multi-billion dollar price tag. The remote secure operations camp housed over 300+ staff and contractors. Many long standing members of the Operations Leadership Team had elected to leave company service in a coordinated fashion. At this same time, a new enterprise bargaining agreement (EBA) had been landed with the major workforce provider and many frontline contract staff were highly disgruntled with the outcome. Operational performance levels were average and employee sentiment was low.

Task:
Join the Operations Leadership Team to safely and effectively oversea the management of the Wellsite Operations crew, with a clear remit to help improve underlying business performance across the hub and restore employee sentiment with both the contract and staff workforces.
Actions:
  • Displayed the courage to challenge the status quo and speak even harsh truths.
  • Showcased servant leadership and a willingness to engage in a period of discovery.
  • Invested significant time and effort into creating development pathways for staff.
  • Undertook a detailed analysis of upstream cost reports, reliability metrics and production benchmarking studies.
  • Implemented a new performance dashboard that distilled a simple to understand strategic frame of reference from all available data sources.
  • Identified, formulated and approved a targeted training programme across the wellsite operations department.
  • Developed a strategic workforce plan underpinned by independent analysis of comparative workforce models across each of the 3 operations hubs.
  • Served on the Emergency Response Team (ERT) and Incident Management Team (IMT) for a multi-billion dollar asset inclusive of 1000+ staff.
 
Results:
  1. Improved the employee sentiment rating from 63% to 98% for 30+ staff inclusive of employees and contractors within 24 months.
  2. Doubled wellsite reliability, leading to significantly reduced production deferment and increased profitability of $9.2m per annum.
  3. Received a Special Recognition Award (SRA) from the client.
A team spirit galvanised around shared delivery towards a clearly understood common goal.