A prevalent word being used these days in the oil and gas business - and society in general, it seems - is "transformation," and bp is no exception. Approximately three years ago, the energy giant announced its new strategy and changed its leadership team.
Bernard Looney, CEO of bp.
"There's a big transformation going on at bp," said Bernard Looney, the company's CEO. "We have been an international oil company for 112 years, and we are transforming ourselves to be an integrated energy company. I believe that's what we need to do to help the world solve this 'trilemma' of how we make our energy reliable, affordable and clean. Our job is to help society do that and, in the process, create what I hope will be enormous value for our shareholders."
Looney said bp is focused on three distinct objectives.
"We're focused on our hydrocarbons business, which remains the core of the company today," he said at CERAWeek by S&P Global, held recently in Houston. "We will reduce that in size over time and reduce emissions so that we will give the world the energy that it needs while doing it better, hopefully."
The company is also in the convenience and mobility business, he said.
"bp sells gasoline, obviously, but we also have a big EV charging business that we're growing. We're very excited about that. We're putting in 115 charge points each week around the world at the moment," Looney said.
"And then, thirdly, we have a low-carbon business in which we are investing in offshore wind and hydrogen and carbon sequestration," he said.
Looney said bp applies different strategies to different parts of the business, including recruiting new talent.
"First and foremost, we need skills in oil and gas, and we're going to need those skills for decades," he said. "What must not happen is we somehow de-emphasize the importance of the skills in the business that continues to fuel and empower the world."
Specifically, reservoir engineers, drilling engineers and project managers will be needed "for decades and decades to come," Looney said.
Workers who have developed these vital skills must be nurtured and taken care of, Looney recommended. "We can take these skills from the existing business and apply them in the new world," he explained.
New skills are also needed for bp's ongoing transition, and that's where the company is hiring, Looney said.
"That's why the direction of the company is so important," he said. "It would be very difficult for us to hire people if we had simply stuck to the strategy we [previously] had. That new strategy is more attractive to people because they can see how they can help make a difference, and we're able to bring those people in.
"I love bringing in fresh talent, because we want our company to be great. We want our company to be successful. Ultimately, we want to win. To do that, you've got to have the best talent," Looney said.
Achieving gender balance
To effectively achieve this massive reorganizational feat, bp recognized that it must engage and employ the brightest, most innovative workforce it possibly can.
"We knew we had to organize ourselves differently, and we conducted the largest restructuring in company [history] so that we are organized to deliver on the strategy, the ambition, the purpose and so on," he said.
The reorganization began by installing a new leadership team.
"We have one person out of 11 from the previous team. It's a whole new team," Looney said.
Six of those 11 team members are women, he said, noting the women's majority.
"We have more women than men now [in the top leadership]," he said. "It's great for our industry. They are there because they deserve it and they've earned the right to be there - not because they are women. It puts us in a great position where we can look out into the world with an open mind and with a team that represents society."
"We're beyond gender parity today," Looney continued. "Of the top 120 roles in the company, 40 percent of them are women. We will be at 50 percent by 2025."
Looney said he is especially proud of how bp's new leadership team executed the reorganization and conducted business throughout the COVID-19 pandemic crisis via online meetings.
"I am in awe of what they did, just as many people in many other companies have done through the pandemic to do this restructuning," he said. "We could have stopped, we could have paused, but we kept going. I'm so glad we did because if we hadn't, we'd simply have to do all of that now.
"I'm very grateful to them. It's been a difficult journey, but we're absolutely on the right track."
