Past experience shows the focus of the O&G industry has been on the bottom dollar, but a new perception has developed and is fueled by a changing workforce.
A new generation has entered the arena and catalyzed a novel approach to achieving operational excellence. With the new worker entering the field, several factors have surfaced.
"Today the strategies we have been using do not work because of the generational gap," said Col. Ben Mitchell, USA (Ret.) and director of safety, health and security at Kaneka North America LLC.
The new generation carries an ambition derived from how their contributions impact company strategy. Mitchell points to fundamental changes in training, implementation and management’s commitment to cultivating and preparing employees for future leadership roles.
Mitchell indicated standardization is critical in initiating training and implementing procedures in the field. Commitment determines the success rate of these actions. Participating as a panelist during the Petrochemical and Refining Summit by Marcus Evans, in New Orleans, Mitchell noted, "It is most important to standardize our approach with it being the same across the board."
Joining the panel, Vince Stutts, VP, of EHS, health services and crisis management with Du-Pont Inc., feels training programs are the start to achieving operation excellence. Companies must invest in their staff.
"Training is key," Stutts said. "People have to know their value and contribution."
He directed by using one blueprint: the process is simple and allows value and integrity to be the primary components. Multiple methods breed a reduction in quality.
"By simplifying the approach and using one method, it all comes together to give operational excellence," Stutts said.
Throughout the panel’s discussion, initial training commanded a sizable portion of attention, but creating a knowledgeable and safe workforce by maintaining this emphasis on training was equally important.
"Companies must have requalification processes with teeth," said panelist Lawrence Moreaux, director of digital technology integration with LyondellBasell.
To ensure the workforce is appropriately qualified to perform tasks, Moreaux indicated the need to continually verify that people remain qualified. If qualifications faulter, management must commit to implementing a replacement while the unqualified individual is retrained. Both demand management’s time and financial direction.
Operational excellence achieved through focus on workforce, not numbers
Pictured from left are Lawrence Moreaux with LyondellBasell, Col. Ben Mitchell with Kaneka, Reginald Joseph with Lanxess and Vince Stutts with DuPont.
Mitchell indicated that developing a workplace culture that embraces speaking up and asking questions leads to ownership and buy-in. Assigning site mentors to assist the workforce aids in success. Discussion assists in identifying safe and unsafe behavior, and asking specific questions about how the employee feels, the task — and what they perceive to be their most considerable risk — opens the door to dialogue and evaluation.
"We aren’t playing, ‘gotcha,’" Mitchell said.
Implementation of a safe workplace depends upon procedures. Mitchell said, "Procedures must be a talking point."
Each job performed on every shift must include procedures consistently checked by management. Mitchell stressed the importance of setting this expectation as an avenue to achieving operational excellence. The workforce must know what it is doing, and procedures serve as the instructions to do so.
According to panelist Reginald Joseph, global principal automation engineer with Lanxess, management has concerned itself with the numbers, not the people. While incidents draw concern, reasoning has differed.
"Corporate America is more concerned with numbers," Joseph said. "They talk about how many man-hours we can survive without incident."
The financial consequences typically commanded management’s focus, and processes were developed to remove culpability, Joseph said. Many documents utilized required the signatures of employees. Joseph indicated that while a person’s signature was inked to communicate acknowledgement, they were unaware of what they signed.
A safe workplace must be enabled, and according to Mitchell, the most effective approach to gaining management’s support must analyze cost-effectiveness. Costs can be measured and related to risk reduction. If the financial benefits can be achieved, management will concentrate on training and how safe measures are implemented in the workplace.
