Dear friends, welcome to the March issue of BIC Magazine. We are in an interesting economic time. There is so much opportunity in our world, especially in our great country, and more particularly, in our energy markets. Yet, I don’t have to tell you there is a great deal of unrest. The regulations, pricing, environment, technology and cycles seem to move more quickly than ever. Change creates opportunity, of course, but how best shall we leverage change to survive and excel?
Don Tapscott, one of the world’s leading authorities on innovation and the economic and social impact of technology, would sum up the answer in one word: “collaboration.” In 2010, Tapscott opined our economy has gone through many ages — agricultural age, iron age, industrial age, technology age and information age. And now in the information age, with so much information at everyone’s fingertips, our economy is entering a new age of collaboration. We all have access to the information, now what are we going to do with it? How best to react to it and leverage it? It is a new kind of economy based on networks, new principles and new ways of creating value.
I thought of Tapscott’s collaboration age recently while participating in a board meeting of the Association of the Chemical Industry of Texas. One of our board members in charge of a major event reported she was enlisting another association’s help and involvement in what historically was a proprietary event. She commented our events were broadly more successful when we worked together with others. Our board recognized without hesitation the collaborative approach simply worked better than the old proprietary model.
“Collaboration is important not just because it’s a better way to learn. The spirit of collaboration is penetrating every institution and all of our lives. So learning to collaborate is part of equipping yourself for effectiveness, problem solving, innovation and lifelong learning in an ever-changing networked economy,” Tapscott declared.
I have strongly felt the power of collaboration recently as BIC Alliance worked with the Economic Alliance Houston Port Region to host industrial purchasing forums and other events. In the immediate future, BIC will work with the Houston Area Safety Council to host a movie screening of “FrackNation” and networking event on April 15. We will be working with several companies to host our annual crawfish boil this month and our AFPM Hospitality in May. (These events are open to all employees of operating companies and our BIC Alliance members. Please feel free to contact us for more information; we’d love to have you join us.) It is safe to say with every networking event we provide, BIC collaborates with other associations and companies, and we have done so long before Tapscott recognized the age of collaboration in 2010.
While Tapscott’s “Age of Collaboration” is relatively new, our publication, 30 years old, is itself built upon a collaborative model. BIC Magazine carries news and information, operating like a multicompany newsletter. Our BIC Alliance members collaborate on projects in the field and in sharing information and best practices through the journal. BIC Alliance’s mission statement is clearly collaborative, “Connecting people in business and industry with one another for the betterment of all.”
But the wisdom of collaboration as an essential and vital element of success is ancient. Old Testament wisdom instructs “two are better than one, because they have a good reward for their toil … woe to him who is alone when he falls and has not another to lift him up.” Further, in the New Testament, we are instructed to work together as one body. Some may be the hands, some the eyes. Neither is better or more important. Each can play a role in helping the collective “all of us” toward success.
Working together, it becomes possible to develop, to deliver and to improve solutions that are not simply current and competitive but break new ground as we make tomorrow’s possibilities today’s solutions.
In this issue of BIC, you will find many contributors sharing and collaborating toward our mutual success including Louisiana Association of Business and Industry President Stephen Waguespack, ExxonMobil Baton Rouge Chemical Plant Site Manager Bob Johnston, LyondellBasell Houston Refinery LP Turnaround Project Manager Joe Jackson and Winshaw Hydraulic Tools COO David Shaw.
We also include information on increasing productivity, building world-class reliability programs and turnarounds, curbing escalating costs of EPC projects, fracking growth, the Louisiana industrial boom and more.
As always, please share this issue with your friends and colleagues by passing along this copy of BIC or refer them to BICMagazine.com.
