Technology Focus: Knowledge Management and Training (October 2009)
Authors: Ellul Ivor 
Published: February 2015

Technology Focus

The inevitable cycles of the energy industry will continue, as will the perceived need for intellectual capital by the oil and gas finders and producers. Intellectual capital is not a line item on a company's balance sheet, yet it is probably one of its most important assets. Organizations take varying approaches to building intellectual capital, from organic development of knowledge to outright acquisition. In an industry that is gradually evolving away from traditional business models, knowledge management will remain a keystone.

A wide spectrum presents itself among the 61 papers that comprise this year's offering for this feature. The recurring themes of real-time data capture, data validation, and protocol for data transmission are prevalent. However, a few new, refreshing, worthy trends emerge. These trends appear to evolve beyond the rudimentary "nuts and bolts" of how to handle the substantial volumes of data [now measured in petabytes (1015 bytes)] to building somewhat cerebral processes that will deliver, yes, intellectual capital.

Surveillance.

Deepwater is a province counted on to deliver the next tranche of significant reserves from known basins of the Gulf of Mexico, West Africa, or Brazil or from evolving areas offshore India and Oman. Experienced engineering resources are, more often than not, focused on project engineering rather than on routine surveillance. Yet, this expertise is necessary for surveillance to be both efficient and successful. To bridge this business dichotomy requires development and deployment of knowledge-management tools whereby the expertise of engineers with 25+ years" experience is captured and made available to the 5-years"-experience resources.

Advanced Collaborative Environments.

It is encouraging that significant investment is being made in environments with clearly stated objectives of improving knowledge capture and eventual application, as well as leveraging the skills and knowledge of experts both internally and externally. Furthermore, an exciting readiness exists to learn from other industries (e.g., the military has had large-scale collaborative projects in place for many years).

Strategic Decision Making.

The use of tools in decision making, such as advanced risk analysis, value-of-information evaluation, and real-options analysis, is becoming commonplace. How does one guarantee the optimum subjective judgment by experts, or, put differently, how does one invest the company's intellectual capital wisely?

With at least a decade of talk on knowledge management under its belt, clearly, the energy industry is refining its approach and beginning to realize dividends of investing in its intellectual capital.

Knowledge Management and Training additional reading available at OnePetro: www.onepetro.org

IPTC 12035 • "Improvements in the Management of Structured and Unstructured Data" by Mike Garbarini, ExxonMobil, et al.

SPE 123213 • "Strategic Decision Making in the Digital Oil Field" by B. Jafarizadeh, SPE, University of Stavanger, et al.

SPE 123096 • "What Lessons Can Digital-Oilfield Practitioners Learn From Defence Initiatives Such as Network-Enabled Capability?" by Michael Popham, SPE, BAE Systems, et al.