The oil & gas industry is a complex field to be in. With a broad portfolio of roles and engineering disciplines, one can be in a pretty unique as well as a routine job. In simple terms a petroleum engineer could be making a hole through the earth, maximizing the oil or gas output, fixing wells, designing the equipment, working on software, making sense of data, visualizing what’s beneath our feet or doing many other exciting tasks. We sometimes make an educated guess when planning what would be right or when troubleshooting what went wrong in the hindsight, while sometimes we go with what’s written in the letter and follow conventions or laws. What one would fall in love with is the uncertainty it brings. You could be solving problems thrown at you under varied situations which may or not follow a trend and are certainly not physically visible to you.
Since it’s an interdisciplinary field, you get to work with some extremely talented people and domain champions. Spending time with people having the depth of knowledge in areas outside of your view is a perk. Also, depending on your profile, you could be travelling a lot, interacting with other professionals, working in an all-male crew, handling run of the mill workers, et cetera. In a short span of time, I’ve had the experience of most as I write this.
A world of opportunities exists for the Oil & Gas students in the form of SPE. Right from being a university student, you can embark on this journey that takes you places! A plethora of technical knowledge, diverse networking options, multitude of volunteering roles and a lot more is on the offer. For a petroleum engineer like me, SPE is as essential as salt is to food.
Balancing work and life while on field could prove herculean. The timings may not be the ones people generally follow. I’ve worked 12 hour shifts on occasions, 8 hour shifts in rotations of two, regular office hours in a six day working pattern and have colleagues that work in 21 days routine. One has to be flexible enough to adapt to the change and fix their sleeping pattern. Field life could also mean being away from your family for longer intervals, lesser social interaction when the location you’re working at doesn’t have connectivity, startled looks from friends who may not have even heard of the place but on the other hand it would mean a lot of me-time. You can find a great amount of time for you to learn, play, pick up a hobby, and evolve.
One association with this industry that even lord Google wouldn’t deny is the pay. Surely, the industry treats you well for the work you do. Putting it straight, talent is recognized and compensated in proportion. While you could be working in the middle of a remote, sparsely populated coal block like me to sitting in a comfortable workstation in a metropolitan office space, you’ll definitely be minting the money you deserve for your effort and it could in most cases, make people envious.
Summing it up, life on field is like being on the road while it’s raining. You can either leave all inhibitions to get drenched and make the most of it, or open up your umbrella and continue to walk. Either way, you do reach your destination and it rains as long as it is meant to be!
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