ENHANCING HR OPERATIONS IN THE OIL AND GAS SECTOR: THE POWER OF RPA TECHNOLOGY IN PEOPLE MANAGEMENT

The oil and gas sector is known for its complex and demanding operations, requiring efficient and effective management of its workforce. In recent years, the integration of technology in various industries has revolutionized traditional processes, and the field of human resources is no exception. One such technology that has gained significant attention is Robotic Process Automation (RPA). RPA has the potential to streamline HR operations and enhance people management in the oil and gas sector.

In the oil and gas sector, people management plays a crucial role in ensuring the success and productivity of the workforce. With a large number of employees, contractors, and suppliers, managing human resources becomes a complex task. HR professionals in this sector are responsible for recruitment, onboarding, training, performance management, and compliance. Effective people management is vital for maintaining a skilled workforce, ensuring safety, and achieving operational excellence. By leveraging RPA technology, HR operations can be streamlined, allowing HR professionals to focus on strategic initiatives and creating a positive work environment.

Robotic Process Automation (RPA) is a technology that uses software robots or "bots" to automate repetitive and rule-based tasks. These bots mimic human actions and interact with various systems and applications to perform tasks with speed and accuracy. RPA can be applied to a wide range of HR processes, including data entry, payroll processing, employee onboarding, leave management, and performance evaluations. By automating these tasks, HR professionals can save time, reduce errors, and allocate their resources to more value-added activities. RPA technology has the potential to transform HR operations in the oil and gas sector by increasing efficiency and effectiveness.

Implementing RPA in HR operations offers numerous benefits for the oil and gas sector. Firstly, it improves accuracy and reduces errors by eliminating manual data entry. RPA bots can extract data from various sources, validate information, and update HR systems accurately and consistently. Secondly, RPA enhances efficiency by automating time-consuming tasks. This allows HR professionals to focus on strategic initiatives and employee engagement, leading to improved productivity. Thirdly, RPA ensures compliance by following predefined rules and regulations, reducing the risk of non-compliance. Lastly, RPA provides valuable insights through data analytics, enabling HR professionals to make data-driven decisions and improve overall people management strategies.

RPA technology can be applied to various key areas of people management in the oil and gas sector. Firstly, in recruitment and onboarding, RPA can automate resume screening, background checks, and document verification processes, ensuring a smooth and efficient hiring process. Secondly, in employee data management, RPA can update employee records, track certifications and licenses, and manage personnel files, reducing administrative burdens. Thirdly, in performance management, RPA can automate performance evaluations, feedback collection, and goal tracking, facilitating a fair and consistent evaluation process. Lastly, in compliance management, RPA can monitor regulatory changes, update policies and procedures, and ensure adherence to safety and environmental standards.

Beside this, it is important to notice that, the use of RPA in organizational design and staff planning process can reduce the number of employees and labor costs up to 25% (Automation Anywhere) and increase the efficiency and effectiveness up to 27% (NICE).

Furthermore, implementing RPA in different functional areas such as finance and accounting, supply chain management, IT, exploration, production and etc can :

Save time

Repetitive administrative tasks are a common part of many business processes. RPA allows your business to automate and perform repetitive tasks with quick, robotic speed. Also, your company and employees benefit from RPA by being able to spend more time on sensitive and complex tasks.

Increase ROI

RPA tools are more efficient at managing repetitive tasks than humans, and they help your business improve work productivity. That’s why one of the greatest benefits of RPA is its positive impact on ROI. With robotic process automation, your business can improve several processes and collect significant amounts of qualitative and quantitative data over time, which helps to inform and manage costs more efficiently.

Eliminate human error

Realistically, no matter how skilled a person is in their role, human error and fatigue are always factors to be considered. With RPA, automated bots never get tired, so tasks are performed accurately, as they’re meant to, each time.

Elevate security

Cybersecurity is extremely important for your business, and RPA solutions help guard against security threats. RPA elevates security by reducing the number of human interactions with sensitive data and information, which helps prevent costly data leaks and breaches. RPA tools help to keep your business secure, whether guarding against access by unauthorised users, or performing triggered account logouts.

Increase compliance

Compliance is important for the reliability and sustainability of your business, and RPA solutions adhere to set rules and guidelines with great accuracy and consistency. Typically, most organisations follow various industry and government regulations, and these organisations reap the benefits of RPA with automated, consistent compliance. Additionally, RPA can be audited from a single location, rather than performing multiple application audits—which reduces compliance risks. Robotic process automation can be applied to contract workflows and submissions, form updates, as well compliance-related notifications, and alerts.

Scale business process automation

As your company applies an RPA tool to more business activities, the automation of processes and tasks expands throughout your organisation. Robotic process automation also allows your business to scale to meet seasonal increases in demand, and projected targets with greater confidence, whether processing orders, invoices, managing stock, or other forms of production and service.

Employee satisfaction

When tedious processes are automated, employees are freed up to focus on more critical needs of your business. As RPA reduces repetitive tasks typically performed by humans, employee satisfaction increases. Employees can then apply their skills to tasks that require strategic thinking, like business planning, public relations, and brainstorming.

Implementing RPA in HR processes requires careful planning and consideration. Firstly, organizations need to identify the HR processes that can benefit from automation and prioritize them based on their impact and complexity. Secondly, a cross-functional team comprising HR professionals, IT experts, and RPA specialists should collaborate to design and develop the automation solution. This includes mapping out the process, identifying automation opportunities, building and testing the bots, and integrating RPA with existing systems. Thirdly, organizations should ensure proper change management by training employees on the new system, addressing concerns, and monitoring the performance of the bots. Continuous improvement and optimization are essential to maximize the benefits of RPA in HR operations.

While RPA technology offers significant advantages, there are challenges and considerations that organizations need to address when adopting RPA in people management. Firstly, organizations should carefully assess the cost and return on investment of implementing RPA. While automation can lead to cost savings in the long run, the initial investment and maintenance costs should be evaluated. Secondly, organizations need to ensure data security and privacy when using RPA bots. Data encryption, access controls, and compliance with data protection regulations are essential to maintain the integrity and confidentiality of employee information. Lastly, organizations should also consider the impact on employees and the need for upskilling and reskilling to adapt to the changing HR landscape.

As RPA technology becomes increasingly prevalent in HR operations, HR professionals need to acquire the necessary skills and knowledge to leverage this technology effectively. Organizations should provide training and upskilling programs to HR professionals to enhance their understanding of RPA and its applications in people management. Training programs can cover topics such as RPA basics, process automation, bot development, and data analytics. Additionally, HR professionals should be encouraged to embrace continuous learning and stay updated with the latest advancements in RPA technology. By investing in training and upskilling, organizations can ensure that their HR teams are equipped to maximize the benefits of RPA in HR operations.

RPA technology has the power to revolutionize HR operations in the oil and gas sector, enhancing people management and improving overall productivity. By automating repetitive and rule-based tasks, HR professionals can focus on strategic initiatives and creating a positive work environment. However, organizations should carefully plan and implement RPA, considering the challenges and ensuring proper change management. Successful case studies in the industry highlight the potential of RPA in streamlining HR processes. With proper training and upskilling, HR professionals can harness the power of RPA and drive the future of HR operations in the oil and gas sector.

In conclusion, oil and gas companies must note that RPA technology needs to be implemented along with a roadmap, where IoT network maturity, networking capabilities, and edge computing play a central role. However, complete digitization can help energy companies score big wins in 70% lesser engineering hours, 60% reduction in data interpretation time, 40% lower maintenance costs, up to 5% more production, and 30% faster delivery. Here are the top 15 use cases of automation in the oil and gas industry that enable leading companies to turn those numbers into reality (Birlasoft):

1. Rig and Well Drilling Automation

Well planning and construction, which typically accounts for 40-70% of an O&G company’s CAPEX, can be turned into a differentiating factor with automation. Currently, offshore rigs require 100 full-time employees on board. With automation of the drilling process, which consists of hazardous tasks like drill pipe lifting, pressure drilling, and drill string assembly, and others that call for a high degree of precision, such as well fracking — O&G companies can orchestrate the entire well drilling and rig construction process with 10-15 FTEs.

Moreover, by injecting intelligence into automation-based platforms, geospatial data, surveys, and flow controls can be internalized with exploration analytics toolsets to automate the various steps associated with the well-planning process. In a mature state, drilling workflows are completely digitized using submersibles, connected sensors controlling the machinery, and interfaced with tablets and augmented reality.

2. Remote Monitoring

The oil and gas industry is an asset-intensive one, where mission-critical systems that track environmental data points such as temperature, pressure, flow rate, motor torque, tank levels, and amperage must be monitored 24x7. Added to this are situations that call for instant attention - such as compressor failures, power outages, high tank levels, or low water pressure.

Where monitoring these variables calls for round-the-clock human presence, callout devices, and PLC alarms, and onsite drones can automate the monitoring process and eliminate the need for keeping human eyes fixated on the screens and machinery to avoid expensive downtime. Moreover, monitoring automation brings zero error and negligence to onsite operations, increasing uptime and reducing costly workforce hours.

3. Field Operations Automation

Field operations in the oil and gas industry, when running on the manual mode, are powered by field workers that can spend only 25% of their time on the target activities. However, with advances in wireless networking and fiber connectivity, installation of fixed cameras, and land and sub-sea robotics, field operations can be automated to identify troubled and sub-optimally running components and virtually eliminate inspection time.

Moreover, augmented microwave imaging and connected worker platforms are also being leveraged to automate reporting and communication in field operations. At high maturity, field operations automation is powered by fully connected assets, augmented with observability solutions, and conditionally optimized with digital twin technology.

4. Oil and Gas Production Optimization

Production optimization in the oil and gas industry accounts for over $50 bn of the total value. However, production automation and optimization consist of varying environmental conditions. With current networking technology, a major chunk of the production process - such as pressure reduction in the transfer line, nodal analysis, inflow performance analysis, digital separation optimization, and sub-surface equipment handling can be automated and integrated with alerting systems for highly optimal production.

Automated processes, gas lift insights, flow rate variables, and production analytics can be integrated into the operators’ digital platform to improve their decision-making while empowering them with key controls for real-time intervention. Lastly, production automation also enables operators to run the plants and minimum allowable rates during challenging times when demand stoops, thereby increasing the profitability of production operations in the long run.

5. Logistics and Fleet Management

Delivery logistics account for ~15% of total production costs for oil and gas companies. Optimal logistics operations are critical for achieving industry-leading paradigms such as just-in-time delivery of drilling equipment, minimal emission levels from trucks, optimized water-hauling, and remote material tracking post-purchase of equipment.

These paradigms are activated by end-to-end connected logistics, powered by automated fleet management and complete visibility into all the moving parts of the fleet. Logistics automation can also reduce the cost of delivery vehicle service by 20%, dropping the total cost of materials by 2%, representing a 2-3% overall reduction in cost per BOE.

6. Regulatory Compliance

The oil and gas industry is heavily regulated, and sustainability-oriented directives will only take the costs of violations higher than before. With some oil and gas companies paying nearly $30 bn in fines, compliance automation can retrospectively safeguard O&G operations by creating audit traceability and guard-railing operations with rules-based process guidelines.

From programming logic that aligns business and production processes to compliance imperatives to report generation automation, compliance automation can bring end-to-end operations of upstream, midstream, and downstream arms of O&G companies to the limelight, thereby helping avoid costly fines and eliminating incidences of violation which cost reputation in addition to a negative impact on the bottom line.

Modern compliance software is also loaded with carbon tracking features that can also help companies adhere to stringent emission guidelines and achieve sustainable operations in the process.

7. Back-office automation

With the pandemic underlining the fragility of physical work models, offloading back-office operations onto a remote-ready platform that a digital workforce can operate is critical in finding the agility needed for continuous operations. These tasks include marketing and sales processes, HR processes like onboarding, payroll management, invoice reconciliations, and operational metrics reporting.

By integrating process metrics into persona-focused virtual work platforms, back-office automation can reduce the costs associated with a workforce-intensive unit in the oil and gas industry and improve the employee experience and reduce attrition rates.

8. Data, Analytics, and Reporting

With a vast amount of structured data generated from SCADA systems, surface and sub-surface process control data, and time-series production data, analytics automation can inject efficiency gains into the production process, refinery efficiency and ultimately improve the profitability of overall operations. However, reporting processes are currently being run in manual mode, and extracting data from disparate systems to collate them in one place brings redundancy into an otherwise automatable process.

Reporting automation is an easy-to-implement use case that can be leveraged to generate customized reports for various stakeholders at regular intervals, ultimately bringing learnings and insights into action in the oil and gas industry.

9. Workplace Safety

The oil and gas industry is replete with high-risk processes where manual intervention leads to hazardous incidents even in the most controlled and monitored environments. However, automation of these high-risk processes in the rig construction, drilling, and fracking stages can help eliminate the need for human intervention.

In addition, connected wearable health devices and cameras, and drones augmented with image recognition technology can be leveraged to improve workplace safety by alarming in case of hazards. Environmental monitoring solutions can alert onsite employees proactively to avoid hazards before they occur.

10. Pricing

With the demand for oil and natural gas peaking in 2030 and reducing after that, the need for maximizing gains on each barrel has become critical. However, a lack of pricing guidelines during deals and complex contractual arrangements render legacy cost + margin - based pricing models ineffective. However, by using strategic price management tools powered by real-time market variables and delivery of deal-specific price guidance and incentive pitches to sales staff, oil and gas companies can achieve over 2% higher annual returns.

Such toolsets also internalize mix analysis, rationalize input costs across multiple parties, thereby securing the pricing perimeters within profitable ranges, even when the markets fluctuate and demand levels waver unpredictably.

11. Order Processing

Most oil and gas companies are characterized by siloed operations when it comes to ordering fulfillment. What complicates order management processes further is that paper-based processes create the need for multiple back-and-forths to confirm production levels, volume commitments across deals, and a healthy flow within the downstream supply chain.

However, most tasks within these processes lend themselves well to automated execution through RPA bots - for example, order capture, billing, credit/debt management, shipment order accuracy, and shipment documentation and status tracking can be completely automated, thereby eliminating inaccurate orders, reducing costs, near-complete transaction accuracy, and nearly 40% productivity gains.

12. Pipeline Monitoring and Surveillance

Gas pipeline construction and maintenance projects can often turn into a cost black-hole when regular field visits and inspections call for multiple trips and the inability to respond to fast compounds losses. However, IoT devices tethered via LPWAN networking can deliver real-time asset data such as cracks, wall thickness, flow rates, and external data such as soil pH, resistivity, humidity, and moisture levels to rules-configured monitoring systems.

Armed with real-time status of the pipelines and automated monitoring and maintenance triggers, zero inspection trips, and instantaneous response to incidents can deliver big savings for downstream oil and gas players.

13. Lease Record Management

In the oil and gas industry, most documents still exist on paper. Because these documents are digitized to add up to unstructured data ultimately, automated document management systems are a must-have to keep track of lease termination, renewals, land files, property files and contracts outlining terms of joint ventures, and other critical documents. Otherwise, back-office workers end up under paperwork, and legal expenses can hamper an otherwise profitable venture.

Automated lease record management is all the more critical for global players with operations spanning across multiple geographies and legislations, where leases must be digitized to avoid legal conflicts and interruptions to operations.

14. Asset Management

Upstream and mid-stream oil and gas companies rely on thousands of expensive assets in orchestrating production, refining, and transportation. As a result, a comprehensive asset management platform that automates and standardizes acquisition, operation, maintenance, and decommissioning of assets with complete visibility across multiple sites is a key element of operational excellence, making the operations resistant to market volatility improving profitability.

Asset management automation platforms also integrate with predictive maintenance solutions, bring seamless asset management that results in enhanced performance, and maximize the value of capital expenditures for O&G businesses.

15. Procure to Pay Automation

Because the oil and gas industry brings unique constraints in the Procure-to-Pay cycle, standardization is central in P2P automation. The Petroleum Industry Data Exchange standards enable a streamlined exchange of technical data points that enable O&G companies to automate their P2P processes, injecting efficiency in the process while reducing invoice clearing times and backlogs.

P2P excellence is also critical for maintaining cost competitiveness, and automation can bring promising results while improving profitability for upstream, midstream, and downstream players.

The oil and gas industry is at a tipping point, and automation brings big promises in the form of potential value untapped in the industry. Moreover, automation releases operations from heavy reliance on human intervention and forms a stepping stone to enabling remote operations for a digital workforce. The next few years will be decisive in demarcating the leaders, and automation will make early adopters a strong contender, especially as it brings savings and cost-competitiveness to an industry combating pricing pressures.