The Pipe – Shell in Ireland

MUSAINT: This Corrib business is starting to get a right old bore!! Firstly the locals should be thankful for the business that it brings and secondly others (such as Tom McAndrew) should realise what benefits Shell provides with it's donations to the community / schools. NOT everything that Shell gives should be seen as a bribe or sweetener!! The Greens and Tree Huggers on this planet should realise that Shell, and other companies, do add value to the lives of communities throughout the world.

MUSAINT: Memo to "Wilt Staph" : Most of the pollution in Ogoni Land (and other areas) is down to malicious pipeline damage caused by locals trying to steal oil, not Shell.

shellwaarbenjijnu: CEP - there was no problem with the concept as originally designed, but unfortunately was blighted (corrupted??) by the short termism and "worship thy boss" ethos which came into Shell in the 1990's. The result is a devaluation of CEP to mean "crass exaggeration of performance" or "continual erosion of profitability".

Wilt Staph: Well done to BP for getting rogue well under control at last so that it poses no further threat. Shouldn't have happened at all - but in the end it is safe. Good! Memo to Shell: Why not pretend that your operations in Nigeria are actually onshore USA and apply the same environmental rules and concerns as if it was millions of Americans at risk not millions of Ogonis?

Golden Triangle Watchman: The summary here re HR all rings true from where I sit. It has been documented here well the work of Tom Purves in the Gulf coast. He was able to change people's performance factors and make them low enough that , when the severance packages came around, they would be eligible to be let go. Tom knew that the packages were coming because of his relationship with HR, specifically the now retired Glenn Gilchrist. Both he and Tom were able to advocate for the severance packages and also customize and pinpoint those that they wanted to get rid of. This is all well known and will always be Uncle Tom's legacy, not the screwed up CEP project. Ultimately, Glenn retired because HR likes to feed off anyone, including their own. And ultimately, Uncle Tom will get a nice payoff and ride off, or walk off , into the sunset with his little ice teamaker and enjoy his life all to himself. Not the legacy he wanted to end with I'm sure. And for HR, they haven't served the people in a long time. They are there for senior leadership and somehow through Hofmeister, Dalzell, Gilchrist, and others, fancy themselves as having the ear of the top brass helping to create and develop the future leaders of the company. What a sad state of affairs our company now sits in with HR's help. Their own brand of competency mapping for leaders ( aka CEP) ended up creating the 600-750 ( or whatever number Voser landed on) of senior executives to get the heave ho.... Makes you wonder what the CEP is really all about. Gilchrist has now gone on to start another business. Glenn, enjoy yourself and hide behind your web page. Uncle Tom, tell Funkhouser to roll over and get you a glass of tea. Remember, we're watching....

bware: retiree, no doubt, the recent pension pay-out savings scheme, executed by the very subjective, 'relative performance' sentencing, was hatched from one of the latest HR-inspired soup-of-the-day, organizational-performance-improvement plans. When you hear a manager comparing site performance tactics to McDonalds and Starbucks, clearly someone was led to the wrong seminar... and hasn't the sense to distinguish the difference.

retiree: On the HR business in Shell: after that evangelical Hofmeister wormed himself into the position of head HR, things went downhill rapidly. He kept traipsing all over the world to all the nice and expensive spots and invited planeloads of HR folk to discuss whatever HR discusses. He made statements that he would be proud to see someone at an airport and see immediately 'this is a Shell HR person'. He destroyed all good systems we had such as evaluation, development and resourcing of staff. The same staff lost their senior focal points whom they could trust to discuss personal matters and instead the HR circus was swamped with outsiders who only could deal with computer systems and told all staff that they were responsible to look after their own career. Open resourcing became the biggest farce of Shell and I believe it is now called MOR (Managed Open Resourcing). Few people dare say that Open Resourcing never should have introduced because it feeds on the 'me first' principle. Nobody would do anything for the company if he or she would not get personally better from it. Where all that led to has been obvious the last 10 years or so. And then HR people were being promoted into very senior and overpaid positions that were dealing with business. The development of staff had started to crumble and we got a prime example of the blind leading the blind. He received help from Gary Steel who as director for LEAP had the whole CMD dancing the macarena and when he noticed it all went belly-up, left Shell to go and wreak havoc at ABB. Carol Dubnicki came (for a hideous salary caused by a simple mistake of the senior resourcer who keyed in the wrong number) and left in disgrace having achieved nothing apart from leaving more wreckage. And then Hofmeister started to tour the USA as a royal, pretending to know the business. I am convinced he promoted that other silly woman Cook into several levels beyond her competence. She was so bad, she would have made a good modern HR person in Shell! As Shell employs above average intelligent people, these soon followed up and saw what was rewarded: promises over performance, agree with the boss and 'me first, never mind the company'. A great many low and mid level HR folk are now employed and hired from outside. Presumably for diversification but more likely for ensuring there is no more corporate memory. And these outsiders have no feel for the business nor its people. Neither do they care! I believe I have said enough. I am very glad to have retired and can look back on the good old days.... I wish all current employees success in dealing with HR (Human Remains according to Sir John Jennings), but always beware of false or silly information, double check yourself and keep looking over your shoulder.

Uncle Tom: John Dear My comment on Shell HR. USELESS Other synonyms . . . . Non-Existent, Know Nothing, Won't Help - Keep Redirecting, No experience, Every Question looked upon as Confrontation, Should I say more! Why have a local HR group who is useless? Bottom line, you end of getting frustrated and quit asking questions after going thru all that BS!

johndear: Would anyone like to comment on the HR organisation within Shell? I've had a fair few run in's with them so far- they all seem to be blimmin' useless! But perhaps that is like most HR organisations in big corporations (?). It seems like they really do not care about the individual. I've been pushed from pillar to post when I ask for clarification on a particular policy. We are told to contact the outsourced help desks sitting in Poland, KL etc. as HR in the business don't seem to either have the time or skill to deal with local employees. What has Shell become?? Any advice please on how to deal with HR and actually get them to help me would be most gratefully received.

EXSF: Pensioner 009, First, I am a long time user of this web Site myself. Second, I am sure I am not not the only one who has not taken kindly to his condesending and obviously inflated opinion of himself and his put downs of others on this site. His so called "advice" was more of an insult than advise. His "advice" to "primoregggazz" and his Range Rover were thinly disguised insults, not advice. This was not his first time to do this. If you like and respect him, that is your choice but I am sure there are others that do not agree. Read back on how primoreggazz responded to his co called "advice. I will not be commenting further on this issue or Musaint. those that respect his opinion and methods can read his comments. I will not.