Royal Dutch Shell Plc  .com Rotating Header Image

Leaked Shell Internal message from Upstream International Director Andrew Brown

“More drivel on focus, leadership, business and all politically correct words.”

FROM A SHELL SOURCE, A LEAKED SHELL INTERNAL MESSAGE SENT MINUTES AGO BY “ANDY” BROWN, UPSTREAM INTERNATIONAL DIRECTOR. FOLLOWS UP ON A LEAKED MOTIVATIONAL MESSAGE FROM PETER SUPERBUCKET VOSER

John

More drivel on focus, leadership, business and all politically correct words. Even 2 females in the 7 jobs mentioned! Soothing words that for most people there will be little change. He forgot to mention Health and Environment.

He is still called Andy, I wonder when he will transform to Andrew and then Sir Andrew….
 
And there is talk about reinforcing the partnership with P&T. Presumably the technical people will be asked a bit upfront their opinion? I always thought that the oil and gas business was a highly technical business. I appear to be wrong. It is about focus, leadership and relation management. The hard and mundane work will be done by the contractor as Herkstroter already foresaw in 1994. A man with vision!
 
In the next few weeks I fear the staff will see a lot of this:

Would Exxon spout the same crap over its employees? Perhaps one of your readers might enlighten us all.

From: Brown, Andrew RD SI-GLOBAL
Sent: Wednesday, October 24, 2012 1:03 PM
Subject: Message from Andy Brown: Upstream International’s Strategy and Organisation Alignment

Upstream International Team,

Today is an important day for Shell and I hope you have read Peter Voser’s note about proposed changes to Shell’s organisational structure with interest. If you haven’t read it yet, I encourage you to do so. I suspect you have many questions about what ‘accelerating our strategic journey through clearer accountabilities’ means for Upstream International (UI) and especially for you.

The strategy refresh has established themes or “superbuckets”.  I believe this approach will drive focus in our organisation on where we must win and the differentiators we must excel at in order to deliver our strategic ambitions in each new line of business.

But, before I talk about structure, it’s important I explain why we are proposing this change, and why now. There are a number of areas where UI needs to step-up performance including:
·         Safety. Whilst the last few years have seen an improvement, recently our performance has stalled and we need to inject fresh impetus to keep people safe.
·         Production Sharpness. High levels of unplanned downtime are reducing our production and cash flow, impacting our business results.
·         Hydrocarbon Maturation. There is an opportunity to improve our performance in discovering and acquiring new hydrocarbon resources and bringing them through to production in a predictable, fast and cost effective way.
·         Growth Pipelines. We hold a leading position in Integrated Gas across the world and are well positioned in Unconventional outside North America. We need to stay focused to maintain the momentum and growth of these superbuckets.
·         Joint Venture Management. A significant proportion of our production, and so our cash flow, is managed by partners.  We need to improve the way we support and govern these ventures in a consistent way that improves performance.

In order to deliver our revised strategy, and to address these performance gaps, we propose to realign UI’s structure and shift reporting lines effective 1 January 2013.  The organization would consist of four new lines of business: UI Operated, UI Joint Ventures, UI Integrated Gas, and UI Unconventional. Plus, two growth functions: UI Exploration and UI Commercial and New Business Development. A refreshed UI Safety and Environment organisation will support a further step up in our performance in this crucial area.   The proposed UILT will be represented by the leaders of these areas together with representatives from Global Functions. All will be Hague-based with the exception of Integrated Gas, which will be based in Singapore to be close to the largest growth market and customer base.

The proposed organisation will fundamentally do four things:
1.       Create lines of business that are broadly aligned with the superbuckets to unlock value from a more focused approach and consistent delivery that achieves our strategic ambitions.
2.       Drive accountabilities at a line of business, country and asset level.
3.       Reinforce our partnership with Projects & Technology (P&T) by transferring all project and well engineering staff to P&T, bringing P&T earlier into the hydrocarbon maturation funnel and having P&T as partners on our leadership teams.
4.       Bring more focus to production by holding asset managers accountable for all aspects of asset performance including implementing continuous improvement in AIPSM, MIE and WRFM.  They will be supported by a Global Production Excellence department empowered to set and drive standards throughout the organisation.

Let me be clear, this proposed realignment of UI’s structure is not about cost or staff reduction but about how UI delivers the revised strategy and beats the competition. For the majority of staff, this will mean little change to current roles in practice as we propose to map whole teams and countries intact to new lines of businesses. I am certain the strategy refresh with this re-aligned organisation structure will simplify our organisation by driving empowerment and accountability lower in the organization.

For some staff there may be a change in business reporting line or line manager. For instance, some staff in the technical disciplines may be re-mapped to P&T but will continue to do the same job they do today. There will be a small number of staff who will be impacted in terms of a change in accountabilities or location of work. These changes will be handled on a case-by-case basis with the individuals affected in the coming weeks.

Whilst we are going through this change process, which might be unsettling for some, I am keen to ensure we keep focus on delivering our business and maintaining strong relationships with our customers and stakeholders.  Operating our assets safely everyday has to remain our priority across UI.

To assist in delivering a successful change process, I have tasked some current leaders in UI to take on the role of Business Design Leads. These leaders have been working hard with their teams to drive this proposed change as quickly as possible to minimize uncertainty and disruption. You may be hearing from these leaders in the coming weeks as well.

·         UI Integrated Gas –Maarten Wetselaar
·         UI Unconventional –Alison Goligher
·         UI Joint Ventures –De La Rey Venter
·         UI Operated – Harry Brekelmans
·         UI Exploration – Ceri Powell
·         UI Commercial and New Business Development – Guy Outen
·         UI Safety, Environment and Social Performance – David Martin

Tomorrow, I will be discussing the strategy refresh and how it will be supported by this proposed change with over 180 UI leaders at the UI Leadership Forum. We will discuss in depth how the changes will help UI deliver against our strategy.  Following the UI Leadership Forum, local engagements with UI leaders will take place to provide details about specific countries and businesses. A  dedicated website will be launched over the next few days which will provide you more information about the proposed lines of businesses and how it may affect you. This will include a high-level organisational chart.

I will also use the opportunity of the Q3 Talk to Staff webcast on 1 November to describe Shell’s refreshed strategy and the proposed organisation. You will have the opportunity to ask me questions and, of course, provide your comments.

I believe this is an exciting time for Shell. UI’s contribution to Shell is something we should be proud of and I have no doubt we have the people, the technology, and the portfolio to win.   With the strategy refresh and the focus these proposed organisational changes will bring, our roadmap to be the most competitive and innovative energy company is clear.

Andy

This website and sisters royaldutchshellgroup.com, shellnazihistory.com, royaldutchshell.website, johndonovan.website, and shellnews.net, are owned by John Donovan. There is also a Wikipedia segment.

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.

Comment Rules

  • Please show respect to the opinions of others no matter how seemingly far-fetched.
  • Abusive, foul language, and/or divisive comments may be deleted without notice.
  • Each blog member is allowed limited comments, as displayed above the comment box.
  • Comments must be limited to the number of words displayed above the comment box.
  • Please limit one comment after any comment posted per post.