As the price of oil continues upward, us in the industry might get all comfy and fuzzy. The higher the price, the more secure jobs in the oil and gas industry seem to be.
However, I would consider whether a general rise of cost of living would result in a slowdown of the oil and gas industry.If so, then perhaps you should look at the skills that you have, and see whether they can be transferred to another engineering line.
Let’s take me, for example. What skills would I like to strengthen to make me more marketable?
- Engineering skills: I need to keep my ChemEng knowledge and experience in other fields up to date. If I had a choice, I guess I would need to work on downstream processes, where ChemEng rules. Strippers, catalysts, crackers.
- The second best way is to work in upstream projects which use a lot of cross-industry processes. Membranes, glycol contactor systems, deprop and debutanisers. Knowing my way around simulation packages (and not getting into a ‘crap in, crap out’ situation) would be a serious advantage.
- Everyone needs good management skills. So, those project management muscles would need a workout. Try and get into a technical leadership role. The bigger the value of the project under you, the nicer your CV looks.
- Good networking skills are essential as well. I believe that Malaysia runs on contacts. It’s not what you know, it’s who you know. Isn’t that one of the 7 habits of highly effective people?
- If all fails, get a hobby which you enjoy, and think you may be able to commercialise. Blogging, professional diving… wait a minute, that’s me.
Anything else? Share your ideas, and give an old geezer like me job security.
Durban Boxing Shrimp
Wata - Malaysian Oil and Gas Engineer 
Well, transferable skills are vital even if you think you have a secure job. Some acquire it by seeking for those skill sets whereas some just do so many things that they inherently develop them! Is blogging commercialisable(made up that word!)?
now i dont feel marketable at all. hahah.
by the way. how to tell if you’re marketable in general.
Zidni: easiest way I know is to release your CV to the market. If you get an interview, you’re marketable. Whether you want to market yourself in a different industry, that’s another thing.
so… what if you wanna test that… but you can’t go for actual interview yet. go ahead and decline? 😀
Zzeed: you never know till you try. Go and apply for jobs you want, take half day off, and treat the interview as a friendly chat.
Wata, you forgot about thinking 20 reasons so your boss allows u to go for the interview.
Tip for bosses: when your staff ask to go on 1/2 day or one day leave in the middle of the week, either increase the benefits, or start looking for a replacement.