Evolution of the Oil Industry Drives Need for Better Information Management

This opinion piece presents the opinions of the author.
It does not necessarily reflect the views of Rigzone.

The ability for exploration and production companies to optimize their oil and gas assets relies heavily on fast access to the most accurate versions of data and scientific analysis. Time-sensitive predictive decision-making requires geologists and engineers to have confidence that operational and exploratory decisions are based on the most accurate and trusted information known to the company.

Brad Nickle
Brad Nickle, Executive Vice President, Strickland Solutions
Executive Vice President, Strickland Solutions

But while data analysis has the potential to help organizations make more informed decisions that result in profit, the rapidly growing volume of information enterprises now collect and store also presents huge challenges. Organizations must find a better way to manage the information – or they may never realize its full potential.

Shale = Increased Activity

In the last seven years, the United States has surpassed Saudi Arabia to become the number one producer of oil and gas in the world. What is the reason for that? It is because of all the shale activity. The shale play alone is driving an increase in activity in nearly all aspects of business operations. The short life of the well inside of a shale play requires organizations to drill a lot of wells to get the kind of production that has allowed the US to surpass Saudi Arabia. That means a dramatic increase in the amount of data.

Today, there are mountains of data that scientifically describe assets (wells, reservoirs, fields, etc.). Problem is, this information typically resides in disparate software systems and databases designed for the unique requirements of that of that scientific discipline (geology, geophysics, reservoir engineering, land management, etc.). Thus, most exploration and production companies are challenged with providing staff with quick access to all the valuable information that resides within their various internal business applications and databases.

The Tipping Point

What forward-looking organizations are beginning to realize is that with increased activity and continued growth comes the need for better information management strategies. Organizations must retrieve and harness information quicker and faster than ever before if they are going to beat the competition in what has proven to be a very competitive business environment.

Adding to the challenge, the drop in oil prices is forcing companies to take a hard look at their administrative costs. Companies are under increasing pressure to operate more efficiently. These combined factors are driving a need for better information and document management.

Having the ability to find all organizational data fast and effectively is key for operators to survive the downturn. Statistics show the average company still spends an average of 18 minutes looking for the documents they need each day – that’s simply not acceptable, especially in a reduced-price environment and with the fast-pace of shale drilling.

How ECM Technology Can Help

That’s where metadata-driven enterprise content management (ECM) comes in. Metadata – or data about the data - has proven to be a game changer for leaders in the oil and gas industry because it provides a simple solution for effectively organizing and accessing data and documents – even unstructured data.

Many organizations don’t realize that only 30% of their data is captured within structured databases and spreadsheets. The other 70% is unstructured content such as digital documents and drawings that reside in network folders or within various disconnected software systems. The challenge is ensuring structured data systems and unstructured content repositories are connected to make all organizational information easier to find, access and analyze.

Oil and gas companies are still having issues with this because they are unaware of the power that can be harnessed through metadata-driven enterprise content management (ECM) solutions. While traditional tools for managing, and analyzing information generally focuses on structured data, next generation ECM solutions, such as M-Files, have a mechanism that can provide unified access to both structured data and unstructured content. This allows for company-wide data visibility regardless of where the information resides.

By appending metadata attributes to information assets, organizations can make all sorts of unstructured content (Word documents, videos, presentations, PDF files, spreadsheets, emails and the like) easily searchable and accessible. The approach also enables enterprises to more effectively organize, manage, process, secure and share their information, which leads to better decisions, faster results, improved collaboration and the highest levels of security and compliance.

As it stands, most oil and gas companies are only harnessing a fraction of the information available. Metadata enables companies to unlock the true potential of their unstructured content. Metadata-powered systems make it easy to conduct searches and find content wherever it may reside, which then enables oil and gas companies to glean valuable business insights from their unstructured content just as they do from their structured data.

The future of information management is in sight, but it hasn’t arrived in full force. What’s clear is that more companies need to modernize their approach to maintain momentum and build on their success. If more organizations leverage metadata-driven ECM to include all the unstructured content they manage as part of their data analysis and information management strategy, it stands to reason they will garner even more business value. Now is the time for IT leaders in the industry to be making strategic investments in ECM to ensure innovation, productivity and cost-effective business practices in the years to come.

Brad is an Executive Vice President and Partner of The Strickland Group, a Fort Worth, Texas-based IT firm with a strong client roster in the oil and gas sector. As a system integrator, The Strickland Group designs and develops custom software solutions that help clients capitalize on their distinctive competencies. The firm integrates M-Files enterprise content management into its service portfolio because its an easy and effective tool to address the need for many of its clients to better organize and manager their data silos. 



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