Hello all. I will keep this short. Essentially, I am an oil and gas engineering graduate looking for opportunities to add value to a service company and develop my career. I have sent out lots of applications for vacancies in oil and gas, but I don't even get any replies, be it even rejection reply.
My experience is in the sourcing of quotes, project management and a bit of logistics aspects. However, I want more than that. What I want is the field stuff; drilling and production to be precise. Problem is there are no vacant entry level positions. Companies want 4 plus years of experience and I do not have that. Even more limiting are the expensive certifications and courses applicants are expected to have.
I would love to be on a drilling rig and experiencing activities like how the mud system works, tripping in and out, making of connections, pumping of mud into the well, solids control equipment, LWD, MWD, bit changing, casing, cementing, perforation, well completion etc. I'd love to see the different drilling techniques, calculations involved, well control stuff, even something simple like setting up a rig.
I check adverts for other countries and these entry positions abound with amazing benefits, but none such positions are being advertised in Nigeria. Why is that? I can understand that expatriates occupy the top positions, but then why are entry level positions like,motorman, mud engineer, geophysicist, derrick-man, assistant driller, mud engineer not being advertised?
The truth is there are a lot of service companies executing these drilling projects that are unknown to job seekers. Sometimes if you were told the sort of big projects a seemingly small companies handle you would be in disbelief. And these companies do in-house hiring.
So, hiring is strictly based on having someone on the inside who possesses information about the vacancy. No wonder we are living in the IT age. It's all about the information you possess and how relevant and timely it is. But what do we who are qualified for these vacant positions but lack information about them do? You know while studying my dream was to land a good job after my studies and work my way up the ladder, develop myself, grow in rank, take on more responsibility and live a life of meaning. I am not living the dream and it's a sad situation.
I am sad at this 'man-know-man' concept that has crippled a major sector on the country's economy. A barrel of oil costs more to produce in Nigeria than in any other country. Do we drill in the desert or in snow or in an other climatically-challenging environment? Definitely, no. There are many countries who do and incur additional cost due to the terrain where they drill, but they still manage to turn better profit than we in Nigeria, absent of these circumstances, do. Yeah, I understand we drill a lot offshore, but and so what. Our cost of drilling still is above other countries' offshore cost.
Anyways, I would want to conclude that things have to change in this country and soon the change must happen. Well, I am still open to opportunities in the upstream sector in any case and so if you have adverts and vacancies for anything entry-level drilling and production related, kindly do post them here and if you want to PM me or send an email that also works.