Australia is the latest continent to get a taste of a new online self-assessment tool to benchmark the skills within the international operations geoscience community and identify individuals’ skills gaps. The tool enables operations geoscientists, in the oil and gas sector, to objectively assess the level of their current skills – which they need to be successful in their role.

A broad discipline, geoscientists study the Earth’s structure and formation, analysing rocks to explore their natural mineral and energy resources. Geoscientists are often involved in the discovery and development of commercially viable and exploitable reserves of natural resources, such as oil, gas, minerals and water, while others work in areas such as seismology, volcanology, environmental protection, land reclamation or oceanography.

Recognising that geoscientists perform vital roles in the oil and gas sector – which, in one way or another, affects everyone on this planet; produced revenues of some $3.3 trillion in 2019 and comprises some 3.8% of the global economy – Operations Geoscience International Competency Assessment (OGICA), a UK-registered, not-for-profit collective of experienced energy industry professionals has created an online self-assessment tool to benchmark individuals’ skills and identify skills gaps within the international operational geoscience community.

The tool was developed by OGICA in association with the digital learning and assessment specialists, eCom Scotland and is intended principally for those working operationally in upstream oil and gas geoscience.

Having introduced the system to geoscientists in Europe and then outlined the system to geoscientists in North America – via the Canadian GeoConvention, held online, last September – OGICA’s Christine Telford is scheduled to speak about the online assessment tool in a webinar on 22^nd March for Esanda Engineering, which is based in Australia.

“The online assessment is a cost-effective universal tool for all operations geoscientists to assess their skills and identify skills gaps. This is available online at any time to geoscientists around the world,” said OGICA’s Christine Telford.

“Historically, employers and professional organisations appraise practitioners’ abilities based on education, references, continuing professional development (CPD) and work experience, together with organisational membership,” she explained. “While these are important components of a Competency Management System (CMS), they don’t validate the proficiency for the practitioner to work to a recognised standard.

“OGICA believes what’s needed to begin this process is impartial technical skills assessment. In fact, given the importance of geoscientists’ work in the oil and gas sector and, therefore, their significance in maintaining safe operations, this objective self-assessment tool is just the impartial technical skills assessment that this profession needs.”

The system’s three modules are: an online booking management system; the online self-assessment system itself, powered by eCom’s online assessment system, eNetAssess, and the third module, powered by eCom’s digital micro-credentialing tool, eNetBadges, issues candidates with a digital badge to recognise their learning experiences and achievement. This badge has metadata embedded in it, with details of the issuer and the skills levels the candidate has achieved.

So far, oil company and service company employees, independent consultants and one major oil and gas company in the Middle East are using the assessment framework in-house, and several major international operators are currently exploring how the framework can support their activities.

Video link to further details: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kDYaHQFLAL4

OGICA is a UK registered not-for-profit LLP run by Robert Fagg, Martin Gardner, Tim Herrett and Christine Telford.

eCom (https://www.ecomscotland.com/contact/) creates innovative learning solutions – aimed at increasing learning engagement and driving productivity – to help organisations achieve their goals. With offices in Dunfermline, Scotland, and Athens, Georgia, in the USA, but with customers from around the world, eCom focuses on the delivery, tracking and reporting of workforce learning and development through innovative technologies. Its products and services address a range of workforce management, development and training challenges, including eLearning, online assessment, blended learning, competency management and accreditation.