Guest Editorial: Braver, Bolder, and Better: Breaking the Silo Paralysis

As we continue to adapt and evolve to meet the changing needs of our fast-moving world, we see a sizable and growing prize for those who are willing to work and think differently, challenge traditional approaches, forge new working relationships, and act boldly. This topic is one of the ten keynote program sessions at the 2021 SPE Offshore Europe (https://www.offshore-europe.co.uk/) to be held 7–10 September in Aberdeen to drive disruptive and forward-thinking conversations around the conference theme “Oil & Gas: Working Together for a Net-Zero Future.” Since 2019 SPE Offshore Europe, we have witnessed significant change, even before we consider the effects of the global COVID-19 pandemic. Societal interest in the climate and energy has rightly risen up the agenda, and the scale of expectation and pace of change demanded of our industry is high. The need to accelerate the energy transition by investing in cleaner, low-carbon energy production is clear. But oil and gas will remain critical as major contributors to the energy mix for decades to come, and so responsible hydrocarbon production has a crucial role to play in the transition, underlined by the recently published UK Government North Sea Transition Deal. So how can we be braver, bolder, and better—as individuals, as companies, and as an industry—to grasp that opportunity for change and do something positive with it? We hear a lot about collaboration and its necessity, yet Oil & Gas UK’s (OGUK) 2020 collaboration survey indicates that perhaps, despite the best of intent, it is not universally translating into practice. The term collaboration has somewhat lost its true meaning, perhaps through overuse and a shortage of genuinely collaborative partnerships to inspire us. We can all tend to use the term loosely, forgetting that true collaboration can generate incredibly far-reaching and tangible value. We simply must put this right if our industry is to turn the challenge of the energy transition into an opportunity to thrive. Partnering To Empower the Energy Transition The first critical step to achieve greater collaboration is to acknowledge and accept that no individual, no organization, has all the answers. Never has this been truer than now—as we seek to effect one of the greatest changes our industry has ever faced and are duty-bound to find new solutions at pace and scale. Rather than feeling we must each be the sole creator of our own solutions, organizations need to be better at articulating their problem and even better at inviting others to participate in the solution. We will not solve tomorrow’s problems with yesterday’s ideas—we must cultivate innovation and disruption in the way that we engage with one another and in the way that we work together. A real blocker in realizing that mind-set shift is often in the letter of our contracts. We feel so bound by the formal confines of our relationships with one another that we become unable or unwilling to explore new thinking, to be receptive to new ideas, and to create the space for the disruption that we so need. We must recognize trust as a key attribute of successful, collaborative partnerships.