Skills boost for oil & gas industry

As part of the effort to address the skills shortage within the oil & gas industry, an online tool is being developed that will be capable of mapping the skills and competencies required to transfer from certain industries into the oil & gas sector.

Initially, the project is being designed as a means for ex-military and services personnel to match their skills and potentially find jobs in the oil & gas industry.

Although we are focusing on the MoD, we are also in touch with BAE Systems

Dr Alix Thom

“If you take a weapons engineer, for example, they will be able to look at their job in the website and from there be able to find out what jobs in the oil & gas industry most closely match their skills,” said Oil & Gas UK issues and skills manager Dr Alix Thom, who also stated it would be possible for employers to operate the system the other way around.

The Ministry of Defence (MoD), which is working alongside the oil & gas industry in this project, forms the first of what could become a wider inter-industry resource.

“Although we are focusing on the MoD, we are also in touch with BAE Systems, for example, and we are looking at ways to find out what skills are available and when and how we can transition those that are appropriate into the oil and gas industry,” Thom added.

Although the skills mapping in tool is currently a work in progress, the plan is to officially launch it in November of this year, Thom said.