Since the days of apprenticeships in medieval times, mentoring has been an accepted and successful way to transfer knowledge from an experienced older worker to an inexperienced younger worker. Oil companies have been using the concept for years to bring their new-hires up within the organization while capturing the expertise of an older worker close to retirement.

With so much of the industry now “close to retirement,” mentoring is becoming a much-needed tool to ensure that oil and gas and service companies maintain their cutting-edge viability when the old folks turn out the lights. In addition to a much younger generation of workers, there are also workers from other countries who need help adapting to their company’s culture. With these needs in full flower, how will we get any real work done?

Folks at the Society of Exploration Geophysicists (SEG) think they might be close to finding the answer. President Fred Aminzadeh has introduced a concept called “geo-mentoring” to address what he calls a “bi-modal distribution” within his organization — some of the members are older, some are quite young, and there’s not much in between. He described this concept to me prior to the SEG Annual Meeting last September.

“We want to make sure that those who are experienced can give the benefit of their expertise and knowledge to the younger generation that’s coming up,” he said. “We want to make good use of the experience that we have.”

All fine and dandy, but this is a huge society with members strewn throughout the globe. The next step was to find the right technology to address this challenge, and in stepped Bill Barkhouse, a former SEG president who worked for ExxonMobil for 30 years before entering a vague sort of “semi-retirement.” Based on his own experience working for the world’s largest oil company, Barkhouse began to examine what it would take to bring his company’s form of mentoring to the wider SEG audience.

“I’m wondering how someone who hasn’t had the benefit of working for a large organization gets these opportunities,” he said. “I spent a lot of time on the Internet, and during that journey I’ve learned that there’s a whole other world out there.”

SEG is in the process of vastly upgrading its Web site to include things like Web casts, but it’s not there yet. Barkhouse decided to find an interim solution by creating a “geo-mentoring blog.” “We know it will grow over time by traditional processes,” he said.

“But I also was trying to tap into the younger generation that lives and dies by their cell phones.”

The hope is that mentors and mentees eventually can be linked directly. But there’s also a general “post your comment here” aspect to the blog that creates more of an open dialog amongst those wishing to participate. For instance, one geophysicist wants to start a scholarship at his high school in China. Another would like to receive hard copies of “The Leading Edge,” SEG’s monthly magazine, at his high school in Serbia.

In another posting, a high school student in California asked a series of questions as part of an environmental career research project. As a budding geologist, the student wished to know things like what service geologists provide to the community, special skills required and benefits gleaned (including spiritual, emotional and financial). Despite the fact that there were 12 questions in all, someone took the time to answer most of them factually and honestly.

Barkhouse admits that this is not a one-size-fits-all project and that any process that encourages the flow of ideas will be examined. He also sees the mentoring taking place in both directions.

“The classical notion of mentoring is a really senior person to a younger person,” he said. “But we’re in a new era here where we’re seeing some evidence that it can be a younger person to a more senior person. That’s where it gets really interesting, and a lot of fun.”
Fun, in fact, is what he hopes to reignite in some of his older colleagues, who might find blogging just one more thing they don’t have time for. “That’s what geophysics is all about,” he said. “It’s the Indiana Jones experience. How do we get the treasure hunt going? That’s why people come into this industry.”

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