Jan Sherman

In 1986, the oil industry was mired in a down cycle and majoring in petroleum engineering, according to conventional wisdom, was an unwise move.

Jan Sherman did it anyway.

“I loved petroleum engineering so decided to stick with it,” she said. “I figured I would be good at something I enjoyed and never had any regrets.”

She was inspired by Joe and Patty Mueller, owners of a family oil and gas company in Corpus Christi, Texas, where Sherman worked as an assistant. She took care of everything from dictation and payroll to typing well reports and technical and legal documents for the engineering team.

“They were amazing role models for me and encouraged me to finish my college education,” she said. “I stayed in touch with Joe and Patty throughout my career. They were great mentors and continued to have an influence on my choices.”

Sherman started her energy career as a reservoir engineer, tasked with figuring out ways to improve production on Shell’s five lowest producing fields in the Gulf of Mexico. She worked with an experienced geologist to define a redevelopment program to drill six new wells in an old oil field.

“This started a series of jobs where I was tasked with identifying improvement opportunities for workover rigs and production operations,” she said. “I learned a lot from these experiences and loved every bit of it.”

Sherman would take on numerous high-profile projects during her 30 years at Shell. Among them, the Bonga development in Nigeria, Perdido installation in the Gulf of Mexico and Quest CO2 storage project in Canada. Other projects including Unconventionals, EOR and CCS provided experiences in project delivery, leadership and commercial that set her apart from others and were the foundation of her success.     

“As I shifted from technical roles into leadership, my business and leadership skills advanced quickly when I started leading teams where I did not have subject matter expertise,” she said. “This allowed me to focus on how to lead with accountability and that resulted in the development of high-performing teams and my own progression to executive roles.”

To succeed in a male-dominated industry, Sherman took inspiration from other strong women in her life.

“I saw strong women thriving in the industry, starting with Patty Mueller, and felt privileged to participate in a meaningful way,” she said. “Also, being raised in a family as the third of six children with three brothers helped. Plus, both my mother and grandmother were strong women who raised big families and still had meaningful impact in their own professions. I take on the challenges as opportunities to learn and solve problems rather than roadblocks.”

After retiring from Shell, Sherman co-founded Carbonvert, a carbon capture and storage project development and finance company that focuses on decarbonization for industrial emitters.

“It was the external connections that I made while in Shell that helped bring Alex Tiller and I together to build Carbonvert into a successful project development company,” she said. Tiller, her co-founder and the company’s CEO, has guided her through the complexities of the private investor world.

Sherman sees opportunity for the oil and gas sector in the era of decarbonization, but realizes that not all in the industry are convinced.

“One of the keys in transformation is admitting that the energy transition is here,” she said. “I still hear a lot of skepticism about the need for changes in how we produce and receive energy for our lifestyles. Regardless of your viewpoint, we have an opportunity to thrive as an industry by providing solutions to the challenges we are facing in an effective way. Let’s all work together to create cost-effective solutions for a low-carbon future.”

Check out the rest of Hart Energy's 2024 Women in Energy here.