Page 414 - Hydrocarbon

Managing the Producing Field 401

16.4. Managing the Internal Factors

During production, the oil company will need to structure its operation to
manage a number of internal factors, such as
organisational structure and manpower
planning and scheduling
reporting requirements
reviews and audits
funding of projects.

In order to function effectively, the organisational structure should make the required
flow of information for field development and management as easy as possible. For
example, in trying to co-ordinate daily operations, information is required on
external constraints on production-target rates
planned production shutdowns
budget availability
delivery schedules to the customer
injection requirements
workover and maintenance operations
routine inspection schedules
delivery times for equipment and supplies
manpower schedules and transport arrangements.
There is no single solution to the organisational structure required to achieve this
objective, and companies periodically change their organisation to try to improve
efficiency. The above list shows information required for daily operations, and a quite
different list would be drawn up for development planning. Often the tasks required
for production and development are split up, and this is reflected in the organisation.
The following structure is one example of just part of a company’s organisation
(Figure 16.12).
This structure is organised by function – members of a technical function are
grouped together. An alternative to the function-based organisation is an asset-based
organisation, in which a multidisciplinary team is grouped together within an asset.
The asset may be a producing field, a group of fields or an area of exploration interest.

Production

Drilling Production Operations Maintenance Development / Planning

Subsurface Surface Planning / Subsurface Surface
Operations Operations Scheduling Development Development
Figure 16.12 Organisational structure for operations and development planning.