Who are the top UK CIOs in the Oil & Gas industry?

Shell Downstream’s VP and global CIO Craig Walker has helped the organisation along its digital journey, and he sees business models, customer connectivity, innovation and digitisation as the main accelerators for change.

“Our history for 100 or more years has been oil and gas, predominantly oil in the early days and then far more gas business,” Walker said. “But these days, we’re very much moving to be an energy business.

In an interview with CIO UK earlier this year, Walker explained how the future of Shell will be driven by emerging technologies such as blockchain and autonomous vehicles.

“We are transforming from moving molecules to moving electrons,” he added. “And that business is all driven by IT. We are in the process of using digital technology to create business models we have not yet invented.”

Read more: CIO UK podcast episode 17 – Shell Downstream CIO Craig Walker discusses future business models and carbon reduction

Innovation is highly important for Shell Energy’s international trading and supply CIO Clare Patterson. In fact, Patterson has made some big investments taking on emerging technologies such as AI, machine learning and robotics processing over the past year.

“Having a computer science background and being more of an analytical person, the technology side of the transformation is the bit where I’m probably most comfortable,” Patterson said speaking at the 2019 CIO Summit. “It’s measurable, and you can plan it.”

With teams in Australia, Singapore, Japan, China, India, Dubai, London and Houston, Patterson has also been making equal efforts to drive staffing innovation across  the organisation.

According to Patterson, one of the biggest successes of 2018 was moving away from project delivery to product-based teams. The result of assigning product owners and aligning IT teams with product delivery teams includes a reduction in release times and ticket backlogs.

“If you want to make changes, you do need to start from the leaders,” she explained. “With Shell Energy’s leadership team, we first got the training in the outward mindset and it was by humbly explaining the issues that we had, the mistakes we were making, that we could help other people have the confidence to pick up some of these ways of working.”

Read next: Shell Energy CIO Clare Patterson on changing company mindsets

Newly appointed CIO of Neptune Energy Kaveh Pourteymour made a move to the exploration and production company after four years as VP and CIO of oil and gas services and management firm Seadrill.

Pourteymour’s previous role at Seadrill saw him lead the company through to its third phase of IT transformation. Leading up to his move to Neptune Energy, Pourteymour was able to lay out some visions for the transformation journey.

Speaking to CIO UK at theend of 2018, he said: “It is one that is looking at how we are radically changing our business model to become more efficient, more safer. It’s changing our business model to become more effective in drilling and being able to create and deliver quality wells with an outcome in predictable manner.

“Some digitisation capabilities being developed provide monetisation opportunities too, and there is belief that some of the safety technologies we are working on can help the industry as a whole become safer.”

Group CIO at Petrofac Allan Cockriel is passionate about helping to unlock the digital ambitions of the company whilst building and maintaining oil and gas facilities.

Joining in 2018, Cockriel has pivoted the IT function to explore a full digital transformation in order to stand out from competitors.

“Petrofac is working to create a forward-looking digital culture, which is vital to maintaining a competitive edge in today’s industrial landscape, and I am delighted to be part of the team that will pioneer this,” Cockriel told CIO UK.

He is particularly keen on using gamification, in-house innovation and rotational programmes to create a fully digital culture.

“We want to unlock the full potential of digital solutions for ourselves and our clients, and are doing this through continued investment in our digital agenda to deliver data insights, identify innovative ways of working, and find new opportunities; with the best forms of digital defence to protect what we are achieving,” he said.