Monthly Reflections September 2024
by Steve Norton, IOGP Health, Safety, Security & Wells Director

In September, I was in Abu Dhabi for the SPE HSES Conference and I was fortunate to join a panel discussion on Human Performance. Thank you to Mark Scanlon from Energy Institute for moderating the discussion and my fellow panellists; Arthur Alexander from bp, Tahir Azhibekov from ADNOC, Katie Morton from slb and Craig Wiggins from Step Change in Safety.
The oil and gas industry has made incredible progress in improving safety performance but the last few years has seen a plateauing of performance (IOGP Safety Performance Data). I believe Human Performance and unlocking the safety leadership potential of everyone who works in the industry is one of our best opportunities to continue our journey to eliminating fatalities.
The panel covered what companies are doing to build Human Performance into their management systems. This is a topic that can appear complex and difficult to know where to start. The discussion showed there are many opportunities to learn from each other. My takeaway is don’t duplicate or reinvent the wheel instead, steal with pride, learn from others and work together.
Thank you to ADNOC for hosting the Conference. The event had not taken place in person since 2018. It was great to connect with so many HSES colleagues (over 800 attendees from 40+ countries and 100+ companies) from around the globe and share thoughts and experiences on the challenges and opportunities facing the industry.
With so many Safety professionals present we also took the opportunity to hold the IOGP Safety Committee and thanks again to ADNOC for hosting the meeting. The Committee used the face-to-face meeting to receive updates from the Safety Subcommittees and have deeper discussions on some of the current focus areas; adoption of recommended practices, process safety, ship husbandry, IOGP safety award scheme and contractor HSE management. Thank you to all the participants and Andrew Clarke from bp for chairing the meeting.
As we start the last quarter of the year, the IOGP Safety Subcommittees will be meeting to progress their work items. I look forward to hearing the progress and sharing feedback in my monthly reflections.