Petroleum engineer : Employers and vacancy sources

Oil and gas exploration is an international activity and many jobs are based overseas. In the extraction phase, recruitment and training patterns and job titles vary from company to company. For example, some employers do not distinguish at entry level between petroleum, drilling and support engineering. Instead, they prefer to recruit people with wide potential and deploy them after training where individual preference and company need coincide.

The work of a petroleum engineer can take you all over the world: from Africa to Eastern Europe and the Middle East. Employment is usually in one of the following settings:

• operating/producing companies, especially a large international oil company, although some are smaller and less well-known;
• engineering consultancies;
• integrated service providers, providing staff in varied disciplines;
• specialist drilling contractors, from multinationals to one-person companies, who undertake drilling work on an international scale.

A number of new entrants join oil and gas operating companies. However, service companies are gradually undertaking more of the work traditionally done by operators.

Oil companies vary in size from multinationals to small, nationally based groups. They tend to own or lease exploration permits, decide where to drill, monitor the drilling and run the production facilities. Owing to the specialised nature of the business, contractors do much of the actual drilling and construction work.

In this industry, recruitment can be sensitive to global political and economic pressures. Wars, or the rumours of war, can affect prices on the world's market, as much as the effects of supply and demand, but in a more unpredictable way. Inevitably, the market price of a commodity influences investment in the exploration and development of new sources of supply. These factors can have a direct effect on employment, leading to fluctuating demand at short notice for qualified people.

Sources of vacancies

• Search graduate jobs on this site.
• Offshore
• Oil Careers
• Journal of Petroleum Technology (JPT) Online
• Your Energy Jobs

Recruitment agencies commonly handle vacancies. See entries in specialist press.

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