When petroleum companies consider potential risks, the primary focus tends to be on the big issues. That only makes sense, because pipeline leaks, facility fires, or drill site accidents can have a tremendous negative impact on the company, its employees, and even the surrounding community.
However, less catastrophic problems can still have a huge impact on the company. Here are ways that technology can help to rein in those risks and keep your company and employees protected.
Driver Safety
Being on the road is an essential part of work for many employees. While there are considerable 
differences between transporting heavy equipment and driving a rental car to a trade show, many of the potential risks are the same.
Sure, your company probably has safety policies for employees when they’re on the road, but what else could and should you be doing to mitigate your risks?
Texting
Most companies have policies about texting or any cellphone use while behind the wheel; but often, in spite of these rules or local laws, employees continue to use cellphones while driving.
The solution is more technology, not less.
Company vehicles can be equipped with Bluetooth to make hands-free texting and calling easier. 
Revising smartphone apps and settings could simplify the process when drivers do need to use this technology on the road.
Alternatively, as part of a mobile device management program, you can load apps that prevent your drivers from receiving and sending text messages while they are driving. This can reduce the risk of accidents that could injure your employees, their coworkers, and others on the road.
Even a small accident behind the wheel could result in considerable legal risk and liability for the company—and some types of accident might not be covered by your insurance plan. Being proactive about these risks not only reduces your company’s chances of an accident, but these measures will also demonstrate your company’s commitment to safety and minimizing unnecessary risks.
Personnel Safety
Being on the road or out in the field is filled with risks. From broken down vehicles to accidents, you want to know if there is a problem so you can respond as quickly as possible. This is particularly important when employees are working alone and/or in hazardous conditions.
Setting up GPS tracking for your company vehicles and/or employee cellphones can allow managers to
check the status and location of employees. Vehicles stopped along the highway or a worker who isn’t answering a phone while at a drill site can be investigated if you know where they’re located.
Problems with gaps in cellphone coverage in remote sites can make access to tracking information of an employee’s last known position particularly important. In the event of an urgent situation, a GPS tracking system can enable supervisors to quickly determine which employees are nearest a trouble spot, so they can be sent to resolve the problem.
In addition, if you suspect there is a problem with an employee texting and driving, being able to correlate those texts with times the vehicle was moving will give your managers or HR team more tools to confirm and correct the problem.
Employee Training
Accidents happen. Even if your employees never made mistakes, there would still be situations where a problem on the road, with a pipeline, or in the office could lead to lawsuits or the risk of an insurance 
company denying a claim.
Your company already provides safety training, but a thorough policy compliance tracking plan can make sure that no one falls through the cracks either as a new employee or when annual training is required. You can track the individual requirements depending on each employee’s job within the company to ensure that your workers receive exactly the training they need.
You should track each employee’s completion of the required training. Thorough documentation makes it easier for you to quickly provide proof of that training if any questions arise.
Whether you need the information to respond to litigation or managers want to check their team’s compliance, a compliance tracking plan will be there to help.
Site Documentation
There are a number of challenges when it comes to documenting worksites. Records of land surveys,
construction plans, and the work performed must come together in a usable format.
In the past, that meant giant folders stuffed with contacts, plans, and other details. Now technology has made site documentation simpler while creating new potential risks.
A cloud computing system will speed the upload of photographs, videos, and drone imagery, even from remote locations in the field. Organizing your file storage will make it easier for employees to find these records later, while backup management ensures that records won’t become lost. Great security management keeps valuable proprietary data and information secure throughout your organization.
One of the biggest problems is correlating the various types of site information together into cohesive and accessible formats.
Photographs taken before construction to ensure the reclamation work has been properly completed can be difficult to match with the area after construction is finished. After pipelines have been built, tested, commissioned, and the ground surface restored, matching up the plans with pipe locations and features becomes far more complicated.
GPS data can be used to bring this information together. The original land survey of the site will provide a GPS framework. From there, your team can take pictures using their smartphones with the geopositioning feature activated. By taking these images from multiple angles and different vantage points at each step of construction and reclamation, the location of the various elements of the site will be more clearly documented.
Drone imagery can add a better overview of the site and how it aligns with the surrounding fixed reference points like roads or wellheads. As the project progresses, records can be added for any repairs, system alterations, and integrity surveys.
Once you have all your documentation, you need to compile the information together to make it more readily accessible and usable to employees or regulators. Data analysis services can look for other ways to put the information to work by checking for patterns of repairs or production variations, or outside factors that might impact the ongoing safety or operations. This can help to identify and create plans to deal with other risks.
JMARK has been helping oil & gas companies in Oklahoma, Missouri, and Arkansas use I.T. to increase the velocity of their success for over thirty years. We have the expertise to develop a personalized plan for your company on the best ways to minimize risk. Contact us today so we can begin building your customized risk action plan together. Call 844-44-JMARK, email [email protected], or Contact Us through this website!
