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Evolve sponsors 2011 Energy Process Excellence Network, November 15-16

Evolve Partners is pleased to co-sponsor the 2011 Energy Process Excellence Network, November 15-16 in Houston, TX.

This conference is a great opportunity for energy industry practitioners of Process Excellence, Operations Excellence, Lean, Six Sigma and Continuous Improvement to get together to share experience and best practices. Last year's inaugural event was a great success, with about 100 practitioners participating. This year's event is shaping up to be an even better event with a cross section of people from upstream, downstream and utilities participating. This is a unique opportunity to network with your peers and gain perspective on how other similar companies and related industry segments are building capability to drive improvement programs.

Last year, as a lead up to the conference, Evolve conducted a survey on approaches and trends in energy process excellence and shared the findings at the conference. We are pleased to be conducting a similar survey this year. We will be sending out the survey to you soon.

There is a 50% discount on registration fees until September 16. Registration information can be obtained at the conference web site: www.energypexnetwork.com

So many of the participants last year told us that they really enjoyed having the opportunity to meet their peers and share practical experiences. Please take advantage of this unique opportunity.

Evolve continues to help clients unlock value in tight gas

Evolve continues to expand its practice of helping producers in shale gas plays to assure delivery of development programs and manage transition to steady-state operations. Supporting clients in such fields as Eagle Ford, Marcellus, and Haynesville, Evolve is helping clients to develop a deep understanding of end-to-end venture development and well delivery, improve integrated planning and cross-functional coordination, and achieve a Lean manufacturing continuous improvement mindset throughout their operations.

Expiring leases, contractor safety, right of ways, water management, rig and frac schedules, production facilities, road maintenance, pipeline tie-ins, trucking and logistics, regulatory approvals, community stewardship—these and many other issues confront tight gas operators on a continually shifting basis. With more and larger acquisitions into ever expanding list of tight-gas discoveries, major producers are seeking both assurance and acceleration of return on these strategic investments. Evolve is helping producers to enhance decision systems, and organizational effectiveness to preserve acreage, determine depletion, increase rig utilization, improve HSE performance, and flow product to market faster.

Moving to steady-state operations requires building local operations capability in production surveillance and maintenance programs in addition to ongoing drilling activity. Evolve helps guide clients through the asset lifecycle transitions from exploration to development to steady-state production operations. This includes supporting the need to build local capability while integrating with skill pools from traditional onshore gas operations in production surveillance and maintenance, as well as drilling and completions engineering and field-execution

LEADERSHIP COMMITMENT THE TOP CRITICAL SUCCESS FACTOR FOR ENERGY PROCESS EXCELLENCE

Leadership commitment is overwhelmingly the top critical success factor for process excellence in the energy industry, according to a survey released by Evolve Partners LLC. Speaking at the opening session of the ENERGY PROCESS EXCELLENCE NETWORK CONFERENCE on December 7, 2010, in Houston, Seth Tyler of Evolve Partners said, ”What respondents are clearly telling us is that senior leaders must be active sponsors and promoters of process excellence for it to be successful”. Added Tyler’s colleague at Evolve Partners, John Norcross, “Although the oil & gas industry is increasingly seeing the strategic value of operational excellence, Lean and other process excellence efforts, real value cannot be achieved if it is only delegated to a handful of expert practitioners—it takes real leadership commitment.”

Evolve Partners is a Houston-based implementation and operational improvement consulting firm. As an input to the conference, Evolve Partners conducted a survey of over 40 leaders in oil & gas companies to understand comparative approaches to process excellence and continuous improvement. The ENERGY PROCESS EXCELLENCE NETWORK CONFERENCE brought together over nearly 100 process excellence and continuous improvement professionals predominantly from the upstream oil & gas industry .

Other key findings from the survey include:

--Reducing cost is the top priority for process excellence

--Training, often the primary focus of improvement efforts, is not seen as a critical success factor. Training is viewed to be more effective when it is done when companies have first identified clear results and focus areas and training is specific to those areas and results.

--There is no common name for “process excellence”, with companies using a variety of terms such as “operations excellence”, “continuous improvement”, and “Lean Six Sigma”

--It takes more than two years to embed process excellence as a fundamental way of working in a company.
Please click here to download the presentation on the survey.

Evolve to sponsor IQPC Energy Process Excellence Network December 7-8, 2010, Houston, TX

Evolve Partners is a sponsor of the Energy Process Excellence Network December 7-8, 2010 in Houston, TX.

This event will bring together leading senior practitioners of operations excellence and Lean Six Sigma in the energy industry to share best practices and perspectives on process excellence implementation. Seth Tyler and John Norcross of Evolve are scheduled to chair a session at the event. For more information, please go to conference site.
Energy Process Excellence Network

Program steers oil sands start-up toward long term

Seth D. Tyler, Partner at Evolve Partners LLP, co-authored an article with Perry Berkenpas and Greg Bussing from ConocoPhillips Canada Calgary in the June 7, 2010 issue of Oil & Gas Journal.

While every long-term asset play begins life as a start-up, not every startup succeeds in becoming a sustainable long-term asset. Deciding when to build the culture, processes, systems, and practices that will support operations excellence is critical. Oil & Gas Journal Article

Lean Times: Management Strategy

Seth D. Tyler, Partner at Evolve Partners LLP, co-authored an article with William J. Duffy Jr. in the December 2009 issue of Oil & Gas Investor.

The exploration and production community may not have completely readjusted to the changed economics of the past 12 months, but at least the shock has lessened. Although some stability has returned to oil prices, natural gas prices continue to languish. As a result, companies have turned their attention to strategies to rebuild profitability and grow their businesses in the current commodity-price environment.Oil & Gas Investor Article

E&P Journal: Securing a scarce resource

Seth Tyler, Partner at Evolve Partners, LLP co-authors this article. With the buzz concerning recruiting experienced workers to replenish an aging workforce, it is important to find ways to keep the ones you have. E&P Article Reprint

Evolve Partners and the Young Professionals division of the British American Business Council host "The Next Generation of Leadership" Event Next Generation Leadership PDF

New Leaders Please! By Seth Tyler, Evolve Partner
You know you need to develop the leadership capabilities of your second and third tier managers. Read on to see ten things you can do to compress the cycle time of developing a cadre of new leaders. New Leaders Article