Gazprom Neft partnered this year’s Society of Petroleum Engineers (SPE) North—West Russia Section Annual Congress*, at which representatives from leading international companies discussed the HR challenges and new opportunities in developing human capital in an era of digital transformation.

Conference participants included representatives from dozens of leading organisations in various industries, including Gazprom Neft, Wintershall, Yandex, McKinsey, Mars, Rostelecom, HeadHunter, Skoltech, the MIPT Centre for Engineering and Technology, Data Economy PJSC, and many others — the main topic being the impact of digitisation on the development of employees’ professional skills, and approaches to motivating and retaining talented employees.

Demand for newly qualified IT professionals is encouraging companies to invest in training new digital specialists for the oil and gas industry, with organisations creating an ecosystem for recruiting and retaining digital personnel, launching major educational programmes and developing their own tools for finding these valuable candidates.

Gazprom Neft has been supporting specialist faculties and masters programmes at leading higher educational establishments for many years, as well as developing joint research and development (R&D) laboratories. The company is in active collaboration with St Petersburg State University, ITMO University (the St Petersburg State University of Information Technologies, Mechanics and Optics), St Petersburg State Electrotechnical University, the St Petersburg State University of Aerospace Instrumentation, St Petersburg State Polytechnic University and St Petersburg Mining University, the Moscow Institute of Physics and Technology, Tyumen State University, and others. One innovative solution from Gazprom Neft, targeted at developing human capital, is the “Professionals 4.0” platform, bringing together talented young professionals and corporations in addressing business projects through flexible teams. This project has also become an effective tool in career guidance and self-determination for future specialists — school leavers, students and competition finalists.

Gazprom Neft is currently implementing 12 digital transformation programmes, involving more than 500 separate digital initiatives, with digital systems being actively used in geological prospecting, drilling and the design and project management of new assets.

“Gazprom Neft is, today, completing with the global IT giants for the best digital candidates. Our use of technologies throughout the entire value chain is so extensive it’s become one of our key advantages in attracting talent — this being what creates the ‘wow!’ factor for young professionals. Only in our industry do young people, implementing digital projects, have a unique opportunity to assess the results of their work, see how heavy-duty drilling projects move forward, and launch new projects under the conditions of the Russian Far North — something which, until quite recently, was considered impossible.”

Alexei Vashkevich Head of the Gazprom Neft Technology Development Directorate