Focusing on local content
Developing local content and competencies strengthens BW Offshore’s position and operational capabilities. We are committed to being a local employer, contributing to poverty eradication through employment and wealth creation in locations where we operate.
We focus on increasing local content by overall requirements such as prioritizing local candidates for open positions, training programs for fast track development of local talents and having clear goals on nationalization within the local presence. Industrialization, with strong linkages to domestic economies, will help the countries where we operate to achieve high growth rates, diversify economies and reduce exposure to external shocks.
We not only ensure that direct and indirect opportunities are made available to host country Nationals for employment and development of skills, but actively contribute to the local economy by using local vendors and developing a local supply chain. We believe this is good business practise, and continue to partner with the relevant Regulators in the locations in which we operate to ensure full compliance to local content laws.
Nigeria Local Content - a success story
Today our Nigeria operations are coordinated by an onshore organisation that is wholly Nigerian and our offshore assets are well on their way to hitting this statistic. In the global organisation, 70% of our offshore employees are nationals.
Local offshore management increased from 22% in 2019 to 35% in 2020, demonstrating the commitment to developing local competencies in leading positions.
In 2020, we also welcomed the promotion of our first National OIM on one of our units, located in Nigeria.
The significant milestone was not attained overnight, but is a culmination of several years of committed focus on driving the company local content strategy, which has seen us go to an allt-time high in 2020.
Key drivers to achieving our goals so far included:
- bringing in the experts – the line managers are best placed to identify gaps and needed to own the process of developing their teams (with the Human Capital team solidly supporting the process); and no expense was spared by the organisation in ensuring the defined follow on actions were implemented.
- adopting a pragmatic approach - recruit talent where no opportunity existed to develop it
- maintaining focus on the goal by setting SMART periodic milestones, and celebrating the small wins that followed
- promoting and coaching values – we believe in diversity, but our values are non-negotiable for our employees and partners
