Beyond Headcount: Building Real Drilling Capability in Guyana’s Oil Era

 

Guest Contribution · Local Content

Beyond Headcount: Building Real Drilling Capability in Guyana’s Oil Era

The headcount tells us who got through the door. It does not tell us who can run the work.

A solids-control and drilling-waste-management specialist on moving beyond headcount to measure practical capability.

By Othman Soliman · October 2026

There is a useful question to ask at the end of any major training programme: what can the person now do on the job that they could not do before?

Attendance records cannot answer it. Neither can a list of job titles. Those figures matter, particularly in a growing oil-producing country. But they cannot tell us whether a technician can recognise a developing problem, whether a supervisor can explain a difficult decision, or whether a local company can take responsibility for a piece of work without relying indefinitely on someone else to solve it.

I have spent more than a quarter century working with drilling-fluid and solids-control systems. The distinction between being present and being capable is familiar in the field. Equipment may be running, the shift report may look normal, and the system may still be losing valuable fluid or creating avoidable work for the crew. The question is who can establish what is actually happening, and what evidence they use before making a change.

That is why Guyana’s local-content conversation should include not only who is employed and who wins contracts, but also how technical judgement and responsibility are being transferred.

I. Guyana has built a starting point

Guyana’s Local Content Act No. 18 of 2021 established a framework covering employment, procurement and local capacity development in the petroleum sector. Every contractor and sub-contractor must file a master plan with sub-plans for each of the three. Those are substantial commitments, not numbers to dismiss. They help create the opportunities through which experience can be gained.

The official opening of the Guyana Technical Training College Inc. at Port Mourant in February 2026 also signals investment in technical education. The college, a US$120 million facility built with the Stabroek Block co-venturers, offers an 18-month advanced diploma in production, instrumentation, electrical and mechanical disciplines. That is valuable. It is also, by design, a school for the production side of the business: the FPSOs. Building competence in drilling fluids, solids control and drilling-waste management requires its own discipline-specific training and supervised field practice. No single institution can build competence across every drilling and oilfield discipline.

The next question belongs to employers, contractors, training institutions and the people doing the work. Once someone enters the industry, is there a visible path from learning a task to carrying it out under supervision, recognising its limits and eventually being trusted with greater responsibility?

II. A normal mud report can hide an abnormal day

Take a hypothetical situation. It is an illustration, not an account of a particular Guyanese well.

A rig is drilling and the drilling-fluid report looks acceptable. The fluid’s main properties remain within the limits of the approved programme. Yet the crew has had to prepare more replacement fluid than it did during a comparable period. The cuttings coming off the shale shaker look wetter, and waste handling has become more demanding.

A shale shaker is the vibrating screen that removes much of the larger drilled rock from the returning fluid, so useful fluid can be kept in circulation. It is an important first step, not a perfect filter and not the whole system.

Now there are several possible explanations. Perhaps the rock being drilled has changed and is breaking into finer particles. Perhaps the fluid is reaching the screen unevenly, or a screen is damaged or poorly fitted. The flow rate may have changed. Some fluid might have been lost through transfers, a surface leak or a deliberate operational step. Downstream separation equipment may also be operating outside its intended conditions.

The wet cuttings alone do not identify the cause. Nor does a larger volume of replacement fluid prove poor solids removal. One reading describes a symptom. Good field judgement begins by testing possible explanations against the records.

One reading describes a symptom. Good field judgement begins by testing possible explanations against the records.

— O.S.

Testing the explanations

Before anyone changes a setting, the team should compare like with like: the length and diameter of hole drilled, the rate of drilling, the circulating flow, the type of rock, the fluid formulation, the amount of fluid added or transferred, and the condition of the separation equipment. They should examine how the system was actually operated, not simply whether its motors were on.

The rig crew, drilling-fluid engineer, solids-control operator and waste-handling team each hold part of that evidence. If nobody brings it together, every department can produce a reasonable explanation for its own numbers while the underlying question remains unanswered. Any operational change must follow approved procedures, with the result checked afterward under conditions that permit a fair comparison.

III. This is what practical competence looks like

A new technician should not be expected to make a safety-critical decision beyond their training or authority. That would be irresponsible. But the technician can learn to notice a change, record it correctly, preserve the evidence and bring the right people into the discussion.

An experienced operator should be able to explain why a reading matters and what other information is needed. A supervisor should know the limits of a proposed adjustment and how to confirm whether it helped. Those are different levels of competence. A good training programme makes the difference explicit.

The field test is more revealing than an attendance certificate. Ask someone to trace the path of the fluid from the well to the surface equipment and back. Give them two operating reports that appear similar, except that one shows a rising need for fluid additions. Ask what they would check first, what they would not assume, and when they would escalate the issue.

There need not be a single correct cause in a classroom exercise. There should be a defensible way of investigating it. Participants should be assessed on their observations, their reasoning and their respect for safe operating limits, not on the confidence with which they guess an answer.

Just as importantly, the person who can do the job should be given a chance to demonstrate it. Progression should rest on demonstrated competence, with fair access to supervised practice and clear pathways for Guyanese staff. It should not rest on personal connections or on who speaks most loudly in a meeting.

IV. Local suppliers need the same opportunity to grow

Building capability is not only about individual employees. Local companies also need routes into increasingly responsible work. More than 1,300 Guyanese firms now hold a Local Content Certificate. Registration opens the door. It does not, by itself, build what is behind it.

Consider a Guyanese business contracted to maintain or support part of a drilling-fluid system. Winning the contract is meaningful. A stronger result is achieved when the company learns to document a fault properly, plan preventive maintenance, select suitable parts, demonstrate that a repair worked and keep reliable technical records. That is how a supplier becomes trusted for its competence, not simply included in a purchasing total.

Partnerships with established contractors can accelerate that process if they transfer methods, allow supervised participation in real decisions and gradually expand the work local teams are qualified to lead. A partnership that preserves all diagnosis and technical authority elsewhere may produce invoices without producing the same lasting capability.

A partnership that preserves all diagnosis and technical authority elsewhere may produce invoices without producing the same lasting capability.

— O.S.

The standards should remain rigorous. Technical independence is not achieved by lowering safety requirements or assigning complex work before people are ready. It is achieved by making the route to meeting those requirements practical, measurable and accessible.

V. Count progress, but check what remains

Guyana should continue to count employment, local procurement and investment in training. The additional measure I would want to see is straightforward: which tasks can Guyanese workers and companies now carry out competently that they previously needed others to perform for them?

That answer can be documented. A trainee progresses from observation to supervised work and then to assessed responsibility. A local instructor becomes qualified to teach and evaluate others. A maintenance team begins to diagnose faults without waiting for outside direction. A supplier builds a verified record of work completed safely and correctly.

Operational improvements can support that picture, but they must be interpreted carefully. Lower waste volume or reduced fluid consumption is not automatically proof of better training; drilling conditions, well design and the fluid programme may have changed. Good evidence explains what was measured, what else changed and why a particular improvement can reasonably be linked to a person’s work.

The people who develop these skills should not have to remain at the entry level forever. Technical responsibility, mentoring and leadership need to become part of the local pathway. Otherwise, a country can meet participation targets while continuing to import the judgement needed to run difficult operations.

Guyana has a chance to ask for both outcomes: meaningful participation now and greater technical responsibility over time.

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The headcount tells us who got through the door.

The lasting test is who can understand the work, improve it and help the next person learn to do it well.

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