Nearly 30% of HGS members identify as a consultant (see the December 2023 Bulletin for more survey results), yet this number masks the diversity of consulting geologist roles. While some consultants are independent contractors, other consultants are employed by firms. Some roles are focused on subsurface technical evaluations, yet others are focused on corporate strategy. In short, the term “consultant” encompasses a wide spectrum of roles for geologists.
Although consulting geologists come in many different forms, they use similar skills sets and leverage a strong technical foundation. This article explores three different types of consulting company roles: corporate research, corporate strategy and business transformation, and acquisitions and divestments (A&D). Each of these diverse roles coalesce into a common goal: helping clients make strategic decisions.
What does it mean to be a “consultant?”
Rachel Schelble joined Wood Mackenzie in 2021 as the Head of Corporate Carbon Management and Infrastructure after 15 years working across technical and strategic assignments in the Oil and Gas industry. Her research helps oil and gas companies to better understand the value chains, business models, emerging technologies, and policies driving the energy transition. Recent corporate research insights have focused on the role of private equity in the Energy Transition, transportation infrastructure for carbon management projects, and corporate approaches to managing carbon emissions. Like her management-consultant counterparts, clients leverage Schelble’s work to make strategic decisions. Schelble uses her subsurface background, plus a keen interest in profitability drivers, and an ability to integrate diverse datasets to succeed in her role.
“Subsurface is where it starts for strategic questions in the Oil and Gas business,” says Megan Janzen, a consultant with Boston Consulting Group (BCG). Janzen moved to Norway in 2021, after an eight-year career as a geologist and prior roles in nuclear energy. Janzen works across BCG’s energy practice, but primarily focuses on helping European Oil and Gas clients to evaluate questions such as how to reduce geoscience costs, strategically allocate Capex, or navigate the Energy Transition.
A third type of consulting is “real estate for Oil and Gas,” says Bryan Bottoms, Vice President of Geology at Detring Energy Advisors. Bottoms evaluates mineral rights and production acreage for clients seeking to divest assets. He began his role with Detring nearly five years ago after working as a geologist for an operator in Oklahoma. Detring specializes in selling mineral rights, operated and non-operated working interest, in deals that are US$250 million or less across the lower 48.
Prioritization, communication, and data are critical
“It’s prioritize or perish,” says Schelble. “It’s critical to know what to focus on and what needs to be achieved, because there is too much to learn and write about in Energy,” she says. Schelble has learned to approach her work by clearly defining a viewpoint at the outset. She acknowledges that the path to strategic insights is seldom linear and often involves multiple course corrections. It can be tough to strike the right balance between exploring intriguing topics yet constraining the research scope.
The criticality of prioritization is echoed by Janzen, who says she has learned to strategically map out the key milestones and stakeholders required for project success. Janzen has learned to prepare for client meetings by clearly defining the objectives of the meeting, determining what decisions need to be made, and carefully considering the participant list. While she utilized prioritization skills in her role as a geologist and supervisor, Janzen says the skills required for effective project management at BCG require a higher level of deliberate planning and prioritization.
The length of typical consulting assignments is a key driver for prioritization. For Bottoms’s work in A&D, the duration of initial geologic investigations typically lasts only a few weeks. Depending on the deal, Bottoms sometimes extends the evaluation and works alongside a company’s technical team. Janzen says her assignments typically range from a couple weeks long to a few months. Schelble echoes that clients typically don’t want consultants or researchers to expand their scope, so it’s imperative to accomplish the objectives in the allotted timeframe.
Communication skills are another core competency emphasized across consulting roles. Bottoms says that he went to college in 2012 to study geology and geography with aspirations of becoming a park ranger. The thought of working in beautiful natural places appealed to Bottoms. But, upon reflection, he realized he was also interested in communication aspects of the job. “I like to tell people about the geology. I get to do some of that now, by getting people up to speed on the geology of an area,” he says. Bottoms describes that each deal is different and therefore communication becomes an art. He says he approaches the communication strategy by asking, “What would make me see the value in this deal or asset?”
For Janzen, communication is also a critical part of her role. Janzen says that she has learned to tailor her style to her audience. She communicates at a detailed-level to middle management and at an executive summary level to the C-suite. Schelble says that verbal and written communication are both equally important in her role – to provide the most value to clients it’s important both to write about the topic clearly, and be able to explain the nuance verbally.
Data is the most important enabler for Schelble, Janzen, and Bottoms. Schelble says that data on Hydrogen, Carbon Capture, or other Energy Transition topics are required to answer many of her clients’ questions. Wood Mackenzie is dedicated to developing data sets and providing research that transforms the way we power our planet. Woodmac has dedicated teams focused on developing wide-ranging data sets in carbon capture and storage, emissions, and carbon policies that help clients to make strategic decisions for the energy transition.
Janzen echoes the importance of having robust databases for her work with clients in the North Sea. Because it is a mature basin, it can be tough for geologists to get out of a task-oriented mindset and into a creative, opportunity generation mindset. If a client wants to better understand remaining potential, they need an easily query-able database of drilling results—but oftentimes that database doesn’t exist. Some companies don’t keep detailed records, and in other cases the data are not easily accessible.
Bottoms says that identifying upside potential is a critical part of his geologic investigations, because it increases the value of the asset. A robust database of competitor activity is critical to identify new benches or recomplete potential. Bottoms says that he first started tracking competitor activity as a hobby while working for Tapstone Energy, and he soon became “the de facto industry knowledge guy.” In addition to an interest in tracking industry data, Bottoms appreciates that he has a natural ability to memorize the relationships of geologic data across multiple fields.
Consultants are problem-solvers
All three of the geologists who participated in this article are leveraging problem-solving skills plus subsurface expertise in a new way. “If you can learn the consulting toolkit, a background in subsurface makes you really valuable,” says Janzen. Because of her subsurface experience, Janzen says that she can better understand a client’s pain points. Although she is not involved in conducting geologic evaluations for clients, she understands the drivers for both geologic and economic success. Similarly, Bottoms says his early experience as an operator helps him to think through a deal from a client’s perspective. Subsurface oil and gas skill sets are transferrable to many new disciplines and strategic problems. “You can make a career out of how to solve problems, and apply that skill to lots of different situations,” says Schelble.
