Skill shortage is a reoccurring topic in the gas industry, linked closely to price oscillations. It tends to fade away when prices drop, only to re-emerge as soon as the industry recovers.

Already in 2005, Deloitte estimated[1] that a wave of senior gas workers was approaching retirement age, while the number of skilled graduates produced by universities to replace them was falling short of demand, especially in N. America and Europe. Later, in 2012 the first IGU report[2] on human resources anticipated that existing skill shortages in the gas industry were expected to worsen in the future, specifically for technical skills

These forecasts are now being largely corroborated by the newest edition of the 2018 IGU Global HR report. As seen below, retirement is by far the most frequently mentioned reason by gas employees for leaving their companies. As also anticipated in the Deloitte report, this is especially true for North America and Europe where, on a scale from 1 to 5, gas companies attribute on average 4 and respectively 3.8 to the frequency for employees indicating retirement as a reason for leaving.

Fig.1 Reasons Mentioned Most Often by Employees Leaving the Gas Company – by Region1 – least mentioned; 5 – most mentioned

Poor Knowledge Transfer

The 2018 IGU HR report affords us a novel perspective on the topic of skill shortage. It appears that the main factors…