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The Women’s Global Leadership Conference 2009
A selection of quotes from the WGLC, held in Dubai for the first time.
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Dr Muhammed Saggaf, chief petroleum engineer, Saudi Aramco: “Women represent an integral part of our overall human capital and human resource. Today, we have 2000 students around the world studying bachelors, masters and PHD degrees, and a growing proportion of them are women.”
Ghaniya Bin-Daaer Al-Yafei, team leader – enhanced oil recovery (EOR), ADCO: “Things were very hard for me when I started 20-odd years-ago ? my work is very much in a male dominated field. But for the future I believe it will be very different, and I believe that women will actually be outnumbering men in the industry here in the UAE”
Debra Grandjean, oil and gas global client service partner, Ernst & Young: “The main challenge is retaining female talent. We realised 10-years-ago that women were not staying at the company, and we identified three main reasons: providing flexibility, having female mentors, and assigning the right roles.”
Danny Leinnders, client partner MENA, Korn/Ferry International: “We probably see less women in high powered jobs than in other parts of the world, due to historically not having the flexibility for women looking to start a family.”
Nassima Mohammedi, HR manager – oilfield services, Schlumberger: “There is currently a big drive from different governments to give women more rights, so I don’t believe this region is behind or less advanced than other regions.”
Paul Benson, managing director energy division, Heidrick & Struggles: “If you look at the Fortune 500 it has been shown that companies with three or more women on their board of directors have a 75% higher profit and 80% higher equity performance.”
Dr Pinar Yilmaz, manager – external project collaboration, ExxonMobil: “You always get more attention as a woman, whether this is negative or positive, so you must work this to your advantage – one thing I have learned is to have tough skin.”
Crispian McCredie, publisher and managing director, The Petroleum Economist: “If governments spent as much on university research as they did on other areas then we would be advancing in such fields as renewable energy much further and faster.”
Christine Lins, secretary general, European Renewable Energy Council: “Photovoltaic power in Europe has grown from 7.5 GW in 2007 to 13 GW in 2008, experiencing exponential growth despite not having anywhere near the amount of sunshine as you have here in the Middle East.”
The conference consisted of six group panels, who discussed issues such as renewable energy and the power relations between NOCs and IOCs, as well as the role of women in a changing oil and gas industry.
Orthman Zarzour, project manager – Abu Dhbai CCS project, Masdar: “By just accepting the fact that we are going to burn up all the hydrocarbons of the world in the next 100 or 200 years, then we are being selfish and extremely foolish – we cannot have our world run by businessmen and engineers.”
Aida Araissi, founder and managing director, Bilateral US-Arab Chamber of Commerce: “Some of the best companies to work for in the US make special considerations for mothers, not just having flexi time but other programmes helping them to balance being a mother and work.”
Ieda Gomes, head of new ventures, BP Gas Asia Pacific: “NOCs and governments control 70% of the world’s oil and gas resources, and they also dominate the downstream markets. What we must try and understand is the needs and wants of these governments and NOCs.”
Kate Dourian, Middle East editor, Platts: “Resource nationalism is growing so the IOCs must come with a completely different approach.”