Year: 2018
Type: dissertation
Abstract: In 2014 oil prices plummeted by more than 40 pct. (Giles, 2016). The whole industry was\nforced to restructure to meet the new reality of lower oil prices. Equinor, earlier Statoil,\nlaunched the Statoil Technical Efficiency, here forth STEP, programme to meet the new\nreality. With six sub-projects, the STEP programme aimed to cut cost by 30 pct. At large, the\nSTEP programme was one extensive standardisation and industrialisation programme.\n(Aadland, 2015)\nThe STEP programme has only recently been completed. Great parts of Equinor are large\norganisations, run with a long time horizon, where changes take time to unveil its full effect.\nWith this in mind, the study needed to pinpoint divisions of the company where changes were\nlikely to become evident at an early stage, and perhaps inflict greater or more visual impact.\nProject divisions were found to be fitting to such a description.\nThis paper studies the organisational effect of the STEP programme in Equinor project\norganisations. It does so by a series of semi-structured interviews with employees in three\ndifferent project organisations. The aim of the paper is to continue the literature-study by\nBlindheim and Ryland (2015), and to evaluate the current effect of the STEP programme to\nsupply grounds for learning and possible corrections.\nThe study has sought to explore perceived differences in four categories; Efficiency, changed\nworkday, involvement and quality delivered.\nThe study found that the STEP programme has been effective in what is its main goal,\nincreased efficiency e.g. cut cost. However, the increased efficiency can hardly be ascribed to\ndifferent workday routines for the employees. It is rather the result of a changed focus in the\norganisation, along with better cooperation with contractors, as well as some improvements in\nthe TR system and some reduced robustness and redundancy of chosen solutions. Equinor has\nlimited the involvement by employees some, and that has resulted in some STEP efforts not\nreaching their full potential.
Source: BIBSYS Brage (BIBSYS (Norway))
Author: Andreas Hundvin
Language: English
Domain: Social Sciences
Open Access status: green
OpenAlex ID: W2897731765