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| Online training ensures that all workers meet the same minimum safety standards. |
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World Oil: Could you give us some background on this safety training method? How is it different from other training programs?
Rowley: In response to industry, OPITO has developed IMIST, with the objective of improving basic safety training across the global industry, this standard approach will provide a more comprehensive and consistent induction program removing the need to continually repeat and duplicate training. IMIST can be done in a classroom, or it can be done online. Our company, Atlas, was brought in on a tender basis to design and develop the e-learning training program.
Industry has been adopting online training as a way of ensuring that high standards can be delivered to organizations anywhere in the world, large or small, to a very high level. For example, we’re delivering training in Iraq right now, because there is a need for another 20,000 workers in Iraq, as considerable training is needed to create a safe and skilled workforce for the future of the Iraqi oil and gas industry. Instead of training in porta-cabins and using instructors of varying quality, with online training you get a consistency of delivery anywhere in the world.
WO: Has the industry been receptive to online training?
Rowley: Online learning has been adopted rapidly by the industry. The IMIST program was adapted from the MIST UK program that has been running in the UK North Sea for three years, to provide a single training standard so oil and gas workers approach safety in the same way. To date we have trained over 60,000 people to raise the bar of health and safety in the North Sea. Ours is a truly global industry and the workforce is highly mobile, so having a global approach to ensuring offshore safety could bring untold benefits both for individual employees and the industry as a whole.
OPITO has recently opened an office in Houston, where they are working with training organizations and IOCs to deliver the standards that they’ve already delivered in other parts of the world. Atlas and OPITO are working in partnership to deliver IMIST Online to the industry across America through “Invigilation Centers,” which are being approved by Atlas. This is not just for the GOM, but for all of the U.S. and for companies that are deploying their staff overseas.
WO: Regarding training online—-is the quality you get, overall, equal to what you would get with hands-on training with an instructor and a classroom?
Rowley: Yes, it is, absolutely. It also provides greater consistency in the delivery of learning. You can guarantee that everyone going through the online course will be trained with the same level of content. That can’t be guaranteed in a classroom, as this all depends on the trainer, how he or she trains and how they deliver the content. E-learning also does away with the physical limitations of building classrooms and recruiting trainers, and it’s an efficient way to demonstrate that compliance and corporate regulatory goals are met and recorded. Online training makes sure that anyone going out to a rig, whether they’re in catering, service-and-supply or whatever, will have a good understanding of the health and safety issues on that rig. So it brings everyone up to the same level.
WO: What level of industry experience is IMIST aimed at?
Rowley: It’s best for people with 12 month’s experience or more. They can do the online course, which focuses on competency requirements to show that they know what the minimum standards are. They’re expected to already have the practical element down. It brings everyone up to the same level by asking various questions through the process.
Because we’ve got our own system called Fastrack, which is an algorithm put at the front of the course, it enables the system to know what you know and what you don’t know, so that no two courses are exactly the same. One person may take four hours to do the course, and someone else might take two hours, because the system works out what their competencies are by the way in which they answer the questions. Everyone must get 100% of the questions right.
It’s also a compliance tool. It shows that John Doe took that course on the 6th of March at 5:15 p.m. prior to being deployed to a site. So there’s a record and a database. It’s not just a tick-box—they must thoroughly understand it. Because we have that algorithm, the system understands what they do and do not know. You might come across roustabouts who’ve been in the industry 20 years. They say they know everything. When you check them, you find they don’t.
For someone new to the industry, they should definitely go into the classroom first. For someone with 12 months or more of experience, it’s making sure their competency levels are kept up.
WO: Are there recommendations for a certain number of hours of training in a year, like some other professional certifications?
Rowley: What the OPITO standard says—and what the industry says—is that you need to do the full IMIST online course every four years when your certificate comes up for renewal. That’s what’s happening in the UK. Some companies may decide they want to do it every year. Because it’s online, they have the option of using it however often they like.
There is a global workforce of over 2 million people directly employed or contracted with IOCs, and with NOCs. A lot of them are moving around all the time, especially with the skill shortages there are. It means training has to be sped up. If you’ve got someone moving from one of the national companies in the U.S., then they go off and work with Tullow in Uganda, then off to Weatherford or Transocean, then that person can use his safety training as a “passport” anywhere he goes, and it would be recognized anywhere. You don’t have to say, “do it the Transocean way,” or “do it the ADNOC way” or whatever. It greatly reduces the training money spent.
We’ve seen big changes from the past, where 20 guys get herded into a temporary building at 8:00 in the morning, see 50 PowerPoint slides, then when they walk out, they’re supposed to be competent. With IMIST, each individual has to sign off and get through a pretty tough assessment course.
The key thing here is it’s a global program. The industry in the U.S. has been thoroughly consulted about this. It can be done anywhere and uses the latest technology. It is using technology to deliver knowledge, competency and learning, and most importantly, it is done consistently. 
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