David
What are your qualifications?
I have a B.Sc. (Hons) degree in Geology and a Masters degree in Integrated Petroleum Geoscience.
What roles have you had at Cairn?
I started as a summer student on a 3 month placement and stayed on to become a Technical Assistant. I then went back to university for a year, rejoined Cairn as a Junior Explorationist and now with my advancing years have dropped the ‘junior’ tag to become simply an Explorationist.
How does the company encourage you to develop your skills?
The annual development meeting allows me to identify and discuss my primary training targets for the year ahead. I am also actively supported by management to attend any training course not identified in the development meeting but which are deemed to be either directly relevant to the business e.g. field trip to study carbonate reservoirs, or beneficial to my own personal development. In addition Cairn also provided funding for my Masters degree.
What has been your career highlight at Cairn?
Being involved in the Rajasthan drilling campaign. At the time I was new to the oil business and being my first experience I knew no different. Now I appreciate the intensive drilling campaign and the number of discoveries was something out of the ordinary.
What makes Cairn different from other oil and gas companies?
I only have a 3 month internship at Total as a comparison, but I would say that Cairn’s exploration focus in what may be considered ‘unfashionable’ or frontier areas is the primary difference.