Are the Oil Field Jobs Real?

 While looking over the Oil Field Jobs that are listed on different sites I find one big thing in common.  The requirement of experience usually three to four years.  In Ohio this experience is not profound! 

 I said OK self where are these employers going to find the candidates at then, why would there be a need? It seems as if the oil patch has a high turn over rate which tells me something must be wrong.  So are these companies  just bouncing employees back and forth, it kind of appears to be the case, as if not they will will be out of employees very soon. 

  The outlook for high paying oil field jobs in Ohio I believe is a myth with a few exception mainly in the engineering sector. We have to much unemployment for the companies to willing to pay wages like in ND with a small work force in comparison.

   You might say with CHK screwing up, the economy screwed up, the EPA like a buzzard awaiting kind of puts a shadow of doubt on the whole boom.

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Permalink Reply by Dan on July 25, 2012 at 4:50am

Amanda,

Good for you and your son!  With a nursing degree you will be able to work anywhere you desire. 

Permalink Reply by Billy Park Whyde on July 26, 2012 at 4:32am

I live near Zanesville, Ohio.  12% unemployment not counting those not accounted for.

 Dan the old days where you could walk in say hello and someone had a ear to hear if you were what they needed. Next thing a foreman showed up a brief tour, nice looking radial drill press, nice TIG that MIG is handy, nice indiac,  oh wow you have a iron worker. Within minutes that foreman knew you knew you had been around. 

  These days a college degree in humming bird breeding will get a machinist interview way before a tool and die maker would. 

  Ok I will be going down to a oil and gas company service provider. I will sit for an hour filling out a 8 page CDL drivers application. I will attempt to see if I can finagle a chat with someone that has an idea of what they really do outside of the office.  

   Do they need some one that can repair or trouble shoot a micro switch. Do they need one that can take a starter out of a truck and replace it as well as drive that truck. Do they need someone that could fire up a torch cut out a blank flange, drill it, tap it, or face it off in a lath. Do they need some on that can null out a gyro through mechanical measurement to less than .0000 mv?

  Ok that does it I am taking a shower and we will see.

 Result 1. Company #1 nice , did the app. talked to office mgr. nice chat might hear in two weeks or so.

  #2. Dropped off a filled out app. was cheerful, (very Well suited for this job) result, well I will be looking it over. 

 3. Job fair 55 miles away a major frac company might have cut a bit through the application process a bit even though I have been registered through the OJFS for them. 

  Sure a kid can get a job sell cell phones, be s server be a professional student while living at home. I started as a bus boy 55 cents an hour at age 14, ran a full service station at 16 doing oil changes, tune ups, repairing flats closing a station at night then delivering the owner $300 to $500 in cash! 

 "Billboards on the Interstates advertise for drivers" yes 36 cents/mile  (if your lucky) no detention pay, out two to three weeks if your lucky, sit perhaps a say a say and a half awaiting a load with no pay, dead head 200 miles for no pay and possibly make $300 per week if your lucky mind you that does not pay for your food , your cell phone required, laundry . 

  You can not expect a person to work for nothing. 

 In 1973 my uncle driving for Matlack was making $36,000 a year in a small regional area. Now 24 years latter if you make $36,000 a year driving a truck your lucky. 

  

Permalink Reply by Brian Powers on July 26, 2012 at 6:25am

Dan -

The drug tests are not just to get hired; they often remain random througout the employment period. I once had an engineer reporting to me who was "randomly" tested twice during the wonderfully festive Carnival week in the West Indies. Thankfully, he passed both tests and he continues to be a great hand.

 

Passing one test may help get you in the door; passing all subsequent tests and otherwise keeping your nose clean helps  keep you there.

 

Among the more challenging experiences that I had in mentoring and leading today's young folk was in balancing their high expectations with reality. I often refer to Generation Y and the Millennials collectively as the "Tee-ball generation," where ribbons and trophies are liberally distributed for merely showing up; results were not always expected nor demanded.

 

A lot of the young folks who I led expected unrealistically high starting salaries and perqs, expected generous training opportunities (often involving foreign travel), and expected unrealistically rapid advancement through the organization. They were upset when things didn't progress to their timetables and often left the organization. These were also the first folks who left early in the workday when the "stuff hit the fan" at the wellsite, which was often the best time to rapidly learn the nuances of the oil and gas business.  Many of them were uncomfortable with the competition that occurs for advancement through any company- life is a competition from cradle to grave, whether you like it, agree with the notion or not.

 

Brian

Permalink Reply by Billy Park Whyde on July 26, 2012 at 7:53am

Brian my only problem with drug test is I believe that politicians , government officials, judges and attorneys should be mandated as well. 

2pwt9ru4672sqPermalink Reply by 2pwt9ru4672sq on July 26, 2012 at 8:11am

Billy Billy Billy... you can't even pass legislation requiring the people who want to receive welfare and food stamps to take and PASS drug tests!  Good luck with getting politicians and government officials to do so.  As for lawyers... drugs are a necessity!

Permalink Reply by Dan on July 26, 2012 at 6:02pm

Brian, Billy, Steve,

Come on guys, the folks who give the drug tests and handle drugs don't even have to take drug tests.  Some can't smoke though and Billy is the expert there.  Our whole society has been made mediocre by the “test”.  School is now taught to get students to pass the State Exams, not to think and learn.  Drug tests don't qualify competence.  Does anyone really think a worker prescribed a particular drug is not a safety issue if the worker standing next to them taking that same drug illegally is a safety issue?  There was a time when tests were given to have an approximation of one's ability or potential ability and most new hires had the desire to work hard and learn.  The point is that is what you have to do to get the job today and then you actually are supposed to work and perform all the duties of the job. 

Billy, you are mechanically inclined and a CDL and multiple abilities.  I see jobs listed where the driver delivering the equipment has to maintain and repair the rig and the equipment.  I see sales jobs where you must deliver and repair and be on call.  Years back big crane operators not only ran the crane but drove the truck and oversaw the assembly and repairs. Many of these new jobs are like old fashioned jobs where you must handle many tasks but they also have the old fashioned compensation too.  Your not going to find the good jobs at the job fair, you need to get on-line and constantly search for the unique job until you say “I can do all that”

For a while I did recruiting and training.  Once I had the new hires in a group I would ask them why they thought folks coming here from poor countries excelled as entrepreneurs.  Always they would say things like our government gave them money to come here and open businesses and how unfair they thought.  I would ask them even if this was true, how many grants and SBA  loans  had they applied for to open their businesses.  Here is the challenge America faces today.  There is a work force of billions in poor and emerging nations.  They strive with desire to work and study hard because in their land if you do not succeed you may have the opportunity to watch your family starve to death.  For a lot of folks born here in the land of opportunity,  If you don't succeed you get to get food stamps and aid or have to stay in mom and dads basement and play X box and surf the net and watch TV, and fail the drug test.  Wonder who will win the world job game in the next several years?

Permalink Reply by Billy Park Whyde on July 26, 2012 at 6:29pm

I have seen  those from poor countries driving semi trucks. Two in a rig and between the two of them they could not back into a dock! Now who was saving money in hiring them.  In NJ saw one of those got the rig cock eyed in a fuel island tore the paper despenser off had twisted the pump about 2 inches of of square and had no idea as to how in the H to get it out! 

 By the way Haliburton was at the job fair. 

  Dan I have been random drug tested sine I was 17 while in the USN , 23 years civilian USAF subject to randome, USCG licensed subject to testing, CDL subject to testing. Truth I gag on a aspirin! lol

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