Communicating For The Future

By: Petroleum Services Association of Canada (PSAC)

In today’s new technological world of mass media, where environmental groups and protesters are also getting their messages heard through the Internet, Twitter, and Face Book, it’s now more important than ever that organizations position themselves effectively in the marketplace. Branding, stakeholder relations, and communications are considered vitally important to an organization’s survival and growth in the 21st century’s global economy.

Unfortunately, Alberta’s oil and gas industry’s almost century-old history has made industry complacent in its stakeholder relations and communications. Alberta’s oil and gas industry can trace its earliest roots back to its first boom in 1914 when gas was first discovered at Turner Valley. Industry has never been very vocal about what it did, where it did it, or how it did it, and after awhile, the decades rolled by with little fanfare.

But in October 2007, when the government of Alberta made disastrous changes to its oil and gas royalty regime, industry learned about how its stakeholders really felt about its operations. Even though it was later discovered that the panel’s instructions on how to review Alberta’s Royalty Regime was fundamentally flawed, which were a direct result of the disastrous changes being implemented, this led the Petroleum Services Association of Canada to realize it needed to strengthen its brand and renew its focus on stakeholder relations and communications.

“When the government announced it would be pursing changes to the royalty regime, I think most people thought it would end up being an issue that would cost the government at the polls,” explains Kelly Morrison, director of communications and stakeholder relations at PSAC. “When the government continued to enjoy the lion’s share of support among voters, industry took a step back to ask itself where the disconnect was between Albertans’ view of industry as a positive thing for the province.”

Not only did Alberta’s revised royalty regime provide PSAC with a wake-up call, but so too did the intense environmental protests of the last several years. Most notable on the list of environmentalists’ complaints are Alberta’s oilsands.  Environmental groups are in favour of more clean energy sources and have tried to persuade the public that Alberta’s oilsands are “dirty”, rather than raw, and should not be produced.

“While many of PSAC’s member companies are not active in the development of the oilsands, the negative perception that has materialized as a result of misinformation about the oilsands operations has impacted the industry as a whole,” says Morrison. “We get that what we do impacts the environment, but Canada’s oil and gas industry is a world leader for setting the bar high for environmental performance and is developing leading edge technologies and techniques that are spearheading the ‘greening’ of our operations. PSAC member companies are at the forefront of this innovation.”

PSAC’s mission is to champion the interests of its members and the industry. It does this by providing important industry information on its web site; by tackling timely industry issues; by producing relevant publications; by holding events; and awarding $35,000 in yearly scholarships to students and grants to schools to raise awareness of the industry and help develop the future workforce. At the core of PSAC’s mission is communications.

“According to the 2011 PSAC Member Survey, 85 per cent of respondents were very positive about the role that PSAC plays in championing their interests,” says Morrison. “But there is more that we can do given the same survey showed that many respondents were not aware of some of the advocacy efforts and other value-adds like events that PSAC delivers.”

PSAC’s communications plan for the 2011-2012 year is an ambitious one. Top on the list is to strengthen the Association’s brand; create awareness with its stakeholders about the key issues facing the industry; and promote dialogue among all stakeholders which includes PSAC’s membership, the government, and the public.

The Association plans to leverage sponsorship and partnership opportunities to strengthen PSAC’s brand and develop opportunities for speaking engagements and hosting. PSAC will also continue to work to further refine the PSAC brand to reflect the core attributes of the brand – advocacy, knowledge, communication, and leadership. This will help achieve more consistency across all communications vehicles.

“We anticipate the strengthening of PSAC’s brand will enable the Association to build our stakeholder relations and deliver our communications more effectively. We also hope to attract new member companies to our membership through a stronger brand positioning and clarity about the value we deliver,” says Morrison.

PSAC plans to focus on the key issues that matter most to its member companies. In doing so, not only will the Association provide relevant, timely, and important information to its membership through its web site, publications, and events but the Association will also strengthen its voice with the government by meeting and working with government officials and raising awareness of the industry with the public.

PSAC will also provide mechanisms to open dialogue with its membership. Morrison says, “We really want to hear from the employees at PSAC member companies about the issues of the day that impact them. Those aren’t always the same nor seen in the same way, depending on where one is in an organization. We hope that by actively communicating with our membership, we can learn about what issues are important to them and help them address those issues.”

Alberta’s oil and gas industry has been in a state of flux since the mid-1990s and since the global economy collapsed in the fall of 2008, which hit industry and PSAC member companies hard. As one of industry’s biggest, national associations, PSAC needs to strengthen its brand and renew its focus on stakeholder relations and communications to navigate the challenges ahead.

“Enhancing communications with our stakeholders will be a significant contributor to our ability to affect change and advocate for our member companies. We can’t just push information at people and expect them to digest it and understand it. We have to be willing to engage in dialogue and accept feedback – that’s the only way to improve how we do things,” says Morrison.