Local training and recruitment firm, Strategic Recruitment Solutions (SRS), has placed 26 sailors on ships involved in the oil and gas sector since it began operating last year, Chief Executive Officer Kerri Gravesande-Bart says.
Giving the feature address at the official launching of the company at the Marriott Hotel on Friday, Gravesande-Bart said that she conceptualised the business since 2009 and is proud that a decade later, she has been able to give birth to it. She said that the driving force of the 100 per cent Guyanese-owned company, is their passion to help Guyanese maximise their involvement in the emerging oil and gas sector.
“Today, we are making tremendous strides in the training and recruitment of our own Guyanese workers in the oil and gas sector. To date, we have placed 26 sailors on more than two G-Boats’ vessels and these positions range from DP (Dynamic Positioning) third mates, to cooks and the first employee boarded the Stena Carron last Friday. We also have a few more lined up to board and to screen,” Gravesande-Bart said. The Stena Carron drillship is exploring for oil offshore Guyana.
She explained that their intention is not only to provide blue-collar workers, but also white-collar employees while focusing on ethics and a non-discriminatory and gender-balanced approach.
This strategy, she said, will see immediate access to training and development for their candidates, which will include professional certification for senior executives and managers, as well as technical training for skilled and unskilled workers. So far, they have provided more than 3,998 hours of training for their candidates, the businesswoman said.
President of the Georgetown Chamber of Commerce and Industry (GCCI), Deodat Indar, also made brief remarks and hailed the launching of the company as a testament to real local content.
“…Ladies and gentlemen, this is local content. This is local content to the core and its 100 per cent Guyanese; started from scratch…this is local content in action,” he said.
The GCCI executive added that as the country continues to grow, the labour force requirement for offshore jobs will also grow. Consequently, he said, the scope for SRS as well as other companies that wish to enter the market to grow, is present.
“There is opportunity to grow but manpower in Guyana, the manpower itself in particular areas that are needed offshore on the rigs, on the drill ships, on the support vessels, the kind of workers that are needed, they have to be properly trained and they have to have some level of experience,” he said. Indar emphasised that there is need to develop such a pool of workers and create the structure for certifying them so that there will be no need to send persons to other countries to develop their skills.
This needs to be supported by the private sector to develop the facilities to have better institutional organisation, as well as have the backing of the law and government to certify workers, he said, while adding that this will come with a cheaper price tag.
“The training and development aspect of offshore workers is something that we are now starting the process. It’s on the road to develop but offshore workers are a different kind of workers. They have to think safety, live safety and operate safely…It’s a philosophy that Guyanese need to be aware of and it’s a different safety culture,” Indar further highlighted.
He added that the sustainability of the pool of workers to satisfy the industry needs to be closely looked at so that it can be developed properly in order for the country to become self-sufficient.
It was also announced by one of the company’s directing shareholders, Deon Vigilance, that they now have a subsidiary in Texas which will be referred to as SRSUS. The creation of the subsidiary was done in an effort to expand the company’s “tool pool,” he said.
Vigilance added that SRS Guyana will concentrate on attracting individuals with skillsets and knowledge bases that are currently unavailable in Guyana.
“Unlike many companies that have started overseas and subsequently partnered with local companies, SRSUS represents a Guyanese company that has extended its operations overseas with the sole purpose of talent acquisition and training,” he said. The goal is to afford Guyanese rapid knowledge transfer so that they will be able to “stand in our own fields without significant support,” Vigilance added.
