How to Embrace Technology in Land Operations
Whether organizations were prepared or not, the "New Normal" has quickly thrust most professionals into working from home. Once seen as a challenge to keep staff engaged and on task even while everyone works from separate locations, today's tools are creating the effect of having everyone working and collaborating together virtually. While there were many initial doubts as to the effectiveness of a remote working environment, 2020 demonstrated that it can be done and be done well.
Key considerations for a productive distance-working ecosystem include open and transparent communication tools, collaborative software, and reasonable flexibility and understanding of varying schedules.
Many companies in the oil and gas industry have largely embraced technology, but use cases for land departments have seemed limited up until the present time.
Intelligent Land Operations Start with Investment
Budgets for cutting-edge resources have traditionally not trickled down to land professionals. However, there are tools that have emerged to aid in day-to-day workflows. Machine learning, a subset of artificial intelligence, is prevalent and is becoming a necessary part of creating critical efficiencies for land professionals.
Everyday Technologies for Intelligent Land Operations
There are multiple software-as-a-service (SaaS) tools that provide intelligent document recognition and text extraction targeted specifically for oil and gas lease and agreement analysis. These applications can instantly review a digital copy of an agreement, highlight the critical provisions, and place text into tables for import into the preferred land administration system.
Innovative start-ups are creating and distributing land management platforms that are designed by land professionals and are meant to be more intuitive than the traditional lease modules bolted onto accounting software. They are being built and used in the cloud for continuous backup and accessibility from any device, at any time. Given the ample options for technological resources, an organization seeking a solution could benefit from outside expertise on the evaluation and implementation of a new product.
Intelligent Land Operations
In the following installments, we will go through each step of the Intelligent Land Operations hierarchy and the actions you can take to evolve. This series is not asking you to forget everything you know about land and land administration — it will challenge you to think differently about how common key functions have been performed. It will also provide ideas and insights to consider in order to create the most value for investors and stakeholders in any environment.