British Petroleum and the Deepwater Horizon Explosion - Case Study Example

Exploring Change - A Look at BP and the Deepwater Horizon Explosion 0 Introduction While organisations the world over certainly aim for perfection in all that they do, the reality is that this objective most often is not met. In the case of global and multinational corporations, constant change through the years has been necessary in order to adapt to shifting societal norms, environmental concerns, prevailing market conditions, and a host of other phenomenon that makes the status quo of yesteryear non existent today. Companies and organisations that fail to realise the need for such change will likely find themselves moving backward in an increasingly global and competitive world. Sometimes change means being willing to admit that current policies and procedures simply are no long relevant. Other times, it means being able to recognise when mistakes have occurred, some of them quite dramatic, and looking for immediate resolutions to implement the changes necessary to ensure that they do not happen again. In the case of environmental disasters, this reality is even more apparent. A mistake that impacts life as we know it today can have dramatic implications on all of civilisation for generations to come. This is the reality that it currently facing British Petroleum in the wake of the Deepwater Horizon Explosion that recently occurred off of one of its oil drilling platforms. The explosion not only reflects a concern in the way the company operates, but is raises questions about managerial leadership and the direction that the entire organisation is headed in the future. It is this need to explore such change that forms the inspiration for this report. 2.0 Discussion 2.1 British Petroleum and the Deepwater Horizon Explosion The reach of the British Petroleum corporation extends far beyond the territorial waters of the United Kingdom. The issue at question in this particular study involves the recent disaster that occurred in the Gulf of Mexico on April 20, 2010 involving the Deepwater Horizon oil rig. This particular platform was an oil exploration well servicing the interests of BP in the Mexican region. During this even, there was a gas release and following explosion that released millions of tons of oil into the ocean, creating an environmental disaster. Beyond the environmental effects, however, BP itself came under fire for its handling of the disaster, illuminating some key flaws with the managerial structure and corporate operations. The immediate result of the Deepwater Horizon explosion was that eleven people died on the platform itself, and countless others were injured. While BP did issue a statement expressing regret over this incidence, and the loss of life that resulted, many feel that the company itself did not respond quickly to the disaster and the ensuing public relations disaster that followed the April event was near disastrous. Ultimately it was determined that certain emergency shutdown procedures in place by BP on the Deepwater Rig failed for function properly after a release of hydrocarbons resulted in the initial explosion. Because of this failure. the explosion devastated the environment for hundreds of miles around the oil rig itself. While BP has pledged to learn from this incident and never to have it happen again, there are many that contend that such promises mean little aside from a complete restructuring of the company, specifically in regards to it exploratory endeavours. This goes beyond an organisations desire to make profit, as that tis the goal of all multination oil companies. The incident itself speaks more to a fundamental breakdown in management theory and the ability of the top echelon to truly impact meaningful change moving forward. 2.2 Problems at the Top In any major disaster, the top management of a company generally bears much of the blame, and willingly. Even though the reality is that they were likely as far removed personally from the actual event as could be, they nonetheless accept overall responsibility as being the key people in charge of the overall operation. In the case of British Petroleum, much accusation was levelled at top management for not taking a more proactive role in managing aftermath of the Deepwater Horizon disaster. As such, it became evident that there were some deep issues affecting top management and that change would be necessary. Such a radical change requires a systematic and planned approach that aims to reexamine the core objectives and principles of the impact organisation. As BP is a large multinational corporation, group dynamics must be examined in order to determine what changes will stick and be meaningful. Consider the work by Lewin in this regard. Organisational change is best affected by, “An approach to understanding group behaviour by trying to map out the totality and complexity of the field in which the behaviour took place” (Burns, 2004, p. 981). For British Petroleum, this fundamental breakdown in responsibility lead to one of the most devastating environmental disasters known to modern civilisation. Change was necessary, and it would need to planned organisation wide and impact every stakeholder, from the top to the bottom. 2.3 Making Sense of the Problems The process of beginning to address the issue at BP first requires that a comprehensive analysis be conducted to determine the basis of the problem that resulted in issues such as the Deepwater Horizon Disaster. Within this reality in mind, it is important to consider that, “Traditional approaches to organisational change generally follow a linear, rational model in which the focus is on controllability under the stewardship of a strong leader or ‘guiding coalition’” (Greatz & Smith, 2010, p. 136). At BP, it appears that a top down leadership methodology has been employed whereby the massive scope of many of their international operations simply were not properly monitored by the very people who were responsible for ensuring that such a disaster could be averted. As a result, the need for change throughout the organisation is evident, and this will necessitate the implementation of a number of steps that are both predictable and helpful, each of which must be properly planned and managed (Levasseur 2010). The problem, as it currently exists at BP, is that existing leadership strategies negate the power of the individual within the company, eliminating the possibility of adequately receiving suggestions and innovative ideas designed to move the company progressively forward. In the case of the Deepwater Horizon explosion, warning signs existed within the scope of the project off the Gulf of Mexico, yet individuals responsible for the project itself were not seen as agents of change, but rather as automated personnel designed to accomplish and finalise an assigned task (Wolf 2011). 2.4 Bringing About Change Communication is key in brining about organisational change. In the early days of the problem at BP, top management was accused of not maintaining adequate communication channels with employees on the ground, nor was the company willing to be transparent with the public sector about what occurred and what they were doing to rectify the situation moving forward. Along this line, prevailing change management theories dictates that, “Organizational change occurs and is driven by communication rather than the reverse” (Jabri, Adrian, & Boje, 2008, p. 668). As such, the emphasis here, in an effort to bring about change, needs to be on having conversations across the organisation designed to elicit input from all sectors of the company that can help avert disasters in the future. Communication itself needs to be seen as an agent of change in this regard (Kotter, 1998). Through communication, change can begin to take place as everyone begins to align themselves with the same organisational vision and objectives, while attempting together to rectify the issues that have arisen from the top down to the bottom. This will certainly serve as a solid beginning point towards bringing about the type of radical change that will be needed in a company of the size and stature as that of British Petroleum. There are certainly more traditional theories related to change management that some would argue would more aptly apply to the situation at BP, but they tend to employ a more static view of change (McKinnon 2006). Change that occurs only at the top will not filter down to the very individuals within the organisation that can truly support new initiatives and implement needed policy shifts designed to push the organisation forward into a new generation that is more environmentally friendly and conscious about its role in protecting the world from future disasters as that recently experienced (Padar, Pataki, & Sebestyen, 2010). 3.0 Conclusion Companies and individuals alike do not want to be in the position of admitting a drastic mistake that results in loss of life and untold harm to the environment, such as the case with the recent explosion experienced by British Petroleum. Responsible corporate citizens, however, must realise the opportunity and necessity for change, act upon it decisively, learn from past mistakes, and make strides toward a more prudent and successful future. As has been presented in this report, the top leadership at BP is faced with the reality that change throughout the organisation is needed in order to rectify the problem of not adequately getting all levels of professional staff involved in making the important decisions that can avert disasters affecting the livelihood of untold millions of individuals. Moving, forward, the leadership at BP will need explore change, implement recommendations organisation wide, and move towards a comprehensive restructuring of the way the company as a whole conducts its international operations. References Burnes, B. (2004). Kurt Lewin and the planned approach to change: A re-appraisal. Journal of Management Studies, 41(6), 977-1002. Graetz, F. and Smith, A. (2010). Managing organisational change: A philosophies of change approach. Journal of Change Management, 10(2), 135-154. Jabri, M., Adrian, A., and Boje, D. (2008). Reconsidering the role of conversations in change communication: A contributed based on Bakhtin. Journal of Organizational Change Management, 23(6), 667-685. Kotter, J. (1998). Harvard business review on leadership. Harvard Business School Press: Cambridge. Levasseur, R. (2010). People skills: Ensuring project success - A change management perspective. Interfaces, 40(2), 159-162. McKinnon, N. (2006). We’ve never done it this way before: Prompting organisational change through stories. Global Business and Organizational Excellence, 1(1), 16-25. Padar, K., Pataki, B., and Sebestyen, Z. (2010). A comparative analysis of stakeholder and role theories in project management and change management. International Journal of Management Cases, 252-260. Wolf, J. (2011). Constructing rapid transformation: Sustaining high performance and a new view of organisation change. International Journal of Training and Development, 15(1), 20-38. Read More