Stakeholder Management – Ensuring Social License to Operate for Oil & Gas Industry

Abstract

ABSTRACT This paper aims to cover importance of Stakeholder Management in business continuity and its linkage with different business segments. Stakeholder Management looks at the relationships between an organization and others in its internal and external environment. Stakeholder could be a person or a group that can affect or be affected by business activities. Stakeholders can come from inside or outside of the business. Examples include customers, employees, stockholders, suppliers, non-profit groups, government, and the local community, among many others. Effective stakeholder management is very crucial to a company’s success. The core idea is that organizations that manage their stakeholder relationships effectively will survive longer and perform better than those organizations that don’t. All community relations issues must be fully addressed prior to and during the development of facilities via participation and consultative mechanisms promoting active communication involving all key stakeholders. Ensuring awareness of cultural differences, respecting diversity and adjusting our ways of working in different situations as well as recognizing and responding to government and community related expectations and concerns about our activities are crucial to companys business. Leading a structured stakeholder dialog and managing the stakeholder relationship is connected with all operations and starts from local communities, notables, political influential to district, division, provincial and federal authorities. In order to succeed and be sustainable over time, companies must keep the interests of customers, suppliers, employees, communities and shareholders aligned and going in the same direction. However, in some countries like Pakistan where industry faces difficult social and political environments where governments may lack the capacity, infrastructure or enforcement of legislation and regulatory frameworks, Stakeholder Management could be very challenging. Through this paper a model shall be proposed based on best practices of leading Oil & Gas companies in Pakistan, as how different topics such as Sustainable Social development, Community Engagement, Managing Social Risks and their impacts, Human Rights, Local Content & Related Security could be aligned to create the possible much value for Stakeholders and ensuring social license to operate.