100

Good thread...

Question about Loyalty: In this O&G industry, is there any value in being loyal to your employer?

After reviewing past e-mails and LinkedIn messages, I realized that I turned away +/- 75 job leads over 18 months while I was with my previous employer. The CEO keeps his job despite having "quit" the company several times while I join the thousands looking in a dried-up job market.

[/rant over]

Texas is trying to push through legislation to address this very problem.

WOW 100 pages !
Regarding loyalty... It died in our industry in the 80's bust. Companied discovered that they could treat so-called "loyal" employees ANY WAY THEY WANTED and suffer little consequences. Work em 7 days a week for years then throw em out with not so much as a thank you...so what..there were 10 more to take his place OR after a few years the guys came back and did it all over again. As stated above you need to be loyal to YOURSELF ONLY !!! The company is NOTHING more than the name on the bottom of the check. You are NOTHING more than the name on top of the check. And the ONLY thing important are the numbers in the middle of the check. Remember this and you will have a sane career....
CEO,COO,XYZ's what-ever the reapers of the rewards call themselves are ONLY interested in THEIR bottom line. They are out to maximize THEIR returns..If it so happens that the company as a whole benefits..ok that just a minor issue. You see ,everyday, where some CEO type runs some company into the ground only to get a zillion dollar golden parachute AND 6 months later another board of directors hires the same SOB-CEO to steal them blind, run them into the ground and get ANOTHER zillion on the way out of the door.
I am a fierce free market capitalists and HATE everything government but I also admit that the American corporate system is diseased and failing. I completely understand and believe totally that a company exists ONLY to make a profit for the shareholders BUT , today, that has been replaced by companies existing ONLY to benefit the Boards and their CEO's...Inbred interlocking Boards and the CEO covens are destroying American enterprises and our productivity. Your ONLY option is to somehow make it into the special status level in the corporate system, work like a rat, look out ONLY for yourself , take EVERYTHING you can ( legally) and ONLY be concerned for NUMBER ONE...YOU !!!!

RANT OVER....

quote:

---

It seems the only way to get what you're worth is to leave. I've seen several people that left Company A for Company B for 20% and then about a year later returned to Company A with about a 50%-60% salary bump that they left at A the previous year.

---

I'm not sure this is a loyalty issue.

Starred that because usually HR is a scapegoat.

quote:

---

quote:

---

You don't think it is a clear case of companies taking advantage of loyal employees by paying them below market with the assumption they won't leave? Our company does this and it is to the point our managers aren't even upset when we leave because they are just as tired of HR sabotaging their requests to adequately compensate their best employees.

---

In my experience it isn't up to HR to decide. They execute decisions not make them.....

---

I know you're in HR, but not one manager at our company (fortune 500) can speak well of HR. We've had them change performance reviews, we can't fire horrible employees regardless of how much documentation we compile. It takes months for a hire to be made after the manager signs off and that's assuming they don't screw if up. We can have positions approved with pay grades only to have HR offer something different and it sure as heck isn't higher. Try hiring qualified people like that.

I am not in HR at all. I have hired/fired and given raises to my best employees when I have needed or wanted to. HR has never been the hurdle but an ally to gather market dat to present to my superiors for approval. If it isn't getting done your don't have the correct data.

This is widely diverging from the purpose of the thread.

quote:

---

quote:

---

quote:

---

quote:

---

It seems the only way to get what you're worth is to leave. I've seen several people that left Company A for Company B for 20% and then about a year later returned to Company A with about a 50%-60% salary bump that they left at A the previous year.

---

I'm not sure this is a loyalty issue.

---

How do you reward loyalty? Through compensation. If Company B believes you're worth 20% more than what you're making, you're damn right that means Company A had no view of loyalty. I'm talking about influential, large raises. If someone offered me only 5% or 10% for a lateral career move, I'd tell them to go pound sand. But if someone approached me for a lateral move with a 20% pay bump, it would tell me that I'm more valuable to my industry than my company thinks.

---

Compensation comes in many different ways, you have to compare the full spectrum not just base salary.

---

I understand, but for this purpose I used compensation as my basis of loyalty because it's the easiest for comparison purposes. Personally, I work for a small, family owned company with 18 people including myself. These people do reward loyalty. It's evident in that the five original hires from 1997 are still there and it's evident in how they treat us and pay us. I'm 27 y/o making the type of salary that some people in my industry don't get until they're in their 40s. Sometimes never.

I speak on the loyalty part based on what happened to my father. He was with a company for 20 years and out of nowhere (2 days removed from returning from vacation for my brothers wedding) his position was "eliminated". Come to find out he pissed off the president of the company for not agreeing with a project plan. The plan the president went forward with went south, cost millions, and blew up in his face. Dad was a scapegoat and everyone knew it. His boss was crying when he told my dad. His boss was pissed, but he couldn't really do anything out of fear for his own job. Funny thing is dad got a job offer six hours after he was laid off that included a raise. His direct boss (the crier) called a few people and landed him a gig. That president has since been demoted to paper counter in a division that's about to be eliminated because they were bought by another company and realized how incompetent he was, but have to keep him for 2 years per agreement. Karma is a biitch in the business world too.

quote:

---

I am not in HR at all. I have hired/fired and given raises to my best employees when I have needed or wanted to. HR has never been the hurdle but an ally to gather market dat to present to my superiors for approval. If it isn't getting done your don't have the correct data.

---

I have worked at companies with great HR, no HR, and then where I am now. It should work like this, but instead of being a valuable support position to managers, however ours is a barrier.

At least where I work, there is a budget for raises and bonuses each year. That budget gets broken down all the way to individual teams based on performance evaluations. So at the end of the day, you only have $x to give your team raises. You could give everyone a modest raise or you could give none to one guy and double to another. But if you actually want to keep all your employees, giving none to the one guy probably isn't a good idea. HR doesn't make the budget and just has to follow the policies.

When do companies have to write down their reserves based on current prices. That's going to be a big hit to the P&L

I must also say that HR most certainly can create barriers. When I was hired on at the company I'm currently at, there was some interesting second guessing by HR as to what my hiring manager was looking for. It made the process interesting, like a roller coaster. I applied for the job, and was told they weren't interested if I didn't relocate. Fine, but the head hunter called me and I was always up front that I wasn't going to relocate. Then, the story changed and not relocating was fine and they wanted a telephone prescreen interview with HR. Then they didn't want me for some reason, but then my hiring manager wanted a telephone interview. The desire to move forward seemed like it changed every other day.

After being hired I sat down with the hiring manager and we mapped out how the second guessing by HR mapped up to decisions on previous candidates. It was interesting.

quote:

---

When do companies have to write down their reserves based on current prices. That's going to be a big hit to the P&L

---

I thought I saw something that SEC rules required writing reserves to the average price over the last 12 months. I think they price their reserves with their quarterly filings, but until mid year, there is a sizable amount of highs of last year being averaged in.

What is interesting is we could see a modest recovery in prices up to the $60 range but still see downward trend in reserves because you are replacing $80-100 months with $60 months. Might be interesting to see how the market reacts to that.

quote:

---

Loyalty is to your wife and kids, first and foremost. It is unfortunate but many that remain loyal to their companies will find their companies are not necessarily loyal to them. We are starting to see several cases where a former employee files for unemployment then realized the company actually had them categorized as an independent contractor thus making the individual ineligible for benefits. No bueno.

---

Talon,

Look up 84(R) SB 529 - relating to the eligibility of a landman to file for unemployment benefits.

quote:

---

quote:

---

quote:

---

It seems the only way to get what you're worth is to leave. I've seen several people that left Company A for Company B for 20% and then about a year later returned to Company A with about a 50%-60% salary bump that they left at A the previous year.

---

I'm not sure this is a loyalty issue.

---

How do you reward loyalty? Through compensation. If Company B believes you're worth 20% more than what you're making, you're damn right that means Company A had no view of loyalty. I'm talking about influential, large raises. If someone offered me only 5% or 10% for a lateral career move, I'd tell them to go pound sand. But if someone approached me for a lateral move with a 20% pay bump, it would tell me that I'm more valuable to my industry than my company thinks.

---

At some point you accepted to work for Company A for X salary, which sets your market value for that particular company. If that becomes outdated after some number of years or if you're simply more valuable for Company B, I don't see that as a loyalty issue. You could have negotiated higher raises or maybe the company is simply strapped by limited policies. Either way it doesn't mean the company is disloyal to their employees.

Yes. Non cash ceiling test write down for impaired asset.

I think it will start to happen in Q1 earnings calls. I believe you use a rolling 1 year average oil price to base reserves on but I'm not sure about that.

My Dad said "loyalty is the most important thing on earth". I was young at the time and argued back that it was actually blondes with big tits but in retrospect Dad was right yet again!

My Dad died long ago but our employees have each been with us a minimum of 13 years and a maximum of 40 years. We have never fired anyone and when I hire new employees the very first thing I look at is if they job hopped. Then I call their last two employers and asked their opinions. Loyalty matters to me more than anything else.

Seems like doing a good job matters more than anything else. Regarding loyalty, I think you are foolish to expect it. How about just do a really good job and let the rest take care of itself. Dogs are loyal.

Gonna be a ton of pissed off landmen in Texas. I bet we'll see landmen working for Texas based companies here in Marcellus looking to remove their case to a Pennsylvania court. PA is much friendlier to the employee than to the company. While we do not have precedent for this, it is going to be a pain in the ass for lots of our clients