Oilwoman Magazine May/June 2021 : simplebooklet.com

1Oilwoman Magazine / May-June 2021 / OilwomanMagazine.comIN THIS ISSUEFeatureCover Story: The Million Women Mentor: Rebecca Ponton ......................................................................................................................18In Every Issue Letter from the Editor-in-Chief ............................................................................................................................................................................2OILMAN Contributors ......................................................................................................................................................................................... 2OILMAN Online // Social Stream ....................................................................................................................................................................3Energy Data ............................................................................................................................................................................................................ 3OILWOMAN ColumnsWomen in Engineering, Procurement and Construction (EPC): Geeta Thakorlal, President, Digital And Energy Transition, Worley: Sarah G. Skinner ..................................................................................................................................................................4Competitive Edge: Ace Your Next Virtual Interview: Amanda Rico, PhD ............................................................................................6SMB Leadership: Small Businesses Driving Big Change: Tonae’ Hamilton ................................................................... 28Fossil Fuel Future: Rebecca Ponton ...................................................................................................................................... 37Woman on Board: Women Add to a Board’s “Cognitive Diversity”: Lucinda Jackson ................................................. 38Oilwoman Cartoon: Andrew Grossman ............................................................................................................................... 39Dovetail Workwear: Sisterhood of the Working Pants: Rebecca Ponton ........................................................................ 40Guest ColumnsHonorary Oilwoman: What Power Means to Me: Chris Dao .................................................................................................................... 8Special to Oilwoman: Is Unity Possible in Today’s Competitive World? Susan Morrice .................................................................... 10Day in the Life: A Robotics Entrepreneur By Dianna Liu ........................................................................................................................12STEM in Action: Wanted: Thrill Seekers, Humanitarians, Inquisitive Types: Rani Puranik ............................................................... 14Feature Op-Ed /Commentary: Diversity and Inclusion of Asian American and Pacic Islander Women Past, Present and Future: Susie Y. Wong, Asians in Energy, President and CEO .............................................................................................23Mental Health Special to Oilwoman: Emerging from the Year That Was: Dr. Todd Ryan ............................................................24NextGen: “I Can Make a Difference”: Yogashri Pradham .........................................................................................................................26She’s Got the Power: Charting a Path to Clean Energy: Karen Haywood Queen ...............................................................................30BookSHElf: Lady with the Iron Ring: An Engineer’s Memoir of Hope, Luck and Success: Nattalia Lea ......................................32BookSHElf: You Are Enough: A Manifesto for the Overworked and Overwhelmed: Islin Munisteri ............................................33Alternative Energy: Power Surge: Women in Geothermal Energy: Claudia Melatini .........................................................................34Living the Crude Life: Living the Crude Life: Genneca Houser .............................................................................................................36

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2Oilwoman Magazine / May-June 2021 / OilwomanMagazine.comMAY — JUNE 2021PUBLISHER Emmanuel SullivanEDITOR-IN-CHIEF Rebecca PontonMANAGING EDITOR Sarah SkinnerASSISTANT EDITOR Eric R. EisslerASSOCIATE EDITOR Tonae’ HamiltonCOPY EDITOR Shannon WestCREATIVE DIRECTOR Kim FischerCONTRIBUTING EDITORS Lucinda Jackson Amanda Rico, PhDADVERTISING SALES Diana GeorgeTo subscribe to Oilman Magazine, please visit our website, www.oilmanmagazine.com/subscribe. The contents of this publication are copyright 2021 by Oilman Magazine, LLC, with all rights restricted. Any reproduction or use of content without written consent of Oilman Magazine, LLC is strictly prohibited.All information in this publication is gathered from sources considered to be reliable, but the accuracy of the information cannot be guaranteed. Oilman Magazine reserves the right to edit all contributed articles. Editorial content does not necessarily reect the opinions of the publisher. Any advice given in editorial content or advertisements should be considered information only.CHANGE OF ADDRESS Please send address change to Oilman Magazine P.O. Box 42511 Houston, TX 77242 (800) 562-2340Cover photo courtesy of Cole ChemicalLucinda JacksonLucinda Jackson is the author of the memoir Just a Girl: Growing Up Female and Ambitious about her struggles to succeed in male-dominated work settings. As a Ph.D. scientist and global corporate executive, Jackson spent almost fty years in academia and Fortune 500 companies. She has published articles, book chapters and patents, and is featured on podcasts and radio. She lives near San Francisco and is the founder of Lucinda Jackson Ventures, where she speaks and consults on empowering women in the workplace. Connect with Jackson or nd her book at: lucindajackson.com.Amanda Rico, PhDAn editorial specialist and resume expert, Amanda Rico, PhD, helps senior and executive-level professionals optimize their career proles, pivot to alternative career paths, land jobs and level up! Currently a columnist for the Houston Business Journal, she writes on the intersection between career trends, job search strategies, and the energy and petroleum industries. Dr. Rico, who holds a PhD in English from Texas A&M University, will be writing OILWOMAN’S Competitive Edge column, providing accessible, actionable advice to E&P pros. Connect with her on LinkedIn at www.linkedin.com/in/amandaricophdLETTER FROM THE EDITOR-IN-CHIEFCONTRIBUTORS — BiographiesRebecca Ponton, Editor-in-Chief, OILWOMAN MagazineAs the EIC of OILWOMAN Magazine, it is my honor and privilege to get to talk to some of the most incredible women in industry, and I always consider it the mark of a good interview if I have more material than I can possibly use. That certainly was the case with our cover story in this issue, which celebrates Asian Heritage Month (May) and Asian/AAPI women in industry.Throughout her 41-year career in the chemical industry, Donna Cole has inuenced many women and, in the last eight years, she has reached millions of women with the movies and plays produced through her media production company, Pantheon of Women.Earlier this year, Kamala Harris was sworn in as the rst female U.S. vice president, the rst Black woman and the rst South Asian woman to hold the ofce. Some of Harris’s comments undoubtedly will resonate with Black, Asian and other women in the energy industry, including those celebrated in this issue, many of whom have been the rst to break barriers in their elds.“My mother would look at me and say, ‘Kamala, you may be the rst to do many things but make sure you’re not the last,’” then vice president-elect Harris said during a lecture at Spelman College, recalling the motto that has guided her life. “That’s why breaking those barriers is worth it. As much as anything else, it is to create that path for those who will come after us.” We may not have a world stage or a theater stage, but we all have a sphere of inuence. We all can mentor – even unknowingly – through our words and deeds; you never know whose life you might touch.As Donna Cole said during our interview, “We all have to start somewhere.”Let’s start today!

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4Oilwoman Magazine / May-June 2021 / OilwomanMagazine.comGeeta Thakorlal, President, Digital and Energy Transition, Worley By Sarah G. Skinner WOMEN IN ENGINEERING, PROCUREMENT AND CONSTRUCTION (EPC)There are many facets that go into making the oil and gas industry thrive. Engineering, procurement and con-struction (EPC) rms are vital as they essentially put together the pieces that complete the puzzle. Starting with the straight edges and corner pieces, they methodically work until the last piece goes into place. Decision makers are key in this process and it is critical that the right people are involved. Traditionally, this has been a male-dominated industry but, as more companies recognize the need for new and advanced skills, they are making concerted efforts to hire and promote more women to upper manage-ment positions. They also are realizing the importance of diversifying their teams and widening the talent pool to give women every advantage in a some-times adverse climate.Worley is one company that not only embodies diversity and acceptance but celebrates it. Recognizing that the energy industry remains one of the least gender diverse sectors globally, it has taken on the task of narrowing the divide. Worley not only talks the talk, but walks the walk. With a management team comprised of six men and ve women, it’s almost a 50/50 divide, a rarity in the energy industry. Worley has a graduate devel-opment program that shares knowledge, skills and expe-rience by bridging the gap between academic learning and practical skills needed to excel in the industry and has an active Women of Worley global network which plays a key role in identifying mentor-ship opportunities for women.I had the privilege of speaking with the President of Digital and Energy Transition of Worley, Geeta Thakorlal, on her story, her successes and the future of energy. Can you briey walk me through how your career began and what led you to this industry?I got into it by accident. It truly started with my curiosity about people, knowl-edge and learning. I enjoyed math and science at school and actually wanted to be a medical doctor. I was talking to some engineering students, and I learned about chemical engineering and that it was more about problem solving, practi-cal application of knowledge and “x-ing” things. I also learned that a chemi-cal engineering degree offered a vast array of career opportunities. I attended the University of Auckland and it was the best decision I made. I’m so thank-ful for the great experiences, knowledge, technical, business and life skills that I’ve gained from working in several indus-tries in over 20 different countries and across ve continents. I can honestly say that the opportunities, experiences, global travel and meeting people have led to a very fullling career, most of which was spent in the oil and gas sector in upstream engineering in technical and operational roles and, in the last ten years, business leadership roles. As a woman rising in the ranks of a male-dominated industry, did you encounter any obstacles along the way?I think I can speak for many women who work in a male-dominated industry. It comes with the territory and is largely based on the choices you make. It’s how you present yourself and how you deal with the situation that matters most. I am fortunate that none of my experi-ences, whether they were on projects, in Geeta Thakorlal, President, Digital and Energy Transition, WorleyGeeta Thakorlal, then-president of INTECSEA, was a 2017 recipient of the Houston Business Journal (HBJ) Women Who Mean Business in Energy Award.

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5Oilwoman Magazine / May-June 2021 / OilwomanMagazine.comthe ofce or in the eld, were such that they set me back in any way. I actually found those experiences, where my male colleagues did not know how to deal with someone different, enlightening. I relished the fact that when these situa-tions occurred, it was an opportunity to share my background and to learn from them. This allowed us to understand one another’s bias or differences and use it as an opportunity to understand one another better. I loved that when I used to go offshore onto drilling rigs and platforms, I didn’t have to share a cabin, I got my own amenities. In a male-domi-nated eld, you get treated special. However, I must say, as you get higher in the ranks and get into more executive positions, it gets more competitive and challenging. That takes some effort in navigating. That is a different environ-ment you nd yourself in because the stakes are higher. In executive leadership roles, you need to possess the ability to read the room. You must learn how to present yourself to a wider array of stakeholders while maintaining your authentic self. What do you think the future holds for this industry and what is Worley working toward for the future?I don’t believe there has been a more challenging, interesting and exciting time in the energy industry than the present. In this energy transition, there is a profound change in how humanity develops, uses and benets from energy. Unlike before, the scale and complexity are different. The other different factor is that it is enabled by disruption facili-tated by digital. Urgent action is needed to address climate change. The devel-opment of cheaper, lower emission technologies requires everyone to play a part to address the problem in a sustain-able way. No one has a monopoly on ideas, and everyone has a part to play. At Worley, we believe we have an im-portant role to play in addressing these challenges and we are a key part of the solution. It will take world class engi-neering, scale and operational expertise to solve these global challenges. The massive infrastructure spend that will be required for technologies like carbon capture, utilization and storage (CCUS), hydrogen and renewable, in the future, is at a scale that has never been seen before. The investment is in trillions of dollars around the globe. Worley has a competitive advantage in ve key areas: long term relationships with customers who are critical players, our global reach, experience in deliver-ing technically complex projects, experts with transferrable skills and a more mobile, industry-enabled workforce. With a real commitment to drive change together, in partnership with our cus-tomers, technology providers and other stakeholders, we will work to solve the problems of the energy, chemicals and resources industries in a truly sustain-able way to meet the commitments that many companies and nations are making around net-zero by 2050 or even earlier. Our climate change position statement outlines our commitment to achieving net-zero Scope 1 and Scope 2 green-house gas emissions by 2030 and signals our ambition to be a leader, and this will shape our strategy in [terms] of deci-sions and types of projects we choose to work on. We are in line with the ambi-tions of the United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goals and also the goals of the Paris Agreement. Sustainability is a core part of our strategy and is spelled out in our purpose. We believe, over the medium and long term, sustainability will provide a structural framework for growth for Worley. WOMEN IN ENGINEERING, PROCUREMENT AND CONSTRUCTION (EPC)“We’ve seen a growing number of women in the EPC industry in recent years. Now more than ever, women play a key role helping companies adopt a more diverse perspective while accelerating the transformation of the industry. At Worley, we’ve seen women introduce new ideas, new ways of working and innovative ways of collaborating and conversing. Women who lead EPC businesses are inuential role models and allies for future generations of women leaders,” Karen Sobel, Group President, Americas.Karen Sobel on-site in Alaska.Karen Sobel, Worley Group President, Americas

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6Oilwoman Magazine / May-June 2021 / OilwomanMagazine.comAce Your Next Virtual Interview By Amanda Rico, PhD COMPETITIVE EDGEAs we collectively adapt to our brave new world in 2021, recent hiring trends have surfaced that pose new, unexpected challenges. One such challenge concerns job interview best practices, which have primarily shifted to a virtual format rather than the pre-2020, in-person structure that we knew well, for better or worse. For the most part, it was a given that we would arrive at a set loca-tion at least 10 minutes ahead of time, prepped and ready for an interview with a specic person or team. In today’s increasingly virtual job search landscape, there are new expectations and require-ments to consider. These expectations concern both the style of hiring and often unspoken expectations concerning technological prociencies, interview etiquette and the process in general. For instance, is it ideal to conduct a job interview with the camera facing a personal area, such as the bed? Probably not. Could your interview require you to record yourself answering a set of pre-specied ques-tions? Potentially! So how should you deal with these unknowns? Here are the top considerations for your next virtual interview: ✓ Create a checklist for success: It can be challenging to consider all the variables required to make the best rst impression. So why not make a list? The last thing you want is to “walk” into a virtual interview unprepared. Issues include a poorly lit candidate, underdressed, out of earshot or simply struggling to use the technology. To ensure success, brainstorm a list of topics you could run into from start to nish. These issues will typically lead to critical questions that require answers before jumping into a remote interview. For instance, I once interviewed someone unaware that their entire face was blacked out by the sun because they were sitting in front of a window. Additionally, this candidate decided to wear a casual t-shirt – and sit in front of their unmade bed for the interview! From purchasing light-ing equipment to practicing with new technology, creating a checklist boosts a candidate’s success rate. ✓ Prepare for one-way video inter-views: One of the most common job seeker grievances I hear post-2020 involves the rise of pre-recorded interviews. In a recent April 2020 ar-ticle on Flexjobs.com, author Rachel Peleta outlines the top reasons why companies use one-way interviews and the best ways to pass each screen-ing with ying colors. According to Peleta, “Sometimes called an asyn-chronous interview, a one-way inter-view is a pre-screening tool employ-ers use to determine if you should move forward to the next round of interviews. These interviews usually ask three to ve basic questions about who you are, why you applied for the job, [your] strengths and weaknesses, as well as other high-level items.” A one-way interview streamlines HR processes by screening more candi-dates at one time, widening the can-didate pool by removing restrictive location requirements and assessing a candidate’s technological skills. This pre-recorded interview is then added to a candidate’s initial application and plays a signicant part in determining the next steps in the hiring process. An asynchronous interview can feel, well, weird. Make sure to prep heav-ily, ask plenty of questions and look directly at the camera as you record – not at your image – to give the im-pression of maintaining eye contact with your interviewers. ✓ Show and tell: One common in-terview mistake involves answering questions without providing ex-amples. In a virtual interview, rapport is more challenging to build, so use real-life examples to support your answers to each interview question. For instance, a common interview question is, “Give me three words to describe yourself.” Rather than simply Photo courtesy of Tirachard Kumtanom – www.123RF.com

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7Oilwoman Magazine / May-June 2021 / OilwomanMagazine.comgiving three words, ground each skill set in a story. Using examples helps interviewers envision you perform-ing this action and, more importantly, begin to see you as a colleague rather than a job candidate.Of course, it can be easy to stumble when answering basic interview questions remotely! In a recent video by Houston-based HR professional Melanie Woods of CGL Recruiting, drafting responses to the top 10 most common interview questions will help candidates ace interviews and land jobs. Questions like, “Where do you see yourself in ve years?” Or “What is your biggest weakness?” are best considered before an interview to ensure a candidate moves to the next stage in the hiring process. As the COVID-19 vaccine becomes commonplace, face-to-face interviews may resurface. However, there are plenty of reasons why virtual interviews put a candidate at an advantage. Someone’s ability to control their environment from the comfort of their home – regardless of the location – provides job seekers with an advantage over more traditional interview practices. The aforementioned tips lay the groundwork for not only acing your next interview but landing a new job.Key Takeaways: ✓ Create a checklist for success: The last thing you want is to “walk” into a virtual interview unprepared. Issues include a poorly lit candidate, under-dressed, out of earshot, or simply struggling to use the technology. To ensure success, brainstorm a list of topics you could run into from start to nish. These issues will typically lead to critical questions you will need to answer. ✓ Prepare for one-way video inter-views: An asynchronous interview can feel, well, weird. Make sure to prep heavily, ask plenty of questions, and look directly at the camera as you record – not at your image – to give the impression of maintaining eye contact with your interviewers. ✓ Show and tell: Drafting responses to the top 10 most common inter-view questions helps candidates ace interviews and land jobs. Questions like, “Where do you see yourself in ve years?” Or “What is your big-gest weakness?” are best considered before an interview to ensure a candidate moves to the next stage in the hiring process. Show interviewers what you bring to the table using real-life examples to ground your answers to each question. COMPETITIVE EDGELUCINDA JACKSON VENTURESAUTHOR, SPEAKER, CONSULTANTEmpowering Women in the Workplace and in LifeLucinda Jackson is the author of the memoir Just a Girl: Growing Up Female and Ambitious about her struggles to succeed in male-dominated oil and gas and chemical organizations. As a PhD scientist and global corporate executive, Lucinda spent almost fty years in academia and Fortune 500 companies. She has published articles, book chapters, and patents and is featured on podcasts and radio. She is the Founder of Lucinda Jackson Ventures, where she speaks and consults on empowering women in the workplace. She lives near San Francisco. Connect with Lucinda or nd her book at: www.lucindajackson.com Just a Girl doesn’t leave you angry or feeling hopeless. Instead it oers solutions for how women can learn to stand in their authentic selves”— Kaya Singer, Author, Wiser and Wilder“

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8Oilwoman Magazine / May-June 2021 / OilwomanMagazine.comWhat Power Means to Me By Chris Dao HONORARY OILWOMAN“Perception is reality.” This was the very rst career pep talk I heard, as a freshly minted petroleum engineer graduate in 2015. At the time, I had no idea how much power this sentence would have over me. Power can mean a lot of things in our oil and gas indus-try – from electricity to the terms of a corporate joint venture or the dynam-ics of ofce politics. What does power mean to you?Those three words instantly lled my mind with dread and self-doubt. “What if I don’t belong? None of the leader-ship looks like me at all. Where would a professional of color, as well as a member of the LGBTQ+ community, even t in here?”That pep talk forced me to realize the reality of how unbalanced the power dynamics are in our energy industry, inequitably excluding women, people of color (PoC), LGBTQ+ and other minorities. We often feel like we don’t belong and, sadly, often feel forced out of the energy industry.As I chatted with my peers in our oil and industry, I noticed a pattern. When I spoke to peers who were minorities, or even multi-minorities, they still felt a sense of powerlessness and lack of be-longing. They told me about how it felt like they were continuously “working for the same boss, just a different face.” There was no diversity in our industry and there denitely was no inclusion. This was both my wake-up call and my “aha!” moment.I suddenly realized what power meant to me.To me, power means that there are other minorities out there who haven’t found their voice and that it’s my civic duty to help them nd it. It’s why I continue to advocate for ally-ship through various positions on the Society of Petroleum Engineers (SPE) committees, by empowering others who haven’t found their own voice yet. Like Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., I too “have a dream.” I dream of a better future for our energy industry, a more inclusive future and culture. I want an energy industry that doesn’t just toler-ate our differences, but an industry that celebrates them.That is why when I served on our SPE Hiring Event Planning Committee, I immediately looked at our list of part-nered professional societies. I wanted to see how I could help enable more minorities to feel that they belong at our SPE hiring event and, in turn, our energy industry. I wanted to be able to say that I had made a difference in someone’s life and our oil and gas industry, once it was time to gracefully step down.I served as the Social Media Coordi-nator and the Media Coordinator for our SPE Hiring Event Committee Board for nearly two years. During that period, I stubbornly advocated for more diversity, equity and inclu-sion (DEI) and I can proudly say that it was a success! We were able to include the Society of Asian Scientists and Engineers (SASE), Oileld Christian Fellowship and GeoLatinas in our SPE Hiring Event.This is what power means to me: I will continue to use my voice to help professionals who are women, Black, Indigenous and people of color (BIPOC), LGBTQ+, neurodiverse and other minorities to feel a sense of belonging in the oil and gas industry and to see and hear through example, “YES. YOU BELONG. There are people who look just like you!”Chris Dao is a graduate from UT Austin with a bachelor’s in petroleum engineering. He started his career at CB&I in facilities. Dao has also worked in upstream with Stryker Directional in the Permian Basin. He’s well experienced in project management, data management and nancial data analytics. Dao enjoys providing his skill sets and leadership through volunteering for professional societ-ies. Current committees he serves include: SPE Intl. D&I, SPE Gulf Coast Section Business Develop-ment, Houston National Black MBA Association (NBMBAA) and more. Dao can be contacted at chrisvdao@gmail.com. Photo courtesy of Shelly ChettyMarlette Dumas, PMP, senior project risk management engineer, bp, and Chris Dao.

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Introduction to the Oil & Gas IndustrySelf Paced eLearningThis short self-paced introductory training course provides delegates with an overview of principal activities in the international upstream, midstream and downstream petroleum industry, which can be undertaken as a whole (4 hours of study time) or as individual modules (45 minutes of study time).Ageing and Life Extension of Offshore Structures for Oil, Gas and Wind Energy6–7 and 9–10 September 2021, onlineThis course will give you an insight into managing ageing and life extension of offshore structures. Delivered by three engineers with extensive consultancy and regulatory experience of ageing and life extension of offshore structures.Introduction to LNG10–13 May, online & 1–2 November, classroom This course gives an overview of the LNG chain and the technology and economics of the global LNG industry. By the end of the course you will appreciate thecore technologies underpinning the LNG industry in Liquefaction, Shipping, and Regasication.Economics of the Oil and Gas Industry24–27 May, online & 8–9 November, classroom This course provides an introduction to the economics that drive the oil and gas industry. Topics covered include; the oil and gas value chains, costs, revenues, and risks associated with various stages in the chains, basic economic principles, the pricing of oil, and oil products and gas.Oil and Gas Mergers and Acquisition: Acquiring and Divesting Assets and Companies24–27 May, online & 25–27 October, classroom This course focuses on integrating an understanding of Mergers and Acquisition (M&A) activity trends, the process involved in conducting M&A activities and the skills that requires.Energy Storage Fundamentals for Energy SecuritySelf Paced eLearning & 6–7 May, onlineThis course provides delegates with a comprehensive overview of energy storage systems as we transition from fossil fuel based energy to renewable energy sources looking into the power and oil and gas sectors.Oil and Gas Industry Fundamentals – Awareness20–21 September, classroomThis course provides an overview of principal activities in the international upstream, midstream and downstream petroleum industry.Oil and Gas Industry Fundamentals – Intensive2–5 November, classroomThis intensive 4-day course comprehensively covers the oil and gas supply chains from exploration through to fuel retailing. Oil and Gas 2021 Training Courses For more information visit www.energy-inst.org/oilandgastrainingor contact webtraining@energyinst.orgIn-house training available upon requestThe EI can also create tailored programmes from a combination of our existing course content or develop a unique programme from scratch using our specialised qualied trainers. Introduction to the Oil & Gas IndustrySelf Paced eLearningThis short self-paced introductory training course provides delegates with an overview of principal activities in the international upstream, midstream and downstream petroleum industry, which can be undertaken as a whole (4 hours of study time) or as individual modules (45 minutes of study time).Ageing and Life Extension of Offshore Structures for Oil, Gas and Wind Energy6–7 and 9–10 September 2021, onlineThis course will give you an insight into managing ageing and life extension of offshore structures. Delivered by three engineers with extensive consultancy and regulatory experience of ageing and life extension of offshore structures.Introduction to LNG10–13 May, online & 1–2 November, classroom This course gives an overview of the LNG chain and the technology and economics of the global LNG industry. By the end of the course you will appreciate thecore technologies underpinning the LNG industry in Liquefaction, Shipping, and Regasication.Economics of the Oil and Gas Industry24–27 May, online & 8–9 November, classroom This course provides an introduction to the economics that drive the oil and gas industry. Topics covered include; the oil and gas value chains, costs, revenues, and risks associated with various stages in the chains, basic economic principles, the pricing of oil, and oil products and gas.Oil and Gas Mergers and Acquisition: Acquiring and Divesting Assets and Companies24–27 May, online & 25–27 October, classroom This course focuses on integrating an understanding of Mergers and Acquisition (M&A) activity trends, the process involved in conducting M&A activities and the skills that requires.Energy Storage Fundamentals for Energy SecuritySelf Paced eLearning & 6–7 May, onlineThis course provides delegates with a comprehensive overview of energy storage systems as we transition from fossil fuel based energy to renewable energy sources looking into the power and oil and gas sectors.Oil and Gas Industry Fundamentals – Awareness20–21 September, classroomThis course provides an overview of principal activities in the international upstream, midstream and downstream petroleum industry.Oil and Gas Industry Fundamentals – Intensive2–5 November, classroomThis intensive 4-day course comprehensively covers the oil and gas supply chains from exploration through to fuel retailing. Oil and Gas 2021 Training Courses For more information visit www.energy-inst.org/oilandgastrainingor contact webtraining@energyinst.orgIn-house training available upon requestThe EI can also create tailored programmes from a combination of our existing course content or develop a unique programme from scratch using our specialised qualied trainers.

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10Oilwoman Magazine / May-June 2021 / OilwomanMagazine.comIs Unity Possible in Today’s Competitive World? By Susan Morrice SPECIAL TO OILWOMAN What if there was a holistic model, one that had unity at its core, its premise being that at the heart of each and every human being we are all one/the same? What if we knew that our inherent es-sence is about unity and innovation and collaboration and goodness?What if that model had a profound understanding of human nature and the brilliance of the unied mind as the very basis from which, when it is ap-plied, the results are generated? What if that model can be learned by anyone, anywhere to bring about new solutions beyond the conventional rational answers that might have been derived from analysis and logic? That model exists. It is called the Educo Model, taught and presented at the Educo Seminar by Dr. Tony Quinn. Is There a Way to Mine for the Re-newable of all Renewable Energies – the Power and Potential Within?What if each and every one of us could learn how to draw from within ourselves the latent, innate power and potential which make the difference in nding solutions to our current problems and bring about equality and unication in balance and harmony with the nature of our world? A Tangible Example of Unity in ActionAs co-founder and chairperson of Belize Natural Energy (BNE), this is what I did, which resulted in the discov-ery of oil in Belize in 2005 on the rst strike, where conventional thinking and analysis concluded there was none. I realized that as a geologist I had studied the earth, but nowhere in my education was the capacity of our mind explained. I was asked how I came up with the idea and creation of “The International Pavilion,” inviting the countries of the world to exhibit their oil and gas po-tential at the American Association of Petroleum Geologists (AAPG) Conven-tion in 1994, and I realized I could not explain! At the same time, a famous oilman named Wallace Pratt was often quoted by presidents of the AAPG as saying, “Oil is found in the mind . . .” yet no one seemed to want to follow this advice and understand the mind and how mindsets are formed. The unied mind (conscious and un-conscious working in perfect harmony) naturally leads to the falling away of old, outmoded mindsets, especially fear and self-doubt, including the mindsets of prejudice and limitation. Culture of Inclusion and CollaborationFor BNE and its employees, who are also educated in the Educo Model, the resultant culture is about inclusion, expansion, innovation and creativity. Beyond prot for personal gain, the culture naturally leads to expanding into far-reaching projects, impacting commu-nities to bring about transformation and success in terms of awakening others to their birthright potential. Not only is the Educo Model at the core of the success of BNE, which has been the number one revenue generator over the past 12 years, but is also reected in crime reduction (by 52 percent in one year in the capital city Belmopan, as reported by then-police senior superintendent, How-ell Gillett); entrepreneurialism (Elsia Pop winning the Princess Diana Legacy Award); and education (BNE winning

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11Oilwoman Magazine / May-June 2021 / OilwomanMagazine.comthe GetEnergy Award, beating 42 other countries for “Learning at the Core” in 2013 and again in 2017 for the lasting empowerment of a nation competing against 50 countries such as the USA, Canada, the UK and Malaysia). There are issues we must address in our world, including those of inequality and prejudice. What if the answer, as Buck-minster Fuller so wisely said, is, “You never change things by ghting the existing reality. To change something, build a new model that makes the exist-ing model obsolete.”For more than 12 years, BNE has proven the effectiveness and validity of the Educo Model. A Call to Action: A Murmuration of Solutions Around the WorldWhat would be possible for you, your life, your community and our world if we all embraced this new model today? What would it be like to live in a world where we celebrate, encourage, col-laborate and innovate; in which our mindset is one of unity and expansion and creativity for all where we naturally consider and honor each other and our planet? When we learn how to unify our divided mind through a series of replicable, repeatable steps (the Educo Model), the striving and the struggle cease and we access a higher order of thinking and being from which all else naturally fol-lows. Consider what this would mean. Solu-tions beyond what we can logically con-ceive, moving us from doubt and fear to clarity and unity. All of us – one human family – moving together (a murmura-tion) for the good of all.Susan Morrice is the co-founder and current chairperson of Belize Natural Energy (BNE), which has the Educo Holistic Business Model at its core. This was the vital difference that enabled Morrice (and her business partner, the late Mike Usher), against all the odds, to discover the rst oil in Belize in 2005 with and for the people of Belize and in balance and harmony with nature. BNE won the Green Award and the Global GetEnergy Award for empow-ering the people of Belize, has consis-tently been the number one revenue generator in Belize and has inspired world leaders, resulting in a major trade agreement being signed with the United Arab Emirates (UAE).Morrice earned a degree in natural sciences from Trinity College, Dub-lin, Ireland, specializing in geology. She was awarded the Norman Foster Outstanding Explorer Award and the Presidential Award for Exemplary Service by the AAPG in recognition for her work in geoscience. SPECIAL TO OILWOMAN “Hello! Are you the man who believes that there are magic rivers of liquid gold running underneath Belize? My name is Susan and I have a special way of knowing if there is magic hidden in the ground just by looking at the rocks. Why don’t we have a wee look?”Mike was amazed that this happy lady, who always jumped into everything with enthusiasm, was bursting to help him!So, Mike and Susan joined forc-es and looked at all the rocks in Belize. Mike was overjoyed that he had now found a kindred spirit in Susan who shared his dream for the country.After looking at rocks for many years, Susan told Mike that she, too, was absolutely certain that the magic was un-derneath the ground and that she would help for as long as it took to bring it up!But Mike had notice some-thing else in Susan, too.“The more I get to know you, Susan, the clearer it becomes that you possess some sort of magic inside of you! You’re different to most people I know. What is it?” Mike asked his fellow friend.“You know Mike, I’m glad you asked me that,” she smiled.“I can tell you the answer. You see it’s not just underneath rocks and in the heat of the sun that the energy in the mag-ic of the world lies, but inside each and every living being on this earth shines a very power-ful light that is unlimited.”Immediately Mike felt a little tickle in his stomach. He was as sure as Susan spoke these words that they were [the] truth! He straight away be-lieved that this energy inside of him was just like the oil underneath Belize.“The oil within,” he said.The Magic in YouIrish author, artist and cartoonist Emma Maree. Her second children’s book, A True, True Story, will be released later this year.Excerpted with permission from the author of e Magic in You children’s book written and illustrated by Emma Maree. Available on Amazon U.S. and U.K. To learn more about what inspired Maree to write the book, watch this video clip https://fb.watch/56w3d8HJdI/.

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12Oilwoman Magazine / May-June 2021 / OilwomanMagazine.comA Robotics Entrepreneur By Dianna LiuA DAY IN THE LIFE OF . . . 7:00 am: By the time I get online, our European engineering team is already up and working, and our early bird Houston teammates have begun send-ing emails. I love our diverse and global team but learning not to check email immediately after waking up has been a difcult lesson to implement. This has become especially important in the time of COVID-19. If you’re not careful, working from home makes it easy for work/personal life barriers to disappear (or at least what little barriers exist for an entrepreneur).I then see a urry of exciting emails come in from our director of business development, as well as some beautiful technology prototype updates from our data scientist. I answer what emails I can knock out quickly, and then visit with our Houston robot team as they arrive. ARIX is building a novel pipe inspec-tion robot, and I saw an article the night before that gave me some ideas which could signicantly benet customers. I wanted to oat those by our product manager and design leads to see if, and how quickly, we could incorporate those into the design. Before COVID-19, I would stroll into the lab more often to poke around rsthand, but now, on days when I am remote, a video call to the lab video set-up works very well as a substitute. While I do miss seeing the robot in person each day and watching the engineers perform their magic, I would imagine that this probably lets the engineering team focus better, too.9:00 am: As a venture-backed company, part of my job is updating our investors. However, what we as a company ap-preciate more than just the money is the incredible knowledge and expertise our investors bring. This day, I’ve scheduled a call with one of our investors to run some strategy ideas by him. I love sur-rounding myself with mentors like him – people who have done it before and can help us see the big picture. I love how they can guide and push us to the next milestone but also aren’t afraid to roll up their sleeves and dig into the nitty gritty and whiteboard things out with us. Being an entrepreneur is a lonely road, and I truly cherish being able to learn from these generous advisors who just want to see us succeed. 10:00 am: We have a job coming up, so I visit with our operations and service manager to talk through the plan. Today, he wants to double check the logistics as well as walk through a job safety analysis (JSA) with me. Back when I was a young engineer at one of the ExxonMobil reneries, I absolutely loved being in the eld and working with operations. They are some of the most knowledgeable and hard-working people in the plants, and I nd myself missing that environment a lot. This industry’s focus on operational excellence and safety has been some-thing both our operations manager and I personally have lived in our past roles, and they are the foundation upon which ARIX’s own operations have been built.Now, while I try to be in the eld for our work as much as I can, I often nd myself living vicariously through our operations manager. He is a true gem who can run circles around me with his experience, so I’m condent we’re in good hands.12:00 pm: After catching up on morn-ing emails, I join my business develop-ment director on a video call and virtual demonstration with a customer. As our company has grown, I’ve focused on a great piece of advice a mentor gave me: hire yourself out of a job. This director is living proof of what happens when you do that successfully. Just a year ago I was the one handling sales calls all on my own; now, I am grateful to have such a talented partner that I can learn from. Whereas I used to do all the talking in calls, now I can focus on adding value around the edges and reinforcing key points while listening to him beautifully and concisely explain our value proposi-tion, service offerings, safety impact and cost savings to this customer. Although I unfortunately cannot attend every sales call these days, I always enjoy them and join as many as I’m able since being in the oil and gas industry gives us access to truly amazing customers. One thing that we really appreciate about this industry is people’s focus on safety and integrity, and that focus has shone through in every call we’ve had. 1:00 pm: Right after the sales pitch, I immediately jump on another video call, but this time with another oil and gas entrepreneur. One thing that I’ve learned after starting a company is that entre-preneurs are incredibly generous people who want to help each other succeed. That has resulted in many mutual men-torship or strategy share sessions, as well as some deep friendships.2:00 pm: We’re currently hiring for a senior engineering subject matter expert role, and I’m excited for the two inter-views we have scheduled. Our robot project manager and I have combed through hundreds of resumes of truly Photo courtesy of Tsai Center for Innovative Thinking at Yale (Tsai CITY)

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13Oilwoman Magazine / May-June 2021 / OilwomanMagazine.comBreaking the Gas Ceiling: Women in the Offshore Oil & Gas Industry by Rebecca Ponton | Foreword by Marie-José NadeauThe international petroleum industry has long been known the world over as a “good old boys' club” and nowhere is the oil and gas industry's gender imbalance more apparent than offshore. The untold story, shared in these pages, is about the women who have been among the rst to inhabit this world, and whose stories previously have been a missing part of the history of the industry.Available from www.breakingthegasceiling.com or on Amazon “As a CEO, I believe it is imperative for today’s generation of young women to realize there is a seat for them in the boards of oil & gas companies as the “gas ceiling” can be broken quicker and easier than before. Reading this book, they will think about these women who have gone before them and broken down those barriers in order to give them new opportunities.-- Maria Moræus Hanssen, CEO, DEA Deutsche Erdoel AG“My belief is that diversity is key to both creativity and solid long-term business results. Even in a country like Norway, where professional gender diversity is greater than in any other country I have had interactions with, we have an underrepresentation of women in top management positions. I would therefore like to express my appreciation to Rebecca Ponton for keeping this important subject on the agenda by presenting to us positive, impressive and, at the same time, obtainable role models.-- Grethe K. Moen, CEO & President, Petoro AS“Everyone needs role models – and role models that look like you are even better. For women, the oil and gas industry has historically been pretty thin on role models for young women to look up to. Rebecca Ponton has provided an outstanding compilation of role models for all women who aspire to success in one of the most important industries of modern times.-- Dave Payne, Chevron VP Drilling & Completions“Rebecca Ponton has captured the compelling stories of many women, both the early pathnders in the oil and gas industry and new entrants. Through these stories, it is very satisfying to now see that the industry has matured to be a place where anyone – man or woman – who commits themselves to high performance can succeed. No doubt we are all the beneciaries of these intrepid women who have dened themselves by their work ethic and commitment.-- Greta Lydecker, Managing Director, Chevron Upstream Europeimpressive candidates, and we’ve nar-rowed it down to our top six. Today, we have two back-to-back interviews, and I’m excited to get to know these poten-tial teammates. It’s incredibly humbling each time we go through the interview process, as the sheer amount of pure talent in the world is massive and is often taken for granted.3:30 pm: I nally get some quiet time to catch up on emails that have arrived during the day as well as to knock out some administrative work. When we started this company, I never could have imagined how many administrative tasks were necessary to make the company run smoothly. As a result, we’ve tried to leverage as many time-saving tools as possible in terms of technology and processes. There denitely is still massive opportunity here, though, in case any en-trepreneurs are reading this and want to tackle the administrative burden problem of starting and running a company!6:00 pm: I nish off my workday with a mentorship call from an aspiring entre-preneur. Both the entrepreneurship and oil and gas communities are so gener-ous and focused on building up the next generation, and we want to do as much as we can to pay it forward. It’s the least we can do for all the help we’ve received, and absolutely a core motivator for ARIX. The people are what truly matter in this industry, and what better way for ARIX to thank all the inspectors, engi-neers, operators, innovators and vision-aries at the oil and gas companies who have helped us than by delivering great service, technology and data to help make their jobs easier and safer?10:00 pm: After a couple hours away from the computer, I do a nal check of email before bed to see if there are any urgent new items needing to be ad-dressed. We have a developer who loves working late, so the last thing I want to do is be a block for something he’s work-ing on. If there’s nothing else I need to catch up on, I quickly glance over tomor-row’s schedule before signing off.Dianna Liu is the founder and president of ARIX Technologies, a robotic inspection company us-ing pipe-crawlers and a data analytics software platform to help manufacturing companies bet-ter manage corrosion and schedule maintenance. Prior to founding ARIX, Liu was an engineer for ExxonMobil with roles in logistics/operations and engineering. She also has had R&D experience in the medical device and pharmaceutical industries and prior en-trepreneurship experience in founding and managing a 20-year-old continu-ously operating online game. Liu holds dual mechanical and biomedical engi-neering degrees from Duke University and an MBA from Yale University. www.arix-tech.com. A DAY IN THE LIFE OF . . .

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14Oilwoman Magazine / May-June 2021 / OilwomanMagazine.comWanted: Thrill Seekers,Humanitarians, Inquisitive Types By Rani PuranikSTEM IN ACTION People are often surprised to learn, number one, that I work in the oil and gas industry and, number two, that I’m the chief nancial ofcer of a global company – and, I must admit, I under-stand. Not many women who look like me are in my position but, I assure you, there is certainly more room for us all.Worldwide Oileld Machine (WOM) is a globally recognized, multinational company established in 1980 with head-quarters based in Houston, Texas. With over 3,000 employees, the WOM group of companies is strategically located worldwide with manufacturing facilities, engineering centers, sales ofces and as-sembly/testing workshops.As CFO, I’ve been able to invest in diverse growth strategies and create innovative methods to redesign the business as a legacy business. My success is rooted in a practice I learned during childhood.Science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) are critical in workforce development and, if more of us open ourselves up to it, we’d see how both STEM and the oil and gas sector rely on each other, creating lucrative and meaningful careers.For those who don’t understand it, the concept of STEM can be overwhelm-ing, but it’s really not complicated. Studies have shown that in grade school just as many girls as boys have positive attitudes toward STEM subjects but, as time moves on, the interest dwindles among girls.At WOM, we encourage women, par-ticularly with a background in STEM, to join our organization.We are on a mission to do three things: inspire, serve and support each other. We are building a network within the organization which is positively impact-ing the community by mentoring younger women. Focusing on maintaining a healthy balance, last year we created a “Women of WOM” pro-gram which was designed for us to con-nect and exchange strategies of growth, personally and professionally, especially during the uncertain times of 2020. We want to talk about how we can improve the quality of our lives, which includes increased job opportunities.Even with all of the available jobs, wom-en’s participation in the energy sector is below that of the broader economy and varies widely across energy sub-sectors, according to the International Energy Agency (IEA). Despite making Photo courtesy of the Puranik Foundation, Houston, Texas.

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15Oilwoman Magazine / May-June 2021 / OilwomanMagazine.comSTEM IN ACTION up 48 percent of the global labor force, women only account for 22 percent of the labor force in the oil and gas sector and 32 percent in renewables.There is a breadth of opportunity out there for women, and we must keep in-troducing our school-aged girls to proj-ects involving STEM, opening their eyes and providing a deeper understanding of the important role the energy sector plays, in addition to the diverse range of careers it encompasses.I’m in nance and I love the arts. Cre-ativity is my passion, so STEM is in my wheelhouse. I have the ability to bring innovative ideas to the company, keep-ing the business abreast and in align-ment with its overall vision.Every area of progress starts with an idea. To put the idea into action, tools and skills are required. Just as in the arts, a thought or feeling is expressed through tools of paint or a musical instrument. Technology allows the op-tions and exibility, which can be used for a variety of applications as indus-tries evolve.WOM’s products have changed over 40 years and we have managed to keep Continued on next page...Amanda Rico, Ph.D. | rico.editorial@gmail.comwww.RicoEditorialServices.comExpert resumes built so you get back to work faster.RESUME BUILDING | EDITING | CAREER SOLUTIONS

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16Oilwoman Magazine / May-June 2021 / OilwomanMagazine.comgaining momentum. We continuously worked to develop, engineer and cre-ate our future in line with our vision. Last year, we were proudly named Best Workplace in the Houston Chronicle’s Top Workplace Program, our Helix was selected Best Project at the 2020 Offshore Network Ltd. Global Awards, and we hit many im-portant milestones in manufacturing and development. Today, our Magnum SP is a culmination of four decades of innovation, challenges, customer needs and environmental awareness.We are witnessing the impact of tech-nology right now during COVID-19. The world didn’t stop even though we were limited in our movements. We had to make major shifts in our work and personal lives in order to sustain.STEM is like a base tool for any craft and, once you gain expertise, you will be able to create, evolve or pivot as the world does. STEM has so many components. The work attached to it affects our everyday lives. The use of technology impacts the environment, pollution and our global community. If you really took time to see what is out here, you just might nd your niche.If you are a thrill seeker, this eld is for you. Now don’t get me wrong, you won’t be jumping out of any planes, but there is always a challenge and an adventure in discovery.If you are a humanitarian, this eld is for you. There are advancements in technology every day that you help create to protect the environment, remove pollution and do lots of other things that positively impact the global community.If you are inquisitive, this eld is for you. There is something new to learn every day.STEM allows women to utilize their specializations, technical degrees and credentials to remain competitive, and provides an introspective on different methods of solving problems, major cost estimates and evaluations that affect the bottom line. These skills give women opportunities to remain competitive and be promoted to posi-tions that once seemed completely out of reach.My mission is to help others reach their fullest potential.In addition to other charitable causes I am involved in, I am the proud executive director of the Puranik Foundation, which was founded by my mother. This organization, which is headquartered in Houston, Texas, owns and operates a school in Pune, India, called Vision International Learning Center. At VILC, we believe in providing educational opportuni-ties that open minds, stimulate holistic perspectives and inspire transforma-tion. Seated on 27-acres of sustainable land, our school provides free private grade education to underserved chil-dren grades K-12. This includes hous-ing and meals throughout the week, along with a curriculum enriched with nature exploration, mindfulness prac-tices, critical thinking exercises and leadership training.I believe that leadership is not about the position or a title, but it is about the inuence each of us has to impact the people in working environments that surround us every day. It is our duty to build relationships beyond our four walls and model positive, effec-tive and authentic leadership for the next generation.I am excited about my soon-to-be-released book, Seven Letters to my Daughters, which is about the roles that we, as women, play. The book gives us a perspective about life. Popular science tells us that the cells in our body are constantly dying and being replenished within any given seven-year period. With that in mind, there’s an idea that we can reinvent ourselves after each one. Being 49 years old, I divided my own life into seven clear seven-year “eras,” each one dened by a new identity, and shared my “life lessons” in a series of seven letters. Remember, there is always a way to be better, to be stronger, to be more effective and to improve your circumstances. Put one foot forward and keep moving. Rani Puranik is co-owner and global CFO of Houston-based World-wide Oileld Machine (WOM). She received a Bachelor of Science in Accounting from the University of Pune in India and an MBA in Finance from Rice University. Her debut book, Seven Letters to my Daughters, is scheduled for release in May of 2022. For more informa-tion, go to www.ranipuranik.com. STEM IN ACTION

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18Oilwoman Magazine / May-June 2021 / OilwomanMagazine.comFEATUREForty years in a male-dominated, cycli-cal and volatile industry is quite an accomplishment for a female entre-preneur and, last year, Donna Fuji-moto Cole, founder and CEO of Cole Chemical, reached that milestone. It was an occasion that should have been marked by celebration but, instead, she found herself in the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic, dealing with a serious family health crisis and nar-rowly avoiding being swindled out of $160,000. Any one of those things could have dealt a severe nancial blow to the company she has built into a successful enterprise over the past four decades – not exactly the celebration she had in mind. To her credit, she found the same in-ner strength that enabled her to start the business as a 27-year-old divorced, single mother to her four-year-old daughter, Tami, to keep the company aoat and even diversify into new areas of business when many others were unable to survive the crisis. The same mentor, who believed in her and helped her have the condence to found Cole Chemical in 1980, and later became her “signicant other,” is still by her side, having survived a near fatal health crisis last year. “We all need good mentors, somebody who knows us, who says, ‘You can do it. Here are all the reasons why I think you can [succeed],’ and ‘Here’s what I have seen in you and your work.’ I was The Million Women MentorBy Rebecca Ponton One of the bright spots in 2020 – Cole Chemical celebrated 40 years in business.

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19Oilwoman Magazine / May-June 2021 / OilwomanMagazine.comFEATUREvery fortunate to have somebody like that. Bob Berryman is now my sig-nicant other and we’ve been together for 35 years,” Cole says with a smile in her voice. Berryman has helped many entrepreneurs over the years and has had more successes than costly disap-pointments. It took some convincing on Berryman’s part where Cole was concerned. Prior to deciding to go out on her own, she had already been working in the chemi-cal industry and had encountered not only sexism, but racism early on when a Japanese company refused to put her name on the stock distribution page – despite the fact that Cole is of Japanese heritage! “I could have sued,” she says, “but I took the high road.”It also led her to the epiphany that if she continued to work for someone else, she was limiting herself. She real-ized that by starting her own business she had the potential to make a lot more money. “Part of that was just being a mom and wanting to put a roof over my daughter’s head. I had a lot of reasons why I needed to succeed.”Cole had the will, but she had to make a way in an industry that was not particularly welcoming to women and certainly not to a woman who was a member of a minority group during a time when there was still anti-Japanese sentiment in the United States. Despite the fact that in 1974 the U.S. Senate passed the Equal Credit Oppor-tunity Act, which “prohibits discrimina-tion on the basis of race, color, reli-gion, national origin, sex, marital status or age in credit transactions,” unmar-ried women – whether single, divorced or widowed – often were required to have a man cosign in order for them to obtain a credit card.“Nobody wanted to give a divorced woman a credit card,” Cole states atly. She took on some working partners to help increase her cash ow, in order to purchase raw materials and build inventory, a decision Berryman dis-agreed with. She eventually borrowed the money from him to buy out her partners and they agreed on a business arrangement whereby he would buy the product and then resell it to her, so that she could pay back the debt she owed him. “When you’re starting a business, you have to think about nancing and how you’re going to be able to pay for prod-uct. Not being able to get credit can be a deal killer.”Fortunately, her “angel investor” was by her side and some of the major oil and gas companies – Exxon (now Exxon-Mobil), DuPont, Shell – that had urged her to go out on her own stayed loyal to her. In time, however, during one of the downturns, she noticed company Continued on next page...Cole and friends at the 2017 Japan Festival in Houston, Texas.A member of George H.W. Bush’s Export Council from 1991-93, Cole met the president in 1992.

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20Oilwoman Magazine / May-June 2021 / OilwomanMagazine.comFEATURErevenues had dropped considerably from a high of over $90 million in sales. When she began inquiring, those long-time customers told her that instead of supporting local or regional suppliers, they were now accepting international bids. Indignant, Cole pointed out that she had not been asked to bid and was told that she did not have enough of a global reach. “As a business owner, I love challenges and nding ways to overcome them, but that was one great challenge that I could not overcome even though I had already been in the industry for 20 years. It was a big blow. Part of it also is taking a look inside at what’s going on with the company, what are the trends and what are the challenges facing us going for-ward? I could always look at the future and say, ‘Where do we need to be? What do we need to do to survive?’” but Cole admits the pandemic, this year’s devas-tating winter storm and its aftermath, and the looming hurricane season pres-ent formidable challenges to business owners. “It will be interesting to see how things play out in the future, especially for the oil and gas, rening and petrochemical industries because so many people are against us, but what they don’t know is, they can’t live without us,” Cole says, pointing out that electric vehicles (EVs) are made using petrochemicals. Citing the February snowstorm and power outage as an example, she asks, “What are we going to do when the batteries are dead?” As someone who lives in Houston, she thinks of another natu-ral disaster fairly common to the Gulf Coast. “What if there was a hurricane, and the electricity was out and every-body had electric cars? You’re trying to get on the road [during an evacuation] and they’re stalled because there is no way to charge them.”The snowstorm that descended on Texas and other parts of the south-ern U.S. as the country surpassed the one-year mark of the COVID-19 crisis served as a stark reminder “of how much the chemical industry is integrated into our everyday lives whether it’s soap or detergent or cleaners,” Cole says. “All of those surfactants are made from petrochemicals.” She notes that many products – from automotive moldings made from resin to engine coolant – were in short supply as the swiftness and severity of the storm did not give the reneries and chemical plants time to shut down slowly in stages, like they would do in the event of a hurricane, and suppliers, like Cole Chemical, didn’t want to gamble bringing in inventory from overseas.“We also sell to the electric utility in-dustry. During the freeze, they couldn’t get product to run the electrical plants, which is something people don’t think about. Even if they were able to get electricity off the grid, the plants can’t run without chemicals. You need re resistant hydraulic uids; you need wa-ter treatment chemicals because of the power generation in your boilers. People asked why they had to boil water. There were no chemicals to keep the water clean.”As a leader, Cole notes how important it is to keep customers calm and reas-sured that they will have the products they require in a crisis situation. “Com-panies need to nd a good supplier who’s going to protect them and locate and deliver the product whether it’s under a transparency basis or not. We have a clause in our contract that, even if our producers go on force majeure, we’re able to go off the contract price to globally source product for our customers that meets their specs to keep them from shutting down.” While high demand for a product might sound desirable, Cole points out that is not the case during a severe shortage.During the ongoing COVID-19 crisis, Cole Chemical repurposed its alcohols and glycerin to make hand sanitizer A former Girl Scout herself, Cole was the leader of daughter, Tami’s, troop in 1982. (Cole describes Tami as “very Zen” and says she is now “living her dream” as a yoga instructor on the Galápagos Islands.)“Every day in the chemical industry is thrilling enough for me.”

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21Oilwoman Magazine / May-June 2021 / OilwomanMagazine.comFEATUREwhich, for a time, was almost impos-sible to nd as demand skyrocketed and people began panic buying. Trying to help other small businesses pivot and do what they could to stay aoat opened the door for the company to supply masks, gloves and other supplies “to survive this whole COVID situa-tion.” In the process, the company was almost swindled out of $160,000. “At the last minute, the VP of operations, Jodi Phillips, got this gut feeling and did a little more investigation and, sure enough, it was a scam,” says Cole, who contacted the FBI.The pandemic reinforced the fact that reinvention is critical in the rapidly changing world in which we live and, most recently, the company has em-barked on research, marketing and sales of products from a proprietary carbon capture of CO2 emissions pro-cess. “It’s exciting to help companies meet their environmental and sustain-ability goals,” Cole says.She has seen a lot during her 40 years as an entrepreneur, although 2020 certainly presented unique challenges. Unfortunately, she hasn’t seen much of an increase in the number of women CEOs, who she believes bring “more caring and compassion” to corporate culture. “We try to treat people as hu-man beings in terms of what they need to relax and just do their job.” Cole admits that “prior to COVID, I was against working from home (WFH) but now I realize it can be done and there’s so much more savings in fuel, carbon footprint [and even our] work wardrobes, so there are some nancial benets.” Cole also thinks it could be mentally benecial to some employees – and confesses she has had to relax some of her rigid standards, such as answering the phone within four rings and not putting customers on hold for longer than 30 seconds – but she also misses seeing her employees face-to-face and having the opportunity to address things as they happen instead of after the fact. She has also been known to work late and send emails after hours, although she read somewhere that it sets a bad precedent, as employees will feel like they have to do the same thing. Despite striving for excellence, Cole says, “Oh, gosh, please, I don’t expect that!”She does have high expectations of herself and wants to pass along the wisdom and knowledge that come with four decades of running a successful business as a woman and a member of a racial minority group in a white, male-dominated industry. As a busy CEO, who is also a wife and a mother, it is hard to nd time to do that in the form of individual mentoring, but the woman who “loves challenges and nd-ing ways to overcome them,” found a solution in 2013 when she joined forces with several other women and formed the media production company, Pan-theon of Women (POW). In 2015, the company produced the movie, I Dream Too Much, starring veter-an actress Diane Ladd. Four years later, the world premiere of its stage produc-tion, Breaking Out of Sunset Place, was held in Houston. While each received critical acclaim, its 2020 musical, Lady of Agreda, was forced to drop the nal curtain after ve performances due to COVID. Most recently, POW released the 2020 coming-of-age lm, The Never List (hint: it is the opposite of a bucket list), featuring Asian actors in the lead roles. (Fun fact: Cole’s own “never list” includes scuba diving and skydiv-ing, bungee jumping, riding a zip line – “basically anything where I have to sign a liability waiver if I get injured or die! I have a huge sense of responsibil-ity to the company and my employees and I’m not that kind of thrill seeker [anyway]. Every day in the chemical industry is thrilling enough for me.”)Continued on next page...From “meager beginnings,” as she calls the early days, Cole grew Cole Chemical into a multi-million-dollar business.Making movies provides Cole with an avenue to “mentor millions of women.”

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Not only does making movies provide Cole with an avenue to “mentor mil-lions of women instead of just a few,” it enables her to combat negative stereotypes. “I think, if we can tell a great story about strong women and supportive men, we can empower and inspire them to make positive change in their lives and communities.”The ability to impact lives is some-thing that weighs on Cole who, de-spite being a successful entrepreneur at the helm of a multi-million-dollar business, is not immune to the racial tension and social unrest currently plaguing the U.S., nor does her posi-tion spare her from prejudice and discrimination. Cole recalls a recent incident in the grocery store where a child sitting in a shopping cart pulled on his eyes to make them slanted ev-ery time she looked his way, his father seemingly oblivious. “It took me back to elementary school when I was be-ing tormented and bullied.” She didn’t say anything to the child’s parent but, in hindsight, believes she should have.In a more covert example, Cole recalls talking to a radio show host about her 2020 musical, Lady of Agreda, and later mentioning the Texas Lost Bat-talion and the American soldiers of Japanese ancestry who rescued them. “There was dead silence. He was really interested until he found out I was Japanese American. I thought, ‘Oh my gosh, it still exists,’” says Cole, who remembers her parents not being able to speak Japanese for fear of being taken to an internment camp; conse-quently, she does not speak Japanese. “But now I have to be more proactive in my response instead of just ignor-ing it.”According to Juunishi, the Asian zo-diac, Cole was born in the year of the tatsu (dragon). As she explained in a 2012 interview with the Chao Center for Asian Studies at Rice University, it was also the Year of the Dragon, making her 60th birthday that year especially signicant, as she had gone through each life cycle – wood, re, earth, metal and water – ve times, representing the start of a new life. As she approaches her milestone birthday next year, infusing new life into Cole Chemical is on her mind.After considering a list of potential successors that reads like a United Nations’ of candidates – a Hispanic man, two Hispanic women, an Indian man and a Filipino man – Cole has xed her gaze on Jodi Phillips, one of her early employees, who worked with her before going to college and entering another eld. In 2019, Phil-lips rejoined the company as its VP of operations (and head scam detector).“Jodi’s really smart; actually, she’s much smarter than I am,” Cole says self-deprecatingly. “We complement each other. I’m more of a visionary and a people person, and she’s very analytical and detailed so, between the two of us, we’re able to balance out into a whole person,” Cole says laughing.“Down the road, I look forward to hopefully selling her 49 percent of the business with my share being 51 percent. I’ll let her lead the company while I sit back as chairman of the board and make the nancial deci-sions, the big decisions.” With Berry-man, now fully recovered, by her side, it will be the start of a new life. FEATURECole, at the Queensbury Theatre, in Houston, Texas, is one of the founders of the media company, Pantheon of Women.“If we can tell a great story about strong women and supportive men, we can empower them.”22Oilwoman Magazine / May-June 2021 / OilwomanMagazine.com

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23Oilwoman Magazine / May-June 2021 / OilwomanMagazine.comAs we celebrate and observe Asian Heritage Month and the achievements of Asian women in industry, we want to state our support of the Asian/AAPI community, both in the U.S. and worldwide, as we acknowledge and thank it for its continuing role in and contributions to the energy industry. We are a better and stronger industry when we stand in unity and embrace all forms of diversity and inclusion. FEATURE OP-ED /COMMENTARYDiversity and Inclusion of Asian American and Pacific Islander Women Past, Present and Future By Susie Y. Wong, Asians in Energy, President and CEOWe enjoy such great social diversity, strength and potential in the oil and gas industry and wherever we em-brace our differences and understand they make us stronger and more vibrant. In May, during Asian Ameri-can Pacic Islander (AAPI) Month, we recognize the contributions of Asian Americans who work in the oil and gas industry who strive every day to make our nation better, for our children, their children and future generations. Today, the Asian American and Pacic Islander women in leadership roles remind us of the proud chapters of our history, despite Asian-American women often being typecast as meek or unassertive, rather than leaders.A game-changing energy leader who broke the bamboo ceiling is Anne Shen Smith, our Asians in Energy 2017 honoree, who served as chair-man and CEO of Southern California Gas Company, a subsidiary of Sempra Energy, and retired after a 36-year career with that company. She led the nation’s largest natural gas distribution utility, providing service to over 21 million consumers in more than 500 communities in Central and Southern California. Her leadership has paved the way for a younger generation of Asian American women and made a lasting difference for legions of women striving to reach the C-suite.As the oil and gas industry prepares workers to become engaged 21st century citizens, we have an obliga-tion to offer rich and varied programs focused on the nexus of energy, inno-vation and research, and environmen-tal sustainability. That means training the pipeline of energy talent needed, while serving the needs of the oil and gas industry. We honor the invaluable roles Asian American women have played in our past, and we recommit to ensuring that opportunities exist for generations of Asian American women to come. Susie Y. Wong is the president and CEO of Asians in Energy. She is also the managing principal consultant at Wong Public Affairs. Together, we are the global energy community.&

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24Oilwoman Magazine / May-June 2021 / OilwomanMagazine.comEmerging from the Year That Was By Dr. Ryan ToddMENTAL HEALTH SPECIAL TO OILWOMANWhile most of us are eager to put the pandemic behind us and return to “normal,” we know that the world we are reentering in 2021 looks very dif-ferent than the one that turned upside down – taking our lives with it – in 2020. It’s important to remain optimis-tic while also being realistic about what we can expect as we venture back into a changed world, as changed people.Our Collective New Normal The full effects of the pandemic on our mental health won’t be known for some time. To try to sum up the range of emotions that the average person went through this past year wouldn’t do it justice. It’s hard to comprehend what we’ve had to endure, even for those who have had it good by comparison. What we know is stress has never been experienced at the levels we’ve seen in the past year. Many people went through loneliness, isolation, depression and anxiety for the rst time in their lives. Women were hit hardest, with many fullling career obligations, in addition to disproportionate household work and childcare responsibilities.It will take a while for the fog to lift, so people need to be patient with each other and with themselves, as many will still be mentally recovering from the year that was.Hello, WorldWhere many of us will rejoice at the return to our routines, it has been a long journey of exercising caution and limit-ing contact to our immediate families to minimize the spread. As parents whose job it’s been to keep their families safe, the emptying of the nest will be a huge adjustment and take some getting used to. After all, we’ve spent over a year in our COVID “pods.”Symptoms of anxiety have been made worse in the last year by lack of expo-sure to anything but our bubbles. With people who were already anxious while isolating themselves for over a year, leaving the house and familiar sur-roundings can be quite difcult.A study from the American Psychologi-cal Association showed about half of adults are feeling uncomfortable return-ing to in-person interactions once the pandemic ends. If your anxiety feels overwhelming or is debilitating, seek professional help from your doctor or a counselor, many of whom offer telemed services, if you feel more com-fortable at home.Goodbye, HomeschoolingWith COVID-19 variants that have made the younger population more susceptible to contracting the virus than the initial strands, combined with the much slower vaccination process for children, there will be more risk for kids who are going back to school than many parents will feel comfortable with.Emotionally, kids have missed more than a year’s worth of birthday par-ties, graduation ceremonies, sports and recreational activities, and extra-curricular activities. This window of time is a substantial portion of young children’s lives, and it’s hard to know the emotional toll it will have taken. Anxi-ety and depression are not limited to adults. If your child or teenager seems overly fearful, nervous or reticent about returning to school, talk to their doctor about how to ease their concerns.Mothers, who have taken on the dispro-portionate share of childcare duties and have been the protectors of their chil-dren’s safety, will have the added stress of their kids being put in harm’s way, both physically and emotionally, once again. Take care of your mental health and well-being rst, so you can help guide your family through any emotion-al difculties they may be experiencing.Re-integrating into SocietyWith more than a year’s worth of physi-cal isolation that has restricted social visits to virtual hangouts or outdoor and distanced visits, it’s likely that many people will have developed some sort of quarantine-induced social anxiety.Whether you’ve struggled for a while with social worries or nd yourself feel- Photo courtesy of Imagehit Asia – www.123RF.com

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25Oilwoman Magazine / May-June 2021 / OilwomanMagazine.coming more awkward than usual around people during the pandemic, worrying excessively actually can shrink your life and develop into social anxiety disor-ders. It may take time to reintegrate. Move at your own pace and don’t feel pressured to keep up with anyone else.Stats suggest that women have left jobs at a clip up to ten times higher than men during the pandemic, so a return to a social environment in any capac-ity will likely be a shock to our systems that will take time to adjust to. Envisioning the FutureNot all things brought on by COVID -19 were negative. People were able to slow the pace of their lives and give attention to things that were previously put off. Forcibly, it brought all of us more time and restored some balance from the pace of life we lived before. While many of us are yearning for a return to old routines, we also have been presented with the opportunity to re-evaluate what routines work and which ones no longer do.The new normal thrust us into a digital transformation that took some time to adapt to. However, after the initial pe-riod of adjustment, many people have found it has helped restore balance to their lives and provided additional time to enjoy things we previously were unable to, which can be a tremendous boost to our mental health.Dr. Ryan Todd, a psychiatrist, is an award-winning lmmaker and host of the podcast Beyond the Checkbox, the goal of which is to help listeners future-proof their organizations. He is also the founder/CEO of mental health tech startup, headversity. About headversityheadversity is a workplace mental health and resilience platform built for the modern workforce. Like a personal-ized resilience trainer in your pocket, headversity allows organizations to put the mental health and performance of employees back into their hands. Rooted in neuroscience, psychiatry, and performance psychology, headversity delivers vital resilience skill training to help your people think, feel and be bet-ter, rain or shine. headversity was born in Alberta, Canada, in 2018. Its plat-form is deployed across 15 industries and 150 organizations throughout the U.S. and Canada, positively impacting over 500,000 lives worldwide. For more, see www.headversity.com. MENTAL HEALTH SPECIAL TO OILWOMANMay is mental health awareness month in the U.S. For information and resources, go to www.nami.org/Get-Involved/Awareness-Events/Mental-Health-Awareness-Month.SUBSCRIBE TODAY!Get the Oil & Gas news and data you need in a magazine you’ll be proud to read. To subscribe, complete a quick form online:OilwomanMagazine.com/advertise Editor@OilmanMagazine.com (800) 562-2340 Ex. 5

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26Oilwoman Magazine / May-June 2021 / OilwomanMagazine.com“I Can Make a Difference” By Yogashri Pradham NEXTGENAs a toddler, my parents knew I was good at math and science. I had a pas-sion for counting and reading simple books about science. To foster this talent, my parents bought more toys relating to [those disciplines] and that’s how I devloped my passion. I was con-sistent in improving my skills by attend-ing competitions and challenging myself with advanced courses. I am blessed to have parents that understood my talents and encouraged me to pursue STEM at a very young age. I was fortunate not to have encountered the barriers that some women face when even being exposed to math and science. Engineering and medi-cine seemed to be tangible goals for me.Before attending high school, I attended a camp called GRADE hosted by the University of Houston. This is a ve-day camp introducing teenage women to en-gineering through robotics and teaching other engineering concepts. There was one session during the camp where we got to meet people from different en-gineering disciplines around the Hous-ton area, and I met a number of folks from the oil and gas industry. From that experience, I had petroleum engineering in the back of my mind, but I knew I wanted to pursue a STEM career even more after GRADE camp.A fun fact about myself is that I was also on my high school’s speech and debate teams. While I was also think-ing about a career in law, I learned a lot about current events from this activity, such as how the world economy works and the inuence of energy on geo-politics. I knew I wanted to be a part of the oil and gas industry because of the dynamic nature of the sector and the level of inuence it has on people’s qual-ity of life. When researching for college majors, I did not know that a petroleum engineering degree existed locally (and at some of the best schools, at that). As a junior, I knew I wanted to pursue a ca-reer in petroleum engineering and study at the University of Texas at Austin.My last year of college was formative for me in learning about petroleum engineering and even starting my career at that time. Our school district has a gifted and talented mentorship program, where high performing students would be selected from around the district to pursue a mentorship in their career of choice. In the rst semester, students would write a research paper on a topic that interests them in their selected ca-reer. The second semester would involve nding a mentor and pursuing a mentor-ship until graduation. I stumbled across CO2 ooding as a high school senior when researching OnePetro papers in the University of Houston Anderson library and attempted to write a research paper on the subject.We learned how to write cold emails near the end of the rst semester of my senior year; little did I know that this would be essential for job searching in the future. Out of all the cold emails I wrote to industry contacts around the Houston area, I received one response, and that was my rst mentor in the oil and gas industry. He worked for a con-sulting rm and invited me to interview. I not only ended up with a mentorship for the spring, but also a summer intern-ship before my university studies.My rst mentor taught me a lot about the oil and gas industry. I learned about articial lift as my topic of research for my nal presentation for the mentorship program. He also introduced me to nu-merous SPE conferences, such as Digital Oileld and the Offshore Technology Conference in Houston. I also was introduced to the Society of Petroleum Engineers (and an active Gulf Coast Section) and learned the importance of networking as well as building relation-ships in the industry. My passion for STEM opened doors for me that have benetted my career to this date.Who says there was nothing to celebrate in 2020? On October 17, 2020, Yogashri Pradhan, senior reservoir engineer with Endeavor Energy, and Ryan Yarger were married by Dawson Hoover in Midland, Texas, on-site at the Tex Harvey Spraberry 941H. Two months later, on December 11, 2020, Pradhan graduated from Texas A&M with a Master of Science – Petroleum Engineering. Congratulations! Photo courtesy of Deanna Racca.

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27Oilwoman Magazine / May-June 2021 / OilwomanMagazine.comNEXTGENI am passionate about STEM not just because I was good at the subjects, but my experiences showed me that I can make a difference in the world by applying math and science skills. For instance, oil and gas are the world’s largest energy resources and the energy density alone can support the world’s demand. Ap-plying my skills to learn how oil and gas can be efciently extracted from the ground makes oil and gas a low cost, affordable energy, improving the world’s quality of life. From my experiences, attracting others to STEM should start at a very young age. I was fortunate to have parents that observed my talents. Introducing young girls to math and science and fostering those talents can lead to advancement in those skill sets and an unstoppable career in STEM. The next step would be to build a community of support for girls getting into STEM by partici-pating in competitions and advancing the STEM skills and passion. Finally, retaining women in STEM occurs at many levels, including in college. Having industry representatives notice talented women in STEM improves the recruit-ment rate entering the industry and later advancing in their careers.Yogashri Pradhan, M.S., P.E., is a senior reservoir engineer working in the Permian Basin. She holds a Master of Science in Petroleum Engineering from Texas A&M University and a Bachelor of Science in Petroleum Engineering from the University of Texas at Aus-tin. She is a co-founder of the Society of Petroleum Engineer (SPE) Cares, and chairperson of the SPE Permian Basin chapter. She also sits on several SPE committees including Diversity & Inclusion.

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28Oilwoman Magazine / May-June 2021 / OilwomanMagazine.comSmall Businesses Driving Big Change By Tonae’ Hamilton SMB LEADERSHIPEven a pandemic is not enough to stop the American entrepreneurial dream. According to U.S. Business Forma-tion Statistics, 4.35 million applications for new businesses were submitted in 2020 alone, as people move away from the traditional 9-5 to create their own empires.With many individuals starting new businesses, managing their current small to medium business (SMBs), or trying to expand and acquire more businesses, there are numerous challenges that small and mid-size business owners face. In addition to competing against other small business owners in their respective industries, SMB owners also have to face intense competition from large corpora-tions. The current global pandemic has added another obstacle for SMB owners. In these unprecedented times, effective small to medium business leadership (SMB leadership) is crucial and involves individuals dedicated to uplifting and expanding their businesses through various channels. This could entail rein-venting business models, collaborating with other leaders to form new strate-gies, exploring new technologies and outreach campaigns, or reaching out to agencies for aid and advice. SMB leaders are dedicated to seeing their businesses succeed. Among these SMB leaders are many minorities and women, looking to fulll their vision and see their businesses ourish in what was once a less-diverse market. As of now, there are over 12 million women-owned organizations and four million minority owned or-ganizations nationwide, who especially need their platforms elevated in order to remain competitive in the market. Many resources are out there for SMB leaders, such as the Small Business Ad-ministration (SBA). The SBA works to empower small businesses through vari-ous avenues from mentorship and train-ing programs to funding. Such methods enable SMB leaders to fulll their company goals and build their brand.For women-owned busi-nesses, specically, the SBA maintains the Ofce of Women’s Business Ownership (OWBO), for women business lead-ers to take advantage of. The ofce helps women business leaders obtain equal opportunity in the business world, by pro-viding business training, counseling, and access to credit and capital, among other things. Natalie Coeld, who serves as assistant administrator for OWBO, works with women SMB leaders to not only keep their busi-nesses aoat during the current pandem-ic, but to help them thrive. Coeld, who is a successful SMB leader herself, works alongside other SBA leaders to empower women entrepreneurs and help them navigate the industry. SMB leaders take an active approach to growing their personal brand, using a va-riety of resources and methods available to them, and it’s crucial for communities to recognize these efforts and support these leaders. According to the 2019 Annual Business Survey (ABS), approxi-mately 18.3 percent of all U.S. business-es were minority-owned and about 19.9 percent of all businesses were owned by women. To continue diversifying the business world, breaking gender barriers, and keeping the visions of these leaders alive, consumers should make efforts to purchase locally and promote their local businesses whenever possible.Small business leaders lift their com-munities by providing jobs with greater satisfaction and bolstering the local economy. They cater to the needs of their community and positively impact the culture. On a larger scale, small busi-nesses are an integral part of the U.S. economy, as they create two-thirds of net new jobs and drive innovation and competitiveness. Accounting for roughly 44 percent of U.S. economic activity, SMB leaders are big contributors to our economy and keep it moving. SMB lead-ers often strive to support other small businesses, increase jobs in the commu-nity and build a positive image for their neighborhoods. With many small busi-nesses facing hardships in today’s world, it is important for society to uphold these entrepreneurs, acknowledge their contributions and help them continue to be successful leaders in the industry. SBA Administrator, Isabella Casillas Guzman, was the rst Latina named to a cabinet-level post by President Biden, and the rst Latina to head the SBA. Photo courtesy of the SBA.

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29Oilwoman Magazine / May-June 2021 / OilwomanMagazine.comSMB LEADERSHIPTonae’ Hamilton: What do you hope to achieve in your new role?Natalie Madeira Coeld: As the As-sistant Administrator of the Ofce of Women’s Business Ownership I look forward to continuing to expand our Women’s Business Center footprint and infrastructure across the nation to aid in providing the support women business owners need to survive and scale. I also look forward to ensuring that the president’s agenda for both equity and gender are uplifted and reected in all we do to support and deepen our relationships with broader communities of women-led rms. I plan to remain a voice and a champion of the more than 12 million women-owned businesses to ensure they are included in all aspects of our national economic recovery.TH: What are some of the biggest challenges small business owners face in today’s world? What are some ways you plan to help small busi-nesses overcome these challenges? NMC: The biggest challenge for small businesses today is staying aoat dur-ing the pandemic. The SBA is making sure we extend every resource we have in our arsenal to assist small busi-nesses that are struggling right now. With the help of the CARES Act, and in tandem with the U.S. Depart-ment of Treasury, we are now able to provide aid to our nation’s innovative and determined entrepreneurs, allow-ing countless small business owners to pivot with condence to stay aoat during the pandemic. The SBA has rolled out the Economic Injury Disas-ter Loan, the Paycheck Protection Pro-gram and with the American Rescue Plan Act; more help is coming. We are making sure that funds are reaching the most vulnerable businesses in mi-nority and underserved communities.TH: What advice would you give to individuals looking to start a small business?NMC: Use the Small Business Ad-ministration as your rst resource. The SBA has a wealth of information and resources available at your nger-tips – everything from training and management assistance to webinars to guide small businesses through every stage of development. We also have resource partners like Small Business Development Centers and Women Business Centers. The WBCs, for example, provide resources to our nation’s female economic drivers, providing them with local training and counseling. SBA’s WBCs are a national network of 136 centers that offer one-on-one counseling, train-ing, networking, workshops, technical assistance and mentoring to women entrepreneurs on numerous business development topics, including business startup, nancial management, market-ing and procurement. These resources are crucial to the vitality of women-owned small business owners.TH: What do you think the future looks like for small to medium business owners? What can the community do to keep small to medium businesses thriving?NMC: American small business own-ers are smart, tenacious and deter-mined, and I have no doubt that their future is bright. Under the leadership of our SBA Administrator, Isabella Casillas Guzman, the SBA is focused on providing the necessary resources to the businesses that need it most, the underserved communities. Right now, impacted small businesses need our support, and the SBA stands ready to help them reopen and thrive.As a community, everyone should do their best to buy small and sup-port their local small businesses and restaurants. Before they look on the internet to order from the larger stores, ask yourself, “Can I get this from the mom-and-pop market down the street?” Why not eat at the local sandwich shop or walk along main street and dip your head into a store you’ve never been in before? Your lo-cal small businesses are hidden jewels with hard-working entrepreneurs who are providing jobs to the people in your community, and services and goods that you want and need. Natalie Madeira Cofield, Assistant Administrator of the Office of Women’s Business Ownership

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30Oilwoman Magazine / May-June 2021 / OilwomanMagazine.comCharting a Path to Clean Energy By Karen Haywood Queen SHE’S GOT THE POWER“Change is coming so very fast in the energy sector,” Lorraine Akiba says. “For those at the edge, innovation technology is changing the model that has been used in the past.”Hawaii is leading the way in meeting chal-lenges and gaining benets for utilities, policy makers, regulators, clean energy producers, consumers and innovative companies. Akiba has been part of the evolution as a lead environmental attor-ney, public utility commission member, advisory board member and now as founder of a consultancy to advise others on the clean energy journey.Striking Out on Her OwnAfter a career that has included lead-ing environmental law at two law rms, serving as Hawaii’s Director of Labor and Industrial Relations, and sitting on the Hawaii Public Utilities Commission (PUC) from 2012 to 2018, starting her own consultancy focusing on energy policy issues seemed a natural next step. Akiba founded LHA Ventures in 2018.“I’m used to dealing with disruption, used to being a change and crisis manage-ment strategist and dealing with business transformation,” Akiba says. “One of my strong suits during my practice as a com-mercial litigation attorney was always on management teams facing challenges. I like the challenge and I have the personal fortitude and skills to address difcult situations and work together with others to achieve positive outcomes. That’s im-portant when experiencing disruption.”Many of Akiba’s international clients are, like Hawaii, trying to get to 100 percent clean energy. They are looking for solu-tions to technical problems related to clean energy and working to demonstrate progress to institutional investors and customers, she says.Hawaii Leads the Way to Clean Energy“The policy is Hawaii is very forward thinking,” Akiba says. “We’ve been on this journey since 2008. We were the rst state in the United States to adopt a [goal of] 100 percent renewable energy stan-dards by 2045. We have the highest per capita of renewable energy on the grid – not just solar, not just wind; we have geothermal, hydro, biomass and waste-to-energy. Because of the constraints on resources, because we are an island, necessity is the mother of invention.”Since Hawaii faces singular resiliency challenges and is ahead on adopting clean energy, other states can learn key lessons. (Waving at you, Texas.)“Because we’re an island, we don’t have an energy balanced market,” Akiba says. “Hawaii is so small, so isolated, that not only is reliability of supply important, but also adequacy of supply, being able to support intermittent renewables and also [the ability to] be fast-responding. Each island has to be its own grid. We built real-time insight into the operation of the grid. We’re looking at microgrids not only for energy but also for resiliency.”“We learned a lot from Hurricane Maria in Puerto Rico and from Hurricane Iniki, which devastated Kauai. We learned that you have to put resilience and reliability as co-priorities. Planning for resilience is making sure you have a modernized grid that can with-stand what might happen given the im-pacts of climate change and the increased frequency and greater intensity of storms and hurricanes.”Distributed energy makes sense in Hawaii because the multi-island state doesn’t have a lot of available land for wind farms; existing land is marked for high-end commercial, agriculture and military use, Akiba says. “Residential rooftop solar is a big re-source, something we can teach the mainland U.S. When you have to do it all on one little grid, everything has to integrate and coordinate. We have broken with the old ideas of central stations, the old distribution model of getting energy to customers. We have a lot of distributed energy resources, lots of houses that are self-supplying. [We] can do smart ex-ports to support the grid and allow their [home] systems to be controlled by grid operators.”Transition to Clean Energy Hasn’t Been Seamless Adding more home solar to the grid wasn’t a perfectly smooth transition in Hawaii. Transmission lines are designed to optimize ow from distribution sta-tions to individual customers, not power ow to the grid from those individual solar systems. That led to problems, including home solar that could not be connected to the grid.During Akiba’s term on the PUC, Hawai-ian Electric, working with SolarCity/Tes-la, and the U.S. Department of Energy’s National Renewable Energy Laboratory, completed testing on the ability of invert-ers to mitigate transient overvoltage im-

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31Oilwoman Magazine / May-June 2021 / OilwomanMagazine.comSHE’S GOT THE POWERpacts on the grid and addressed concerns which enabled Hawaiian Electric to allow more distributed rooftop PV to be inter-connected. The limit increased from 125 percent of minimum daily load to 250 percent of minimum daily load, which was the highest amount in the nation.“Before that, we were ying blind,” Akiba says. “How much rooftop solar could you put on a distribution circuit? We didn’t have the ability to determine what would happen. We were looking to get real-time views into the distribution circuit. Mitigation tools, such as voltage measurements on the grid, solar panels with reactive power, became available. Those things started to become part of a coordinated, integrated way to operate the grid.” The transition to clean energy also involves demand side management and greater energy efciency.“You can’t build enough plants to get to 100 percent clean energy with solar and wind facilities,” Akiba says. “You need other tools – whether through energy efciency, time of use rates, using electric vehicles in a smart way as a load man-agement tool – as opposed to creating a crisis at peak times.”No Place Like Home for MentorsAs Akiba powered through workplace challenges, she looked to her mother, Florence Iwasa, as her example and rst mentor.“My mother (who passed away in 1995) was a trailblazer. She was an Asian-American doctor in the 1950s and ‘60s, which was unheard of. She showed me you have to have the courage, the focus and the dedication to continue some-thing, even if people have backward ideas. You have to rise to the occasion and demonstrate you have the capability to do the job. She also taught me that [succeeding as a woman] does take a lot of sacrice. I appreciate every sacrice she ever made for me. She took a job in a clinic instead of being in private practice so she could be with me when I came home from school. My parents sacri-ced to send me to an expensive private school. Education is a great equalizer and a great power tool.”Diffusing Tricky Situations with HumorWhen Akiba started at Cades Schutte law rm in Honolulu in the 1980s, there was only one female partner. Akiba learned to diffuse difcult situations with humor, teaching a lesson in a positive, face-saving way.“Back then, it was unusual to see a woman in a law rm. One time a client thought I was a secretary and asked me to get a cup of coffee. I smiled and said, ‘Are you sure you want to pay me at my hourly rate for that?’ That client turned out to be one of my good clients.”Akiba got used to being the rst woman and appreciated the male mentors who were willing to help her and judge her based on the quality of her work. “I’ve always been the rst, one of the rst or one of a few. I was the rst woman director of labor for the state of Hawaii. My success has been partly a result of having men who are willing to support qualied women who can take up leader-ship positions.”Success sends a strong message. Women and others should always be able to dem-onstrate they’re qualied to do the job and be a leader if given the opportunity, she says.“At my last law rm, one of the younger partners and I were the top rainmakers bringing in revenue. We demonstrated our competency and the ability to be in leadership positions. It’s important for women to be condent, not to shy away from responsibility.”Getting girls and young women into STEM education is a key step to having more women in the leadership pipeline, Akiba says.Putting women in positions of leadership is not just a feel-good exercise or a way to meet diversity goals. “Data show that organizations that are led by women are more productive, more protable and have higher workplace positivity scores. Teamwork is better.”Looking ahead, Akiba has set these per-sonal goals for the next three years:• Continuing to provide thought leadership and strategic guidance to boards regarding corporate En-vironmental Social and Corporate Governance (ESG) management and operationalizing ESG in companies to benet shareholders, investors and the broader stakeholder community of customers, employees and com-munities where those companies do business.• Being impactful and supporting ac-tions to increase gender diversity in corporate management and being an active part of the collective national effort to attain 50 percent women on boards and in the C-suite by 2050.• Making a difference in her commu-nity in Hawaii by being a steward for sustainability and mentoring the next generation of Asian American and Pacic Islander women leaders.Karen Haywood Queen covers manufactur-ing technology, energy, personal nance, cyber-security and health. Her work has been published in a variety of publications including Smart Manu-facturing, Better Homes and Gardens, CreditCards.com and Costco Connec-tion. She lives in Williamsburg, Virgin-ia, with her rocket scientist husband.

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32Oilwoman Magazine / May-June 2021 / OilwomanMagazine.comLady with the Iron Ring: An Engineer’s Memoir of Hope, Luck and Success By Nattalia LeaBOOKSHELFIt was a shock to the University of British Columbia (UBC) Engineering Undergraduate Society that the rst-year class of 1974 had 14 women. Up to then, rst year was 100 percent male or tainted by one or two females, with their graduation highly speculative. In the quagmire of the upcoming international women’s year 1975, the senior students had their minds made up before we walked into the classrooms that we must be feminists. Handmade banners ripped from a roll of white paper graced the halls messaging, “Feminists – go home!” or “Down with feminists!”The F-WordThe f-word, i.e., feminist, was never mentioned in passing among us women engineering students. It had such a nega-tive connotation that fear struck a chord in me. That would make me a castrating man hater, which I don’t think I was. I took all the obligatory high school home economics classes, was highly procient at cooking, baking and sewing. I was al-ways hyper-vigilant about the way I pre-sented myself. I was told that I was not just to think of myself, but for the other women who followed behind me. I usu-ally wore slacks to class. Once a week, and never on the same day, I’d up the ante. I’d deliberately wear my red ruched top with a knee-length, brown Fortrel knit A-line skirt to class. The guys did notice me dressing up, but chivalry was not to be expected. I kind of crossed the line when I entered engineering. #MeToo – Men Who Behave Badly Rarely Make History I applied for a summer engineering job at a prominent civil engineering rm close to New Westminster, B.C. Mr. Smith was a tall, imposing, gray-haired man in his mid 50s, who hadn’t been to the gym in some time. Within seconds, I knew Mr. Smith was livid with me. His rst question was, “How much do you weigh?” [followed by], “Don’t you think you’re rather small to be an engineer?”He leaned back in his chair and put his feet on the desk. I was abbergasted and sat there, my mouth on mute. Mr. Smith continued his rant, “Listen, we can’t hire you. We can’t send a girl to the eld.”I did the unthinkable; my tears started owing at the most inopportune moment. Damn it! This is why men don’t want women in engineering. Mr. Smith continued his female bashing. His ego was crushed. He wanted to make it clear that I was a piece of [garbage] and had no right to waste his time further. He had already made up his mind the moment he saw me enter the room. Returning to the DogIt would be exactly 20 years after my rst layoff from Husky that I would return to work there in 2006. Things were denitely different. Afrmative action and women’s equality prevailed, starting with the ofce vernacular. The F-word was heard frequently from the mouths of the ofce babes, especially the one in procurement who occupied the window ofce across from me. The photos of 1970s topless busty broads had fallen off the face of the planet. Some married male engineers with small children at home shunned eld work. Working men with stay-at-home wives were almost extinct. It was fash-ionable for women engineers of child-bearing age to make babies with no negative repercussions. They kept their seniority and even worked part-time.I didn’t even mind that they put me in an inside windowless ofce. I was back in the saddle, working for an oil company in project management. I was getting stuff done. Condensed and excerpted with permis-sion from the author. Lady with the Iron Ring: An Engineer’s Memoir of Hope, Luck and Success (FriesenPress; July 2019). www.fb.me/LadywiththeIronRing.Nattalia Lea’s grandfather emigrated to Canada from China in 1897. Lea became the rst woman to graduate from the University of British Columbia with a bio-resources engineering degree in 1978, in an era when less than 0.5 percent of Canadian professional engineers were women. Her memoir captures the essence of being a female, visible minority engineer and how this working-class woman broke into the white, male engineering profession – with no mentors or role models. Photo courtesy of Jana Miko

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33Oilwoman Magazine / May-June 2021 / OilwomanMagazine.comYou Are Enough: A Manifesto for the Overworked and Overwhelmed By Islin MunisteriBOOKSHELFTreat Yourself with Self-Compassion “You can search throughout the entire universe for someone who is more deserving of your love and affection than you are, and that person is not to be found anywhere. You, yourself, as much as anybody in the entire universe, deserve your love and affection.” – Gautama BuddhaSometimes I really hate self-compas-sion. Yes, I said it! It is so difcult to explain because I don’t fully understand it myself. But I know it’s about giving yourself the permission to nd yourself in the 30-foot seas of life. It’s about believing in and becoming yourself. It is about that magical thing that makes all things possible. Give yourself grace, especially in the worst of moments. Don’t make your worst moment worse by not giving yourself the grace to revel and be grateful that you can actually feel these emotions. Self-compassion is incredibly difcult. But it’s worth it. It’s what makes learn-ing and change possible. Self-compas-sion gives you the space to challenge the negative voices and the negative scripts your parents did not intentionally mean to give you. It’s that magical step that makes leaps possible. Sometimes you just have to believe that you are worthy of giving yourself compassion. You are worthy of going beyond the negative beliefs in your mind. You are worthy of giving yourself the space to challenge the beliefs that you had. There was a time in my life where I would berate myself for calculating something incorrectly at work. The sig-nicance of this mistake was not small, but I didn’t give myself the compas-sion to get through it, acknowledge the mistake and move on. I was stuck in the strange world of constantly berat-ing myself, not feeling good enough – a vicious downward spiral. But now I’ve learned that when I let the mistake go, allow myself to learn the lesson and don’t beat myself up, my productivity actually increases. I’m no longer so uptight about the outcome. I’m relaxed and just enjoy the fact that I’ve actually arrived somewhere – who cares if it was the wrong conclusion ini-tially? This mindset gives me the space to iterate, to learn again and to fail in a different way. Self-compassion helps you to get out of the self-destructive, self-critical hell that you put yourself through. Give yourself the kindness to say, “It’s okay. I’m only human.”Some people think being kind and com-passionate to yourself is taboo. Don’t let it be. Practice self-compassion. Accept your mistakes. They might be blessings in disguise. One-Minute Chapter SummaryGive yourself the gift of self-compas-sion. It gives you the space to question your self-critical assumptions. It gives you the ability to not berate yourself as hard for real or perceived mistakes. Make a choice now:• I choose to give myself the gift of self-compassion. I tell myself, “I am doing my very best with what I have in this moment, and that is all I can ask of myself.”• I choose to remain overly critical and judge every perceived imperfection as a mistake, possibly extrapolating that my life and my abilities are a mistake as well. [Write down] your answers so that you can have a list of your afrmations in one-minute summaries to take with you after you nish reading the book. Condensed and excerpted with permission from the author. You Are Enough: A Manifesto for the Overworked and Overwhelmed by Islin Munisteri ©2016 Islin Ventures, LLC.Islin Munisteri is vice president and co-founder of Theia Marketing. In her previous life, she was a reservoir engineer in Alaska, determining the remaining producible volume of oil and gas. She also worked as a reservoir engineer for bp in the Gulf of Mexico. Munisteri holds a Bachelor of Science in Petroleum Engineering and a minor in International Political Economy from the Colorado School of Mines. www.theiamarketing.com/company/islin-munisteri.

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34Oilwoman Magazine / May-June 2021 / OilwomanMagazine.comPower Surge: Women in Geothermal Energy By Claudia MelatiniALTERNATIVE ENERGYHeadlines over the past few years have shown that we are far behind when it comes to taking denitive action to save our environment. Activists around the world have pleaded with governments to use more sustainable resources in order to reverse climate change. All the while, geothermal scientists and indus-try professionals have been working be-hind the scenes to develop sustainable solutions that will bring geothermal en-ergy to the masses. This untapped gem of the earth is also providing women with enriching career opportunities and a chance to enact powerful legislation that will positively alter the course of environmental regulations.Geothermal Energy: The Constant Renewable Resource Unless you live in Iceland or New Zea-land, where use of geothermal energy is prevalent, little is known about this renewable resource. Geothermal energy is the heat that comes from the sub-surface of the earth and is contained in the rocks and uids beneath the earth’s crust. In order to source this energy for use within buildings and homes, wells are dug a mile deep into under-ground reservoirs to access the steam and hot water. Turbines and electricity generators are thus powered, enabling a constant source of heating and cool-ing. Geothermal energy is renewable because heat is continuously produced inside the earth. While solar power often makes more headlines, the expanded use of geother-mal energy is being developed across the world through a network of pas-sionate scientists and developers who want to make a difference. Think tanks, like Alphabet’s X – Moonshot Factory, are developing powerful technologies that will allow worldwide consumers to switch to geothermal energy. Dande-lion Energy, developed at X by former Google engineer, Kathy Hannun, says its mission is to “gure out a solution so that there are no more barriers for people to switch to geothermal.” Han-nun and her team have partnered with Con Edison in New York to promote geothermal heat pumps to their natural gas customers. Hannun was drawn to develop the use of geothermal heat pump technology in order to help the millions of home-owners in the U.S. save money on their energy bills. “For the homeowners us-ing oil or propane for heating today, the cost of ownership of a geothermal heat pump is less than that of their furnace or boiler,” Hannun says. “It’s also the single most impactful thing they can do to decrease their carbon footprint. Switching from a fuel oil furnace to a geothermal heat pump saves as much emissions over the lifetime of the sys-tem as taking 39 cars off the road for a year. It’s so rare to have the customer’s nancial incentives align so well with what is best for the climate, so seeing this motivated me to gure out how to overcome the obstacles that were hold-ing geothermal back from wider adop-tion.” Certain states like New York and Connecticut are offering incentives for consumers to switch to geothermal systems, which reduce the overall cost. Many of Dandelion’s customers utilize solar and geothermal systems in tandem, in order to save costs and protect the environment. The use of geothermal energy has been around for decades, but its necessity is coming to the forefront as the world develops green initiatives to reverse climate change. Certain power players have arisen out of this necessity, many in countries that utilize the benets of geothermal as primary energy sources. While the U.S. has become the leading producer of geothermal energy world-wide, it has only tapped into 0.7 per-cent of geothermal resources available. Iceland and New Zealand have relied on geothermal energy sources as their primary heat and cooling source; it is also used in Italy, Indonesia, the Philip-pines and Mexico.Developing a Network of Power Players A 2019 World Bank study of gender inequality within the geothermal indus-try stated that “male domination of the sector is perpetuated by professional networks and local employment norms and practices biased toward hiring men for both skilled and unskilled jobs.” However, a group of professionals within the geothermal industry is deter-mined to change these statistics. Andrea (Andy) Blair, president of the International Geothermal Association The Geysers, CA – 70 MW Dry Steam Plant. Photo courtesy of www.calpine.com.

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35Oilwoman Magazine / May-June 2021 / OilwomanMagazine.comand co-founder of Upow, a geother-mal science, research and innovation company, is a passionate voice and activist when it comes to champion-ing women in geothermal. In 2013, she co-founded Women in Geothermal (WING). The association has grown from 83 members to over 1800 in 48 countries worldwide, making it the larg-est geothermal association in the world. WING is dedicated to promoting the education, professional development and advancement of women in the geo-thermal community. Blair was inspired to take action after traveling the world in her previous role and seeing the “lone woman” in the back of the meeting, among 20 men. “There were these super smart women around the world that were isolated,” Blair says. “It was time to push on the boys’ club. I thought, ‘How do we wrap around these isolated women and provide them support?’”Blair knew two things were necessary in order for WING to work. One, men needed to be included in the discussion. Two, WING needed to be an associa-tion that took action, not one that just talked about inequality. As of 2021, one of WING’s initiatives includes the WINGman Special Taskforce. The workshop is held over 10 months and is a platform that engages men around gender equality and gives them the tools to make powerful changes. The Task-force aims to eliminate gender stereo-types and encourages men to be cham-pions of gender equality.WING’s global leadership team rotates to a new country every three years in order to ensure the association’s ongo-ing relevance and longevity. In 2020, the operations transitioned from New Zealand to the United States, with Ann Robertson-Tait as its new global chair. While many of her undergraduate classmates ended up working in oil and gas, Robertson-Tait started looking into alternatives to fossil fuels, including geo-thermal. After completing a Master of Science at the University of Auckland, she returned to the U.S. and joined Geo-thermEx, which she heads today.Robertson-Tait enjoyed an upbring-ing that she calls “unfettered…I was free to choose my own way. Nobody mentioned anything about what kind of work a woman could or should do.” After realizing that is not the case for every woman, even today, she was inspired to join WING. Now she is helping further the initiatives that the New Zealand team began, including the WING Future Leaders Cohort. The Cohort, a group of 17 women from 11 different countries, is participating in a yearlong program designed to launch the next generation of female leaders in the geothermal community. The group is being mentored and trained in issues outside its core expertise, including lead-ership, governance, nancial acumen, communications, crisis management, cognitive psychology and decision mak-ing.“I think there’s a real power surge from women in our industry,” Blair says. “With the Future Leaders Cohort, our graduates are successful from day one. We teach them how to negotiate, how to inuence, how to be successful board members.” Blair and her team plan on presenting WING’s Future Lead-ers Cohort to boards around the world starting in October 2021. “The pipelines of success are guarded by people who think success looks like them,” Blair says. “Until we break these pipelines, that’s not going to change. We need to get to the top as fast as we can, using any mechanism we can.” Along with the initiatives she’s promot-ing within WING, Robertson-Tait sees evidence of true change at her own workplace. “With women comprising 35 percent of our staff, GeothermEx is moving toward gender equality. I am no longer the only woman in the room.” Claudia Melatini has been a content marketing writ-er in the private wealth, FinTech, and energy and renewables spaces for over 15 years. She has written for American Funds, Capital Group, LPL, RBC Wealth Management, Living Lela, Petnovations and more. Visit www.thepowerfulpage.com. ALTERNATIVE ENERGYAnn Robertson-Tait, president of GeothermEx, Inc. and global chair, Women in Geothermal (WING), shown in Death Valley, the hottest, driest, lowest national park in the U.S.Kathy Hannun, co-founder and president of Dandelion Energy.Andrea (Andy) Blair, president of the Intl. Geothermal Association, co-founder of Upow and co-founder of Women in Geothermal (WING).

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36Oilwoman Magazine / May-June 2021 / OilwomanMagazine.comLiving the Crude Life By Genneca HouserLIVING THE CRUDE LIFEThe Crude Life engages with industry experts and energy enthusiasts every day with interviews, radio programs, social media posts, print features, video content and podcasts. These conversations range from CEOs to truck drivers to authors to engineers to cafe owners. Just like our diverse experts and interviews, the conversations have depth and worldly experience. Here are some quotes from people Living the Crude Life.“People who argue that we don’t have clean energy haven’t looked at the fact that our methane emissions have gone way down in the last ten years, not because of overregu-lation, but because industry’s seen the value and put the technology in place that they need to without being told to...” – Texas Railroad Commissioner Christi Craddick“The rst step is really to create relationships with those policy makers and to create oppor-tunities to educate them about your industry...So, we educate them about the natural gas pipeline and energy infrastructure industry, so they under-stand how we work, what makes us work and what type of policies make sense…” – Amy Andryszak, president and CEO, Interstate Natural Gas Association of America (INGAA)“I believe in the power of change and in the power of the people in the indus-try to nd creative solutions to the problems that face us, including the problem of produc-ing oil and gas responsibly and limiting [our] carbon footprint...I also believe in the power of the industry to adapt to new forms of energy.” – Chrysta Castaneda, Castaneda Law Firm“People think that maybe oil and gas is not as attractive as it has been in the past, so we’re looking at other things now like renewables. That’s coming on board, even though it may seem slow right now. I think it’s going to be very, very important as we move forward.” – Marlette Dumas, PMP, senior project risk management engineer, bp“The oil industry probably doesn’t have a really deep grasp of how serious the legislative stuff is going to be and how intense, really, that Washington and [the] Whitehouse are on their views of the oil and gas industry, and it is denitely going to be an uphill battle.” – Trisha Curtis, CEO, PetroNerd“ESG, as you said, stands for environ-mental, social and governance and the real crux of it is around disclosures. So, it started prob-ably 10 years ago, meaningfully, where investors and different groups, perhaps from the left or the environmental side, were encouraging and requesting more information from any public company in terms of how their operations or company impacts both the environment society and/or how their governance structures play a part in that. So, ESG is basically disclosing your performance in those areas and, as it’s evolved, it’s becoming more formalized. There are frameworks to put them through and potentially even a regulation coming in terms of what ESG will look like and how you will disclose [and] in what metrics.” – Ashley McNamee, ESG Director, Alvarez & Marsal“It’s great to be able to collaborate with people on the government side and to learn more about how we can kind of bridge our talents and help more people get into energy because it’s a national security issue to be energy independent and have people be competent and qualied to be able to carry out the jobs in the U.S.” – Stephanie Canales, Cougar Drilling Solutions

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37Oilwoman Magazine / May-June 2021 / OilwomanMagazine.comLIVING THE CRUDE LIFE“The cancellation of the Keystone Pipeline took away American jobs, it can take away energy independence for America, and it takes away money from American’s pocket-books because it will cost more.” – Arkansas Attorney General Leslie RutledgIn the rapidly changing world in which we live, it seems the energy transition cannot happen rapidly enough. Many oil and gas companies are divesting themselves of their fossil fuel holdings. As they look for ways to reduce their carbon footprint, they are focusing on sustainability and branching out into renewables. However, not all fossil fuels are created equal and natural gas is viewed as a clean energy that can serve as a “bridge fuel” during the transition. Here is what some high-level women in industry have had to say recently on the subject. “We have absolutely committed to natural gas as being a very important transition fuel as we move from fossil fuels to renewable fuels. But it’s only going to be a good transition fuel if there are low to no emissions. And so, it’s absolutely critical that we as a company get this right, and frankly, we as an industry get this right because natural gas loses its effectiveness as a good transition fuel if we have these emissions,” Gretchen Watkins, president Shell Oil, PBS News Hour Weekend, January 24, 2021.“What I think that people don’t understand is we should not be talking about eliminating fossil fuels. What we really need to be talking about is eliminating emissions and if we can provide and we will. Net carbon zero oil that is what the world needs, and the world cannot achieve the goals…of the Paris accord without the oil industry helping with that. We can be leaders in that,” Vicki Hollub, CEO Occidental Petroleum (Oxy), CERAWeek by IHS Markit energy conference, March 2, 2021.“We need to change the narrative…it’s not fossil fuels that’s really the problem, it’s the emissions. Instead of trying to kill fossil fuels, we need to get everybody’s attention on how do we use oil and gas reservoirs to our advantage. How do we use that to lower emissions all around the world, and that’s exactly our goal. Our goal is to be the company that provides the solution,” Vicki Hollub, CEO Occidental Petroleum (Oxy), CNBC Evolve, March 4, 2021. “Natural gas is a fuel that will play an important role in the energy transition and is certainly necessary for RES [renew-able energy sources] to be integrated into the energy mix and to be able to balance the intermittence resulting from solar and wind energy.Natural gas has, in principle, a very clear advantage in the sense that it can be stored. It can ensure adequate energy even when it is not sunny or when it is not windy. In addition, it is certainly the only solution available for the decarbonization of industries that are difcult to electrify. We have some heavy industries, such as those of iron, cement etc., that need very high heat that cannot be produced from other energy sources, with natural gas providing a solution,” Maria Rita Galli, CEO Hellenic Gas Transmission System Operator (DESFA), eKathimerini.com, April 16, 2021.“We’re nowhere close to doing this full transition. There will be oil and gas for a long time. We’ve done some excellent things in oil and gas. We’ve changed everybody’s gross domestic product. But no one heard us because we were only talking to ourselves. So, now everyone is divesting, everyone is saying renewables are the only way to go instead of combining [forces]. I blame that 100 percent on our homogeneity because we were not diverse enough to tell the world what we were doing. You can imagine if there were 30 to 40 percent women [in positions of leadership in industry] in the past 20 years, oil and gas would be totally different place [today],” Paula McCann Harris, former Schlumberger global director, Facebook Live interview with Loretta Williams Gurnell, April 12, 2021. Fossil Fuel FutureBY Rebecca Ponton“Most of our rigs are local here in the Permian, but we’ve gone to Oklahoma, Louisiana, all over Texas, New Mexico, Colorado and Arizona. We’ve delivered a lot of pipe to Arizona. We can go to all 50 states, just sometimes nding a driver is hard.”– Maira Vargas, Amigo Pipe & EquipmentGenneca Houser is a multimedia journalist, audio producer, podcast host and music artist. She has done work in media for 10+ years and has been part of the performing arts for more than 20 years. Houser and her husband own and operate Dirty DAHG Productions, LLC in the Black Hills of South Dakota.

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38Oilwoman Magazine / May-June 2021 / OilwomanMagazine.comWomen Add to a Board’s “Cognitive Diversity” By Lucinda JacksonWOMAN ON BOARDAfter her decades-long career in nance, Vanessa C.L. Chang now sits on the boards of two electric utilities, Edison International and Southern California Edison Company, and on the board of the offshore drilling company, Trans-ocean. Chang explains why we should have women on boards of directors (BOD), what barriers there are to women getting on boards and what the solutions are to drive better gender balance. There’s a lot of discussion these days about increasing the number of women on BOD. But why? What do women bring to the table in the boardroom? Studies show enhanced shareholder value, environmental responsibility, and employee productiv-ity, but Chang shares additional reasons we need women on BOD. “Although every director must have the courage to ask challenging questions, due to their perspective, women seem to raise issues and ask questions that may not have been previously considered,” Chang says. She believes this behavior comes from the fact that women have had to work differently, and sometimes harder, to succeed, and are often in a position to provide independent insights as a woman in a male-dominated business world. Chang believes, “Women add a unique perspective gained from these experiences.”Chang also sees that female board members encourage more engagement on human capital management, gender diversity and meeting high-potential women in the company. Highlighting these signals to the CEO that these is-sues are important, providing impetus and urgency to the company to actively address these matters. Given that women bring value to BOD and to the companies they direct, why don’t we have more women on BOD? Chang cites two main reasons. One, the C-suite is often the pool from which companies look for potential directors and there are not enough women in the C-suite. Two, few board spots become available due to the low number of directors retiring annu-ally. Most U.S. publicly-held companies have a retirement age term, usually 72-years-old. A few U.S. boards have a combination of age and term limits. For example, a director must step down after 15 years of service or at the age of 75, whichever comes rst. Even fewer U.S. boards have a term limit without a re-tirement age term, e.g., General Electric with a term of 15 years.Chang does not believe in quotas as the solution, even though efforts such as the 30% Club, a campaign to achieve 30 percent female directors on major com-pany boards, and new laws in multiple countries and states are setting quotas. “Board selection must be merit-based,” she says. “As an independent board member, my ability to help direct a company is a function of the experience of my colleagues who help comprise the entire board and, therefore, the quality of the debate for any given subject. I want diverse skills and experience to add to the discussion in the boardroom. If we don’t have that, each board mem-ber’s responsibilities to the company can become more challenging.” What are the solutions to these barriers that keep women off BOD? Chang lists several actions companies can take:• Focus on robust talent and develop-ment programs to advance more women to the C-suite.• Address retention issues – determine why women are leaving a company at a greater frequency than their male counterparts.• Require diverse hiring and promotion teams with metrics for accountability. Chang says, “If you put an action in place, but don’t hold anyone account-able, nothing is going to happen.”• Institute merit-based succession planning with women on the list.• Look wider, beyond the C-suite.• Set term and age limits for directors in order to open up spots on BOD.What can women who are seeking board positions do to achieve their goals? “I have found that one of the best things to do is to get on a non-prot board,” Chang says. “Select one for which you have passion and genuine interest to ensure maximum engage-ment.” In this position, other directors on the non-prot board will see how you behave in a boardroom. They might then recommend you to corporate boards they serve on.Chang also suggests taking advantage of organizations that focus on gender diversity on boards. Women Corporate Directors is one such organization that strives to increase representation of women on company boards and the pipeline of qualied female board candi-dates. The Women Corporate Directors’ initiative, BoardNext, offers education, WOMAN ON BOARD!

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39Oilwoman Magazine / May-June 2021 / OilwomanMagazine.comWOMAN ON BOARDresources and support to help qualied women navigate the path to their rst board position. Another organization, 50/50 Women on Boards, offers educa-tion and advocacy to attain gender bal-ance and diversity on corporate boards.Chang also advises women to contact and develop a relationship with search rms that specialize in gender and mi-nority board placements.Women should reach out to other women who are currently on boards. Chang says, “When I meet women who want to be on boards, I’m more than happy to have conversations about how to build their network and what they need to be thinking about.” Other women are also often generous with their time to help those seeking board positions – and Chang says, don’t forget men who have mentored women during their career and will also recommend them to serve on a board.Chang advocates joining organizations, such as Ascend Pinnacle for Asian Americans, Latino Corporate Directors Association and the National Associa-tion of Corporate Directors, where one can broaden their director network.Chang emphasizes that women “really need to be thoughtful and patient about accepting their rst BOD role. It can pigeon-hole you. Be patient.” She also strongly recommends:1. Choose a board of an industry in which you’re interested. 2. Know and understand as best as pos-sible who else is on the board and if you can work effectively with them.3. If you select a small cap (company with market capitalization of less than $2 billion), choose one in a high growth area that could potentially become a large cap (greater than $2 billion).Overall, Chang believes that the “cogni-tive diversity” of a board has immense value – diversity in characteristics, such as experience, perspective and the way people think. She recounts her own life as a woman of her generation being the sole woman in the workplace. Grow-ing up Chinese in South Africa, she encountered extensive discrimination as a “non-white.” These experiences informed her skills as she learned to be acceptable, accepted, stick up for her-self, always strive to be better and have a thick skin. “You couldn’t be overly-sensitive,” she says. “You had to bite the bullet and move on.” Chang believes that her unique background and result-ing viewpoints allow her today to have the courage to raise difcult, perhaps even controversial, points in the most appropriate and constructive manner to ensure a fruitful conversation among her BOD colleagues. Cartoonist: Andrew GrossmanOilwoman Cartoon

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40Oilwoman Magazine / May-June 2021 / OilwomanMagazine.comSisterhood of the Working Pants By Rebecca Ponton DOVETAIL WORKWEAR Rebecca Ponton: What was the dening moment when you were so fed up with the lack of proper-tting workwear that you decided to create your own? What was the main feature you were looking for personally in workwear?Kate Day, Brand Director: Kyle and I had a landscap-ing company, and we could not nd pants that t us properly, looked good, felt comfortable and could handle our work. The women’s workwear we encountered was a lesser version of menswear. The canvas was always too thin. And often the pant leg was too wide. We borrowed our husbands’ work pants because at least the fabric was tough, but the t was awful and unattering. Kyle Begley, Marketing Director: We’re in Oregon and spent a lot of time in the mud and rain doing manual labor. Once we started looking for workwear we were blown away by the lack of options. You’d see racks and racks of men’s utility apparel and a small, sad offering for women. When we dreamed up our rst work pant, we wanted real, functioning pockets (and plenty of them) – pockets designed to t women’s hands. We wanted fab-rics that were sturdy but also would bend and move with our bodies. And we wanted our work pant to look good. Those same goals in t, function and durability apply to every collection we have brought out since.Sara DeLuca, Product Development Director: I was a landscape client of Kate and Kyle’s when they came to me, looking to make the work pant they needed on the job and couldn’t nd in the store. I’d spent my ca-reer in the apparel industry, but at the time (about ve years ago), I was consulting and focusing on my kids. When they asked me to help them develop a work pant for women, I told them they’d better be really serious. Because I’ve always wanted to make utility apparel for women. I’ve seen this industry shortchanging women for too long: it’s called the “pink it and shrink it” ap-proach in the workwear industry – where everything is designed for men and women’s workwear is an after-thought. Kate and Kyle’s challenge was the one I’d been Left to right: Sara DeLuca, Product Development Director; Kyle Begley, Marketing Director; Kate Day, Brand Director; and Andrea Obana, Head of Customer Service. Photos courtesy of Dovetail Workwear.

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41Oilwoman Magazine / May-June 2021 / OilwomanMagazine.comwaiting for. I dropped everything and we’ve never looked back. RP: What is your favorite piece of Dovetail Workwear and what’s special about it?Sara: That’s like asking me to choose my favorite child. Maybe I’ll just talk about my personal favorite piece of Dovetail that I own. I have an original prototype Maven Slim that I wear more than any-thing else in my wardrobe. The thread colors are wrong, the rivets don’t match, and they’ve been patched a few times, but they’ve worn in so beautifully. Kate: I’m going to give a shout out to our Britt Utility pant. It’s such a powerhouse and every time we bring it out in a new fabric, it just hits the spot for our hardcore working women out in the eld, be they tradeswomen or women in natural resources. The Britt Utility has tons of pockets and a tool loop like all of our pants, but we’ve also doubled down on reinforcements: it’s got a crotch gusset, which increases range of motion when you’re bending or climbing. It’s got ar-ticulated knees for extra comfort (with room for knee pads). It also has reinforced back cuffs, so your hems don’t fray. This pant is basically a two-legged toolbox. Kyle: I can only speak to what I love right now. Because like Sara, it’s just too hard to pick. I’m thrilled with our newest pant, the Christa DIY. It’s just an amazing combination of comfort and durability. It’s got this easy pull-on pant vibe, but it’s made of hardcore tough material that’s also soft AND each pant saves eight plastic bottles from landll. It also wicks away sweat really well. And it looks damn good on! Our PR Maven wore hers for nine days straight without washing it. She probably doesn’t want us to say that, but I just did. RP: Dovetail has created maternity workwear, partnered with Artistic Milliners, and incorporated green technology into its clothing. Maybe each of you could expand upon one of these initiatives or others that set Dovetail apart and make it unique in the women’s workwear industry.Kate: Our maternity work pant was a true labor of love. Pun intended. The three of us met as moms through our children’s school, and then Kyle and I started our landscap-ing business. All through those early days, we talked about developing a maternity pant. The big workwear compa-nies have been around for more than 100 years, they never thought to include pregnant women in their apparel. It didn’t exist in American workwear until we invented it and we’re not even ve years old. It took a few years for us to get this work pant right. We’re extremely proud of Maven Maternity, which recently won a prestigious design award. We’re still pinching ourselves.DOVETAIL WORKWEAR Continued on next page...

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FIT FOR THE JOB. CAPABLE OF ANYTHING.42Oilwoman Magazine / May-June 2021 / OilwomanMagazine.comKyle: I think what sets Dovetail apart is our attention to relationships. We work with a lot of organizations and individual professional women to build products from the inside out. We listen, and we rigorously wear test the prototypes extensively across a broad range of women: women who farm, sh, climb, build, drill…if it’s hard work you’re doing, we want to talk to you and get pants on you and have you tell us what works and what doesn’t. We’re so grateful for the chance to collaborate with women in this way. They feed our creativity and inspire us to do better. We love what we do because of who we do it with.Sara: Yes, we are a sisterhood through and through. We were strongly mission-based right out of the gate, and I think that makes us different. This threads through how we make our products too. We work with people who care about their people and the planet. We’re not interested in greenwashing anyone. We’re small and scrappy and that means pragmatic, too. We can’t do everything we’d like to do. But we have great partners that have al-lowed us to invent novel products, responsibly. We’ve made custom fabrics that are indestructible but also soft, comfy, stretchy, and eco-friendly. We’ve also introduced a new kind of thermal workwear that keeps you warm without bulky liners. And a black pant that will never fade. As the Product Design Director, I love to build high-performance apparel that no one has seen in the workwear space – and do it for women, for a change.RP: What is the best feedback you have heard about Dovetail Workwear (a personal story from a tester or buyer/customer)?Kate: A comment that stays with me came from Sue Doro, editor of Pride and a Paycheck, and a retired career machinist. We sent her some shirts, as we were honored to be in her magazine, and she wrote back that she felt like her shirts loved her back! The comfort factor reminded her of all that had been missing from her workwear during long cold winters in Wisconsin, back when she was working day in and out to feed her ve kids as a single mom. To show someone like Sue the love and respect she deserves meant a lot to me. A shirt can be more than a shirt, you know?Kyle: I get my feedback x daily over my coffee, when I read through our customer reviews. Here’s one that came in recently: “These are the pants I’ve been searching for my whole life. I’m a contractor and I go from the ofce to the job site, and I’m in and out of vehicles all day. So, I nd myself wearing leggings or jeans all the time. But as we all know, girl pockets are the devil’s work, and I can’t even carry my phone let alone tools or notes or…These are super com-fortable like yoga pants, but they look more polished while still being rugged and functional. AND THE POCKETS ARE AMAZING! I’m also a pilot and I can’t wait to wear these for summer ying. The stretch and comfort [are] so nice and will be awesome in my small plane.”Sara: The best feedback I’ve received lately chastised us for making jeans for “pancake booties.” We always strive to be inclusive, and our sizing goes up to 24 in core styles, but this is a different request. Her feedback and similar comments from others have pushed us to start developing a new pant that is built for women with more power and curve in the thigh and booty. I keep this note nearby and am so grateful for this customer’s forthright critique. We always need to do better for more bodies – and more booties. DOVETAIL WORKWEAR FIT FOR THE JOB. CAPABLE OF ANYTHING.FIT FOR THE JOB. CAPABLE OF ANYTHING.Dovetail would like to offer Oilwoman Magazine readers 20% OFF their purchase at DovetailWorkwear.com Use the code OILWOMAN20 One-time use only. Oer expires August 31, 2021

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https://www.reutersevents.com/events/data/Key Pillars for 2021: Ease Communications:Break down silos across exploration, drilling and production and strive for a digitally integrated oilfieldLower Carbon:Use digital to set near-term emissions targets and track accountability across upstream operations whilst meeting global energy demandAutomate to AccelerateWield automated and integrated systems to dramatically reduce downtime and OPEX at scaleData Driven Oil & Gas 2021 14-15 June | Online | #DDOG2021Female Leaders in Digital UpstreamRegister Nowreutersevents.com/events/data/3,000+Attendees25+Executive Speakers40%Operator Attendance 2Weeks On DemandJoin the world’s executive Oil & Gas forum at https://www.reutersevents.com/events/data/Raquel ClementDigital Product Line Deputy ManagerChevronRashi Gajula, Sr. Manager Emerging Technologies and Digital StrategyPioneer Natural ResourcesTracy BeamPrincipal Digital Strategy & Business Transformation Advisor, Chevronhttps://www.reutersevents.com/events/data/Key Pillars for 2021: Ease Communications:Break down silos across exploration, drilling and production and strive for a digitally integrated oilfieldLower Carbon:Use digital to set near-term emissions targets and track accountability across upstream operations whilst meeting global energy demandAutomate to AccelerateWield automated and integrated systems to dramatically reduce downtime and OPEX at scaleData Driven Oil & Gas 2021 14-15 June | Online | #DDOG2021Female Leaders in Digital UpstreamRegister Nowreutersevents.com/events/data/3,000+Attendees25+Executive Speakers40%Operator Attendance 2Weeks On DemandJoin the world’s executive Oil & Gas forum at https://www.reutersevents.com/events/data/Raquel ClementDigital Product Line Deputy ManagerChevronRashi Gajula, Sr. Manager Emerging Technologies and Digital StrategyPioneer Natural ResourcesTracy BeamPrincipal Digital Strategy & Business Transformation Advisor, Chevronhttps://www.reutersevents.com/events/data/Key Pillars for 2021: Ease Communications:Break down silos across exploration, drilling and production and strive for a digitally integrated oilfieldLower Carbon:Use digital to set near-term emissions targets and track accountability across upstream operations whilst meeting global energy demandAutomate to AccelerateWield automated and integrated systems to dramatically reduce downtime and OPEX at scaleData Driven Oil & Gas 2021 14-15 June | Online | #DDOG2021Female Leaders in Digital UpstreamRegister Nowreutersevents.com/events/data/3,000+Attendees25+Executive Speakers40%Operator Attendance 2Weeks On DemandJoin the world’s executive Oil & Gas forum at https://www.reutersevents.com/events/data/Raquel ClementDigital Product Line Deputy ManagerChevronRashi Gajula, Sr. Manager Emerging Technologies and Digital StrategyPioneer Natural ResourcesTracy BeamPrincipal Digital Strategy & Business Transformation Advisor, Chevronhttps://www.reutersevents.com/events/data/Key Pillars for 2021: Ease Communications:Break down silos across exploration, drilling and production and strive for a digitally integrated oilfieldLower Carbon:Use digital to set near-term emissions targets and track accountability across upstream operations whilst meeting global energy demandAutomate to AccelerateWield automated and integrated systems to dramatically reduce downtime and OPEX at scaleData Driven Oil & Gas 2021 14-15 June | Online | #DDOG2021Female Leaders in Digital UpstreamRegister Nowreutersevents.com/events/data/3,000+Attendees25+Executive Speakers40%Operator Attendance 2Weeks On DemandJoin the world’s executive Oil & Gas forum at https://www.reutersevents.com/events/data/Raquel ClementDigital Product Line Deputy ManagerChevronRashi Gajula, Sr. Manager Emerging Technologies and Digital StrategyPioneer Natural ResourcesTracy BeamPrincipal Digital Strategy & Business Transformation Advisor, Chevronhttps://www.reutersevents.com/events/data/Key Pillars for 2021: Ease Communications:Break down silos across exploration, drilling and production and strive for a digitally integrated oilfieldLower Carbon:Use digital to set near-term emissions targets and track accountability across upstream operations whilst meeting global energy demandAutomate to AccelerateWield automated and integrated systems to dramatically reduce downtime and OPEX at scaleData Driven Oil & Gas 2021 14-15 June | Online | #DDOG2021Female Leaders in Digital UpstreamRegister Nowreutersevents.com/events/data/3,000+Attendees25+Executive Speakers40%Operator Attendance 2Weeks On DemandJoin the world’s executive Oil & Gas forum at https://www.reutersevents.com/events/data/Raquel ClementDigital Product Line Deputy ManagerChevronRashi Gajula, Sr. Manager Emerging Technologies and Digital StrategyPioneer Natural ResourcesTracy BeamPrincipal Digital Strategy & Business Transformation Advisor, Chevron