The International Dimension

In 2010 - 2011 Eni distributed 24 study grants (for a total of €25,000 each) to students from developing countries. Study grants of €10,000 were offered to students from Indonesia, Ghana, Turkmenistan, Angola, Nigeria and Pakistan to follow a Master's degree in petroleum engineering at the Politecnico in Turin, a course that was set up with the support of Eni. The aim of the master's course, which lasts for 24 months, is to prepare students to be able to respond to the needs of the petroleum engineering sector with the knowledge and competences necessary to enhance, manage and provide solutions for all the technological aspects of petroleum engineering.

The training course for Junior Drilling and Completion Specialists is aimed at new Eni Congo, Eni North Africa and Eni Angola recruits, who, having completed the course, are offered a position as a drilling and completion supervisor. The course involves 21 people who undergo 55 weeks of behavioural and technical training at the ECU site in Cortemaggiore. The students from Congo did a preparatory language course (in English) before beginning the course proper in Italy.

The West Africa Geologists Training Programme is conducted at the main site of the Eni Corporate University in San Donato Milanese in collaboration with the University of Perugia. In the context of activities related to projects in West Africa (Nigeria, Angola, Congo), it has been necessary to provide 7-month courses to train local young resources with degrees in geology.
Since 2003 more than 700 young people from Kazakhstan have been involved in different training initiatives aimed at growing basic competences provided by the Kazakh school and university system.  In 2010 this project involved 83 Kazakhis in six different operational professional positions and is aimed at on field training activities in Italy and abroad.
The KPO Junior Drilling Supervisor training project lasts for 33 weeks, is aimed at around 15 KPO people and was provided in loco by ECU teachers and external tutors. The training includes classroom sessions and work experience on the KPO ring with the support of tutors, simulators and assessment, all of which is coordinated in loco by ECU. In Kazakhstan, Saipem and Agip KCO have financed study grants and internships for students from 25 universities in the country . Moreover, Agip Caspian Sea and ECU have jointly created the chair in Renewable Energy at Nazarbayev University in Astana, which will be inaugurated for the 2011-2012 academic year.

Saipem and ECU are working to establish a two-year master's course in HSE at the USTO University in Orano, Algeria, which will start in the 2011-2012 academic year.
For students at Angolan universities (Universidade Agostinho Neto, Universidade Independente de Angola, Universidade Tecnica de Angola, Universidade Luisada de Angola) internships have been organised to facilitate the employment of young graduates.

In Asia, Saipem has financed training activities to facilitate the future hiring of young staff at the Maritime Academy of Asia and Pacific in the Philippines. In Indonesia, the universities of Bandung and Sepuluh have received financial support for the organisation of training activities for young graduates. In Pakistan, the universities of Lahore, Karachi and Mehran have been supported in the creation of an MBA programme. The Indian Institute of Technology in Chennai has begun scientific collaboration with Saipem India Projects (SIP).

In South America Eni has financed: post-graduate training in geosciences at the Universidad Central de Venezuela, post-graduate training course in biodiversity at the Pontificia Universidad in Ecuador. While the Catholic University of Perù has received support for the provision of study grants for young people.
Finally in Oceania, at the Western Australia University scholarships have been awarded to students from East Timor on upstream issues.

A wide range of action has been undertaken to enhance local people with a view to increasing over time their presence in managerial positions. To this end, 230 development plans for local resources in the E&P sector have been arranged and a broad-based assessment of potential has been carried out in Egypt, Congo and Nigeria.
Likewise in Saipem the VIP –Valuable International Pool project has been launched for the second year in a row , a segmentation process for international resources aimed at consolidating and sharing knowledge at the corporate level for young graduates and middle managers with high potential or high level of  know-how. The project has the objective of creating a pool of particularly valuable resources able to work all over the world. In 2010, 1785 resources were identified distributed in all of the main geographical areas in which Saipem operates.
In this way 933 young graduates, 249 high potential young graduates, 275 high potential middle managers, 328 middle managers with high levels of know how will in the coming years be involved in a series of management, development and training actions that will make it possible to further enhance their professional and managerial skills. In particular, 524 plans for individual development have already been designed, which include international paths for high managerial potential resources. 9 sessions for assessment of potential were organized at different geographical sites which involved 96 people. Particular attention is dedicated to young resources. Among the most important initiatives is the cooperation agreement signed in February 2010 between Saipem Contracting Algérie and the Université  des Sciences et Technologies of Orano ( Algeria) , aimed at empowering local resource of those skills which the Algerian territory lacks of, and the official ceremony held in Singapore in October 2010 addressed to 20 young graduates of the Asia- Pacific area who after three years of work concluded their Young Graduates program and took important positions within the company.
The program for the "nationalisation of managerial positions" aims to develop professional skills in the oil&gas sector in order to support the so-called "expatriates", workers who are not from the countries where they work, with local personnel at all levels of the organisation, in both technical and managerial roles.
An emblematic example: in Nigeria, in 2000, at the three companies controlled by eni, there were 890 local workers and  170 expatriates. Only 19 of the local workers were senior or middle managers, the majority comprising blue-collar workers. In 2010 local personnel numbers were 1,400, a 40% increase, of which 77 in managerial positions while around 100 were in administrative and technical positions. Meanwhile, the number of expatriates has fallen to 157. If also Saipem is considered, the number of employees in 2010 was almost 5,000, 90% Nigerian. In 2000 there were fewer than 800 Nigerians. There are now 63 local managers, while in 2004 there were 6.

In order to further strengthen the effectiveness of interfunctional and  international mobility, during 2010 job posting was started for overseas positions in the e&p sector and the facilities for mobility support were reinforced within the i-recruiting system. An i-offering project was launched to allow the full integration of the recruitment and international mobility management processes.
To facilitate an international mobility that is aware of cultural differences, a training programme was introduced, following a pilot project in November 2009, aimed at developing the international and multicultural competences of Eni personnel on their first foreign posting. Similar training initiatives were also organised for of the HR managers at foreign companies.
Web seminars were organised in 2010 on issues relating to international mobility involving the HR units of more than 30 subsidiaries and these will continue also in 2011. Benchmarking activities also continued in 2010, along with the updating of the support tools for international mobility with the development of integrated IT systems in the different phases of international assignment.