Expert: Keith Patton - 2/10/2012

Question
QUESTION: Dear Keith,

I was reading many of your past question and answers, which are very informative and useful.

I read that you said Petroleum Engineers are better paid than Geologists and Geophysicists. Would you say that is because they are worked a lot harder since they don't go home every evening?

I was told that many are worked like slaves, away for many months, pausing their work for sleep and food, so hourly rates aren't special. How accurate is this narrative?

Also, if someone did a BS in Pet.Engineering, would an MS give them a much better salary?

Kind Regards,
Isse

ANSWER: In large companies, you are paid by your value to the company.  There are something like 15,000 geologists registered with the AAPG, but a lot fewer Petroleum Engineers.

If you do a query online for the salary surveys for the respective positions, you will see the starting salaries are still in line with what my experience has been.

Well site geologists work long hours too, and engineers in offices work about the same as desk bound geolgists and geophysicists.  It is just a reflection of supply and demand.  If there were as many schools cranking out Pet Engineers as there are graduating geologists, their salaries would be lower.  Plus there is the added dimension, that engineers get a certification.  That is a requirement that is only newly implemented for geoscientists.  It think it goes back to the old quantitative vs qualitative divide that separated the two disciplines.

Yes, an MS will increase your salary, but it might also limit your opportunties.  Some companies feel BS engineers are fine, and don't see the need to pay for more.

---------- FOLLOW-UP ----------

QUESTION: Dear Keith,

What effect do you think that a person's university has on job prospects and salary?

For example, if you do not live in US and you graduate with a BSc from an Asian or African university?

Thirdly, would a person with a BSc be able to work up in position and learn the MSc stuff from experience or would he always be below the MSc/PhD graduate?

Thanks,

Answer
Issi:

If you are a BSc Engineer, you could work any number of places.  I know that in the realm of the EU and Near East, they place a big empahsis on academic performance.  It is important to do well in school, and an employer who sees a lot of resumes, will probably use the grades to weed out the less desirable applicants.  Companies like Schlumberger and Halliburton use a lot of engineers on well sites, but do not treat them very well, seeing them a interchangeable parts.  I get the sense that the Brits and French who head up the engineering departments in places like Abudhabi and others, have a colonial outlook and still see the locals, engineers included as wogs and fuzzy wuzzies.  I've been in the the Office in the Emirates and was shocked at the offhanded way these professionals were treated.  I saw them hire and fire Indian and Pakistani engineers with a distainful nonchalance.  They would never treat another Brit or Frog so offhandedly.

So yes, your school can help you get a position, but you have to sell your self.  A degree will only get you into an interview.  The interview is where you close the deal.  Salaries are completely dependent on the postition title and seniority in the company. Large companies have pay grades predetermined at the time of hiring.  Salary treatment comes once or twice a year and depends on the market.  When I left school I got a raise every two months for the first year, simply because I could have walked across the street to a competitor and gotten more money, so in order to keep us they threw money at us.

Before you earn a MS be sure that your employer is willing to pay you for it.  I mean, he may only want a BS engineer, and if you get an MS and expect more pay, he may just tell you to leave and hire another BS engineer in your place.  It happens.  My friend got his PhD from Stanford in Pet Eng.  with a MS in math.  I don't know if it made any more difference other than making it harder for him to find a job.  He is making probably the same as his friend who got his BS from the same school at the same time.  MS and PhD engineers are more likely to be teaching.