In the last decade, oil companies are increasingly viewing collaborative work environments as an important component of their smart oil fields programs. Collaborative work environments (CWEs) have been implemented by several major oil companies, to support the use of technology in smart oil fields. The implementation of these collaborative work environments is not without problems. After major oil companies successfully implemented the hardware, tools and applications in CWEs, organizational design challenges remained unsolved. The biggest challenge is to change behavior of staff and to effectively integrate people across disciplinary boundaries. This chapter emphasizes the importance of the organizational aspect of CWEs in smart oil fields. The objective of this chapter is to provide the upstream petroleum industry with guidelines for the organizational design of the collaborative work environments, in support of the operation of smart oil fields. In order to provide the organizational design guidelines, a PhD research was conducted at three different operating units of a major oil company. This research focused on the business processes, organizational structure, and competencies of staff in the CWEs.

After major petroleum companies successfully implemented the hardware, tools and applications in Collaborative Work Environments (CWE), human factor issues remain unsolved. Working in these Collaborative Work Environments cuts across traditional disciplinary and geographically dispersed boundaries. Less hierarchical reporting relationships and multi-disciplinary teams replace clear-cut single hierarchical reporting relationships and single-disciplinary teams. The new way of collaborative working calls for supporting organic organizational structure for the CWE. Most current organizational structures of operating units are divided into several divisions (for example oil, gas or geographical divisions). In turn, these divisions are organized into functional technical departments (for example Reservoir Engineers together in one department and Production Technologists in another department). Alignment of the overall traditional functional organizational structures of the operating unit with the more organic structure of the CWE is a real challenge. In the past, the petroleum industry had many different forms of organizational structure. To capture both functional requirements and the need to collaborate, they have returned to the matrix structure. We provide empirical results of several cases of Collaborative Work Environments (of different operating units) in the petroleum industry. We show both the issues faced and the path chosen by the operating units to align the overall organizational structure of the operating unit with the Collaborative Work Environment structure.

Individuals in Collaborative Work Environments (CWE's) have interpretations and norms towards the technology they use. We call these interpretations and norms 'mental models'. These mental models form the perceptions from which other models are interpreted, for example decision-making models. Mental models can be divided into taskwork and teamwork mental models. This paper will focus on the group level of the (shared) mental models. Not only the use of technology is influenced by the mental models, also the success of learning will, to a large extent, depend on these mental models. So far, the emphasis has been on the development and implementation of Smart Oil Fields Technology as such. Little attention has been paid to the importance of the influence of mental models during the implementation of the new technology. This paper aims to shed some light on the subjective aspect of the implementation of Smart Oil Fields Technology within the CWE's, by providing a model of major factors of influence and outcomes of Group Mental Models in Collaborative Work Environments. 1. Context of Collaborative Work Environments Most major oil companies have implemented Smart Oil Fields (Technology) in order to enhance their oil recovery and productivity. Collaborative Work Environments (CWE's) have been implemented by several major oil companies, to support the use of technology in Smart Oil Fields. Following Taylor & Fosse (1), we define a Collaborative Work Environment as "any forum, physical or virtual, formal or informal, in which parties can come together to discuss problems and scenarios and come to decisions". These environments will allow people to work collaboratively regardless of distance, making better decisions, faster, thereby enabling enhanced productivity and delivering operational performance improvements (2). The decision-making in the Collaborative Work Environments has to cope with three important aspects:Multi locations (both on site and at distance, without the need for actual face-to-face interaction);Multi disciplinary (people with different educational and cultural backgrounds);Multi party (in collaboration with several service firms). Within CWE's, many models are used to simulate the 'real-life' situation. Employees are used to 'thinking in models', for example decision-making or reservoir models. Besides these models, it is important to know how employees interpret these models. We refer to these as 'mental models'.

After major petroleum companies successfully implemented the hardware, tools and applications in Collaborative Work Environments (CWE), human factor issues remain unsolved. Working in these Collaborative Work Environments cuts across traditional disciplinary and geographically dispersed boundaries. Less hierarchical reporting relationships and multi-disciplinary teams replace clear-cut single hierarchical reporting relationships and single-disciplinary teams. The new way of collaborative working calls for supporting organic organizational structure for the CWE. Most current organizational structures of operating units are divided into several divisions (for example oil, gas or geographical divisions). In turn, these divisions are organized into functional technical departments (for example Reservoir Engineers together in one department and Production Technologists in another department). Alignment of the overall traditional functional organizational structures of the operating unit with the more organic structure of the CWE is a real challenge. In the past, the petroleum industry had many different forms of organizational structure. To capture both functional requirements and the need to collaborate, they have returned to the matrix structure. We provide empirical results of several cases of Collaborative Work Environments (of different operating units) in the petroleum industry. We show both the issues faced and the path chosen by the operating units to align the overall organizational structure of the operating unit with the Collaborative Work Environment structure.

Several major oil companies have brought in specific Information Technology (IT) to implement the Smart Oil Fields concept in practice. They did so to reduce costs, to increase productivity and for recovery purposes. However, implementing IT for Smart Oil Fields does not automatically imply that you have actually implemented a Smart Oil Field with all its benefits. Alignment of the IT to the specific business needs is often lacking. In order to successfully operate Smart Oil Fields, and getting most of the value, oil companies need to have an adequate IT Governance and Organization framework in place, which bridges the gap between business and IT. In order to develop such a framework, a PhD research was conducted at three different Operating Units of a major oil company. The research focused on the organizational structure of oil production locations, which had already implemented Smart Oil Fields. During our field research, interviews with staff & management were conducted, company documents were analyzed and observations were made. We combined our research findings with our project experience on IT Governance and Organization in major oil companies in The Netherlands, Russia and South America. Our research findings combined with our project experience has resulted into an integrated, hands-on IT Governance and Organization framework for oil & gas companies who are implementing or planning to implement Smart Oil Fields operations.