What The Funk?

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0:49 Our second youngest guest ever, Tim. I was actually doing the math on that when I saw when he graduated, I was thinking Is, he our second youngest or second youngest? And I remember Andrew is

0:59 like, oh yeah, whatever. it's definitely our second youngest the Andrew chan whose career continues to progress log now he's like fully immersed in the venture capital world came on when he was

1:09 twenty one right and I think he'd just like just finished up a couple of finals off but now I'm doing this podcast like Oh man he he was getting started young that guy still in college thus those are

1:22 amazing but Anyway I told you to him we're going to be working for him someday anyways this is an andrew chance pod it's Jose Rodriguez time Jay Rod one of my favorite young forward thinking

1:35 technology centric engineers in the oil and gas industry I worry a little bit tim that due to perception in the market and the general desire to get away from oil and gas that a lot of people like

1:51 jose are going into different industries and applying their data skills and love of technology softwares you know so on and so forth into other things. But it's fun to see somebody like Jose who,

2:04 you know, went through sort of the whole program, he's been trained. And now he's like fully immersing himself and being he'll probably be one of the best reservoir engineers in the country, at

2:12 some point. You know what I mean? So, um, nonetheless, I wanted to, to bring on Jose, uh, dude, just turned 25, you know, kind of building something here in Houston and, and Jose, we just,

2:23 we just kind of wanted to have you on wrap a little bit today about all the things going on in, in your world But first and foremost, who, who is Jose Rodriguez, man? Who are you? Well, uh,

2:35 first of all, thanks for having me. You know, pleasure to be here. Uh, well, a quick intro. So yeah, relatively new to the industry, uh, started as a reservoir engineer for a small, to

2:45 mid-sized operator wreck in 2019. Um, you know, I was born in Mexico, became a citizen in 2018. Kind of came in with zero connections. Uh, nice. You know, when I first started, I, uh, I

2:57 concurrently did a master's in data as well. I just recently wrapped it up in a year ago, 2021, the 2021. Yeah, that's a quick intro about me. You know, kind of the data focus side of it was

3:11 just kind of when I first got into the industry, I was baffled at how we were doing things. Kind of like how everything was being done in Excel, legacy systems and I got really annoyed by it. Kind

3:21 of almost pissed off by it. I'm like, there's no way we're doing like, there's no way why we should be doing things this way when there's better ways to do things out there It's tough to wrestle

3:32 Excel away from an engineer. I'll tell you that. Yeah, I mean, for me, the biggest thing was when we were trying to do like, you know, lots and everything else with an Excel, you know,

3:41 maintain databases with an Excel and I'm like, you know, I've just taken like a Python course my senior year and I'm like, why are we doing things this way? This is ridiculous. And yeah, nobody

3:50 seems to have a problem with it. They weren't trained in it like you were, right? I mean, so you went to Houston, are you from Houston? You said you grew up in Mexico.

3:59 So I came to the US when I was a five kind of group in Katie, Texas, been there basically my entire life, then went to the university, Houston, for both my bachelors and my masters. So state

4:09 local. But you know, it's pretty common. I'm seeing that the path that you took. So a lot of petroleum engineers continuing on to get whether it's mid-career type of thing or right after school,

4:23 continuing on to get the data analytics or the data science or the machine learning type of experience beyond that. So that's not an uncommon path, I think. I don't know, Jose, do you see the

4:36 same thing? No, definitely, definitely. I, when I'm seeing most people kind of do like boot cancer, you know, just trying to YouTube stuff, actually full on doing a master's, I've seen a

4:47 handful of people doing that, kind of like in the same peer group as I am. But, you know, I think a lot of it has to do, A lot of people I think are doing it one for career progression and then

4:57 two to kind of have like an out. within the industry, you know, things ever go south. The first kind of why I did it. Wow, it was a hedge. It's a smart hedge though, because data science

5:07 doesn't go anywhere. It's a good one. You get your professional experience, you learn how to operate in a company, and then if there's a good jumping off point. I mean, in the transition

5:17 that is underway, coming, evolving, and so on, there's gonna be a lot of interesting off ramps for aspiring production and reservoir engineers that wanna go off into the transition, I think. So

5:30 I think that that's a good background to have to be able to make that move. Right. Do you think, I can imagine that it's tempting from your seat to working for an operator? And let's just be

5:44 honest, Tim, guys like you and me have been into as many different boardrooms as anybody that's out there, seemingly, hundreds and hundreds of different oil and gas companies And for the most part,

5:56 the environments are fairly sterile. incredibly young or forward thinking compared to some of the technology companies that exist right now that are super hip and do your laundry here and bring your

6:10 dog and whatever it is and pronouns. Jose, for you, what is it like being 24, 25 years old and being a reservoir engineer? Like, are you the youngest person in every meeting that you're in?

6:27 When I first started, yeah, I was the youngest person by like 10 years, you know, everybody had kids and I'm over here 22 and then, you know, we had on some other people my age. I was still the

6:38 youngest person though, like they were 24, 25 now, you know, 26, 27. But yeah, there's not that many young people in the industry, you know, one, they just didn't get hired, you know, I

6:49 came into the industry in 2015, graduate 2019, but you know, those four years, one of the career fair, You know, they're depressing. They don't hiring anybody. People that did get higher than

6:59 got laid off in 2020 and then at the same time there's a lot of people that don't want to go into the industry and just was like the perception now so yeah there's not that many of us. I'll tell you

7:12 so I came into the industry in the 90s and it was actually very similar not that they didn't want to come into industry because we were just coming out of what at least we thought was the biggest

7:21 downturn possible was the 80s and so it took probably 15 years Jeremy before I was not the youngest person in the room you know it there was that big slug of basically nobody getting hired and it

7:37 wasn't till we worked together when I'd sit in the room is like okay I am now the oldest in the room you know like we went to Murphy oil was the first time I had a meeting where most of the people

7:49 were younger than me it was very interesting it's just really entering you know that slug of people at my age and younger starting to move forward. Uh, and the 55, the, you know, the 60 year old

8:01 is starting to make their way out. And now it's in the eighties and it's going to happen again. Absolutely. Absolutely. Peaks and valleys very much in this, this industry. Um, it, Tim, for,

8:12 for you, uh, and Jose, you probably didn't know this, but Tim actually worked at TIPCO and was one of the original people that you really understood and sold like spot fire into the oil and gas

8:23 industry. And he's an engineer here. Okay Good. I was number one in spot fire. The first oil and gas guy hired a spot fire. So, so that leads me to, to you, you said there's issues in, you

8:38 came in and immediately identified inefficiencies in the fact that everything was being done in Excel. Do you use tools like spot fire? Like what are some of the applications that you've leveraged

8:49 and that you really lean on to keep you out of that sort of siloed spreadsheet world? Yeah, so I love Spotfire.

8:57 heaven sent. I use it all the time. I, you know, going from us using Excel to then using spot fire and then, you know, using it properly, not just, you know, connected to itself, but, you

9:08 know, pulling it from SQL using our Python, you know, the whole package of using spot fire, right? It's been amazing. I think it's been great for the industry, but it's also kind of like a

9:18 double sword, because I think spot fire is a visualization software. But a lot of people start using it as like an engineering software and kind of start using spot fire. The point where

9:30 there's limitations to it, and you should just, you know, there should be another software created specifically for whatever they're trying to replicate within spot fire. But I'm a gigantic

9:41 anti-can of spot fire. I love it. If it's, if it's used and done properly, you know, other softwares that I used, I used to use Q engineering all the time, which, you know, was happened to be

9:51 within spot fire. And that's why it became such a huge fan of spot fire

9:55 And then, uh, combo curve. That's something I use all the time.

9:60 Friends of the show, combo curve. Yeah, no, I'm gonna kick into being a combo curve. You know, wherever they came out, like I think it was during the pandemic. Also one of those soft turns

10:09 that I was just kind of blown away by. And you know, the industry really did need it coming from legacy software that's. Yeah. You know, it looks like it was created in 1995 and then they just

10:20 gave up on it. There was no competition and there's no innovation.

10:25 There was one in between that just never really got adopted that Jeremy and I were pushing that anyway.

10:32 Actually, somebody told me the other day about that navigator. Like, oh yeah, that was a good product talking back to the time. I was talking about the podcast, talking about working at our

10:40 generator. And I said, that was a good product and somebody goes, it's still a good product. I forget when it was like, yeah, you know, some things just work. Right. And that's a conversation

10:52 I've had with a number of people lately, right? because I think there's a lot of noise. for somebody like you even who loves tech to sift through when the value Props all Sorta sound the same and

11:05 the U Eyes starts to look sort of similar like how do you start to decipher like what's real and what's not because you've probably seen one hundred demos of one hundred products I would guess at this

11:14 point

11:16 honestly yourself they're going to get influenza that then you know everything but then when you say it looks amazing and then you start getting into like weight and you can't do the simple act or do

11:25 this and why I love it also has to do with the team's no Valley navigate I'm also a fan of them back when we regret what we were using patiently and I just want to get out of PHD when AM I then this

11:37 is ridiculous like I hate doing these workflows because they're just extremely inefficient so we first brought in about Ava then at the same time combo curve kind of came out and then I'm like i Gotta

11:50 go with complicated this is in My opinion it was just kind of more cutting edge modern but either or It doesn't matter if that bound to have combo curve, they were just better than what else

12:01 currently using. So I just want to get out of it. Does that make sense?

12:08 Go ahead, Tim. So let me dig into that a little bit. With your background now in machine learning and data science and so on, you've gotten into combo curve, you understand, you know, clearly

12:20 you understand ARPS equations 'cause you've used PhD win and bound to have and so on

12:26 What is the acceptance level for moving forward with more data driven reserves evaluations as opposed

12:39 to

12:41 ARPS forecasts for reserves evaluations? Is there an acceptance now of, hey, we're gonna use these data driven methods to be able to forecast these wells and get our reserves or is it still pretty

12:52 much now we're gonna be sticking of arts for a long time to go and going forward.

12:59 I think, I think it's

13:02 gonna be both. Look, with software like ComBooker, it gives you the optionality to do more stuff and do more stuff with it. You know, before it was, you know, you're using PhD in areas of like,

13:13 you can only do it one way, and there hasn't been any software updates in years, you know, maybe decades. So you didn't really have any optionality, and you know, when you get audited, you have

13:33 to do your official corporate reserves and everything in these software, like you're kind of forced to use that Now with these new softwares, like you have the optionality to do different things.

13:33 Generally with acceptance, I mean, there's a lot of resistance still, you know, just switching softwares, you know, it's a pain to switch softwares. And you know, more companies have to start

13:45 using it. With the Nolan gas, I don't think it's companies aren't really trying to drive change. They'd rather let other people drive the change, then they'll hop on later once they see it kind of

13:56 based on proven. so so let me let me jump in their right hand now so Yes I think in Tim are you familiar with the book crossing the chasm Oh that Sir love that book love those are you do you have any

14:10 familiarity with it now do so so it really I mean there's a there's like a skateboard ramp basically that shows you like they're the exception or it's about it's a bell curve the exception the

14:21 acceptance and adoption rate effectively of of innovation and it's only something like two or three percent are actually innovators and then by then by the end you have people who are just definitely

14:34 laggards like you said followers on but it's generally like that for most industries right we just have the lens of that being oil and gas and the you most likely sit like within that to two or three

14:47 per cent firmly but as your career goes on you might then become more skeptical of the two or three percent and slide different you know what I mean like these things evocative There's so many

14:58 technologies, and I don't know if combo curve has crossed it yet or not, but that are in the, that stop in the transition from early adopters to what they call early majority. So that, which is

15:10 generally accepted, but they may not have bought it yet, but that's where many technologies die, is in that gap between innovators and early majority. There's a chasm And to live in, if you're an

15:26 innovator, you're willing to put up with all of the pain and headaches. You know, when I got my first Wi-Fi hookup at the house, you can't imagine how hard it was to set up because I was an early

15:40 adopter of Wi-Fi. He also wasn't, he was like negative 10 at that point. Yeah, that's right. You were born yet when I was doing this. He was a twinkle in his mom's eye, man. Yeah, yeah So we

15:52 had anyway. What You're willing to put up with and I Dunno where you where you sit and all that but I feel like combo curve is sitting right at the edge of that getting ready to jump over the chasm

16:02 if that there are any kind of starting to make that move

16:06 so do I so you're you're going to have to live with while those can be many more technologies that come along and hit that and get you get see all these demos and and kind of move forward with So I

16:17 guess we're done plug in the book crossing the chasm but you should you should probably read it to know where you sit as a receiver of technologies

16:26 over here now I'll check it out Yeah

16:30 so let's let's talk about non -work non non business stuff what what gets you going so you you spent you've spent most of your life in Houston Lee said Katie lived in Houston how about when you're not

16:42 at work like what's what kind of keeps you going what's fun for you

16:49 how well you'd respond to work all the day

16:56 I mean, look, recently, ever since I had finished the Masters because, you know, during the Masters, I had no time. I was working and then doing the Masters during the weekends. But ever since

17:05 I finished, yeah, I picked up Gigi too. I picked him wide tie. I picked up a tennis golfing. You know, I'm a hobbies.

17:14 I might have a job for you soon. I'm getting ready to start hiring martial arts experts Oh, yeah. I'm by no means an expert. I, uh, six, seven months. Yeah. Now I'm still getting woke all the

17:25 time. Have you, uh, have you gotten into to any sparring with Colin McClellan at all? Yeah. Actually, so he's the one that took me to my first lesson. Okay. Yeah. My first jujitsu. Yeah.

17:35 Completely. You just whooped my ass. Well, maybe we should set him up with Julie then. Julie, Julie might take you now

17:43 Actually, you know, I think the first time I went there, Julie actually took him down and I'm like, wow, this is amazing. You know, just seeing Colin over here. She's a bad ass.

17:54 So, do you consider yourself a wildcatter? Um, you know, I've gone close friends with a lot of the digital walk adders. Um, I guess unofficially, I don't know. Um, I don't think there's an

18:09 official, there's no secret handshake or anything. I think you can just say, Oh, they haven't. Oh, they didn't teach you that one yet. Because I mean, I got the tattoo.

18:18 He must be a different level because I got the handshake and other tattoo No, OK.

18:24 But now I've seen you at a few of their events. You know, their events are fun. I'm actually it looks like I'm coming down for Empower. We're helping to drive some attendance there because it's

18:33 just a it's a. It's really a fantastic event. These worlds are starting to merge. And this is sort of what's pushing the adoption of oil and gas companies. I think more so into the mining for

18:48 Bitcoin space More and more companies I talk to. have interest in this topic. And Tim, I think you understand this from the engineering perspective and just the environmental perspective. If you

19:01 don't have to flare and you can reuse that to create energy, you should do it. And not even the benefit of making money. That's the side effect. But while we're on that, I mean, I'm actually

19:11 dealing with a client right now as a Colorado operator, in order to produce oil, they have to do something with the associated gas and there's no gas takeaway where they are. So what they're

19:24 bringing in various technologies, including Bitcoin mining, Caruso, I guess there's no reason not to name drop. They've got five Caruso units out there to basically generate electricity to run

19:38 Bitcoin mining so they can produce oil and sell it. So they're going out of their way to reduce their flaring. And one of the ways to do it is to do have Bitcoin mining out on site and they've got a

19:50 couple of other things they're doing. out on site to to avoid flaring so they can produce and sell oil is a very interesting thing to do and they're bringing out cryo units and all kinds of things

20:01 just to really drop it now they're they're also looking into their calling E O R but injecting like the ASS back into the ground so they don't they can't flirt until they get gas takeaway was just

20:13 talking to somebody from oxy who owns about six hundred wells in the DJ Basin about exactly that last week that Colorado is is very environmental right very very SG forward and and basically what's

20:28 happening right now is Colorado says something New Mexico watches a year later New Mexico does it a year after that Texas does it like that's literally the L shape that's happening right now with all

20:38 regulations and what they're doing like you just said in Colorado is you in someplace like you can't emit like basically you have to be carbon zero tim to to produce so that the these engineers are

20:52 being challenged in different ways to, like you said, sequester gas, find ways to reuse product, mine Bitcoin to not flare at all. And it's very, very interesting to see it happen up close

21:07 because these guys are basically like, the way it feels is we're being pushed out of business, but at the same time, we're on the edge of pretty amazing innovation right now You look at, I mean,

21:22 obviously, as we record this, price oil is just above 100.

21:29 It's, well, if you're gonna produce oil, it's worth it to try and figure out what to do something with the gas. Even, I mean, we're talking to clients who are looking at the gas to liquids

21:40 techniques. It's not, you know, not just trying to drop the NGLs out, but actually convert methane into a liquid hydrocarbon to send to the refineries.

21:51 so there's at this at this price spread a lot of different things come up and I could see that really movement into Colorado quickly so so jose effort for you are these things that are that are now

22:04 coming up in conversation within oil and gas companies what is our strategy around potential elimination of flaring or mining for bitcoin like does that come up or is it still kind of solid enough

22:14 where hey you're an engineer you focus on this segment it's come up in the sense that a lot of people are talking about it but not a lot of people know too much about it and I've heard it from other

22:28 peers people I work with like oh should look into but I think there's a lot of conversations about it but no one really seems to fully grasp it from like at least my perspective though I mean I'm

22:40 actually going at the same conference and I'm looking forward to it because I'm like Yeah I want to see how people are actually doing it and what it could be applicable say at our company or somewhere

22:48 else and at least understand the details behind it But it's exciting because if you were to bring it up four or five years ago, they would look at you crazy, like what do you mean Bitcoin? What do

22:60 you mean mining for Bitcoin with oil and gas? Now there's big name companies going to the conference, talking about it, actually implementing it. So it's just an exciting time. So you right now,

23:12 I will get into the transition in a second. You work for next era, which is a -

23:18 Well traditionally a utility company. So presumably, there's no interest in flaring natural gas. You're trying to get the natural gas to generate electricity for the company, I'm assuming. Is

23:36 that the case, or do you guys actually have a good oil portfolio as well?

23:42 So I guess specifically I work for Trinity Operating, which is like the upstream side And yeah, it's like a full blown upstream

23:51 company.

23:53 When it comes to any sort of Becker Mining we Haven't even like we've discussed it but we haven't even really looked into it or actually we have a couple people going to the conference like actually

24:03 see like it was worthwhile but the structure over here is a little bit different but to answer your question journey operating like the upstream portion it's like full -blown just upstream so just

24:16 like a regular oil company you're not really influenced at all by the utility or the company no no not really okay If if anything it just kind of helps when you know prices go negative right and we

24:27 don't have to worry about lay offs in the sense but other than that no no it's that's like Rogers Johnson Told US right down from a family Bible yet I'll tell you you know what Jose just so you know

24:39 no one's ever experienced negative before so that was a new right here he wasn't just that just part of the cycles ago for you

24:49 that was And that was a moment in time that everybody in the industry is going to remember. Yeah. No, everyone in the industry, you know, I came to the industry in 2019, worked for less than a

24:59 year before we went, like, you know, full remote and then prices go negative. And I'm like texting my coworker, I'm like, we have jobs like, like, what do we do?

25:11 No, I tell you what you do is you drain the pool at the apartment complex or wherever you live. And you stored the oil there because you're getting paid to take the oil If I had a, if I had had a

25:22 frat tank, I would have just filled it with oil that day and, you know, something. He lives, he lives on the penthouse of that. What is it? A hotel that has the pool shaped like Texas on the

25:36 town? What is it? The Marriott, Marquis. Marriott downtown.

25:40 That place is awesome. I've actually never been up there, but I feel like I've seen it on TV like I just love when they, they have the blimp for sporting events and they're going around and they,

25:49 And you see this, Texas. pool on top, I was like, man, that really does look cool. Have you guys been up there? Have you guys ever been up there? No, you know, I've been wanting to go there

25:56 'cause I used to live like down the street from there. And I'm like, we should just, you know, I never wanted to book a room, but I've always wanted to go there just to check it out. I want to

26:05 check out that pool. You know, another little oddity in Houston that I, there's a building downtown Houston. I wish I could tell you the cross streets. When you look up, there's a pool that

26:15 extends out about five, six feet, so you can look up and you see people standing in the pool. It's fascinating and it's, of course, to me, I've got a moderate fear of heights. I just get sick

26:28 to my stomach thinking that someone's in the pool. So, but I'm moderate fear of heights. On the scale of fear of heights, which is scared shitless and then not scared at all, what's moderate,

26:40 like a three?

26:43 So let me, I wanna test this. We're going one to 10? Have you been out to, have you been to Chicago? Yes. was the sears tower or the Hancock regale the way up or down the glass comes down do you

26:55 do that you wouldn't do that one but I did at the hancock at the vertical walls stick my Head on the wall and look down but I will tell you that knees are buckling stomach is churning you know the

27:09 whole thing and if it was open air

27:13 that's why I have to grip and talk myself into looking over the edge as that's where I

27:21 have a fear of heights Yeah I Dunno if your hides but any telling me of the situation you know the thought crosses your mind like what if the when the window breaks or whatever you know something

27:33 happens and Jake So I'd Say I'd say like a theory I Go for you no matter the moderate Yeah again in My I Guess I would put myself in moderate to but in the right situation it could be absolutely off

27:46 the charts Is there a dog in your office? Is that what I just heard? No, no, no, he's just telling everybody that someone came to my house, so. Oh, it's you. I thought, no, I thought Jose

27:56 made me run. No, that's good. He's talking to his mind. So I want to talk a little bit more about Houston, about H town. So do you feel like you're going to stay there? Like I know you've, you

28:07 know, you've been there. You're still a young guy. You've been there most of your life, but you've kind of built something in Houston. Do you feel like you're a Houston guy through and through?

28:15 Could you see yourself possibly moving somewhere else? So, so a little bit of background. I got a new job. It's gonna be fully remote. So if I didn't want to stay in Houston. Whoa, you just

28:28 dropped it on us. I was gonna, I was gonna, I was gonna bring it up. Hey, oh no, where you going boy? EQT. EQT. EQT. It's moving to Pittsburgh. Nope. Remote sir. No, so this can use

28:43 fully remote So, I mean technically if I wanted to live. you know in the middle of nowhere I could but I don't think i see myself leaving Texas and I'll probably still stay in Houston but you know

28:55 when kids come into the picture Ah not going to live in the suburbs it's fantastic that I don't have to drive an hour hour and a half now three hours and one day Ah but now I think I'll stay in

29:07 Houston probably Texas at least they don't maybe Austin I Dunno somewhere around there but the remote changed the game so no prepare Nemec if you were asking that question I will stay in Houston or

29:21 you know maybe some your mid Laner You're anywhere where there is oil and gas job that ever since you know code happen and now remote is an option

29:33 it's nice to have that optionality and at the same time you know it just change the game like if companies want to compete for talent you have to offer hybrid at the very least or remote enough to

29:44 have you been out to Pittsburgh In In this process of interview with Yuki two years had all been remote for the interviews now complete them up while now I'm Gonna take a German I have the same

29:53 experience that that you may change your mind I thus says Summer I Wouldn't go in early January but in Pittsburgh is one of the most undersold Sunray communities in the country the impression that we

30:12 all have I just no one's really talking about it is a great community and a great place I think to live and grow up so you might change your mind eventually if you go up there a few times I think I

30:22 know Jeremy Pittsburgh Tulsa be anywhere in North Carolina Tulsa there's a lot of places on the map they're unrated I would have put Austin they're probably fifteen years ago before it was like as you

30:36 know corporate as a foreigner before California found it before the explosion of Awesome though Afford a house maybe

30:46 Yeah their Pittsburgh is really really nice the the problem there is that it's only sunny about one hundred days a year so I mean coming from a place like Houston where it's probably Sunny two hundred

30:58 and forty days a year or something like that I would be a it'd probably be called is is there any expectation that you're going to have to like go up there and like meet the team and go to meetings

31:08 and stuff like will you go to Pittsburgh I don't think so at least not in the near future in Ontario and further down the Line I possibly I may have to go out there but for the most part at the very

31:21 minimum I'm assuming it would be I've read you know go go up there every once in a while

31:27 what's the name of the chief data science science officer they might need you to come up for certain investor meetings and things like that you know I actually saw that they were hiring directors

31:36 fully remote which mounted unheard of for MPS Yeah you know just going fully remote while That's nice. I think it's a very, I mean, that's an evolving company, EQT, and I think that that's, it's

31:52 interesting that they've come to that level. So that's

31:58 great. I've certainly embraced being remote and resisting any urge to be pulled back into the office. Our whole company kind of has done that. You can go to the office if you want or stay remote,

32:09 but I think I'm done with trying to go into an office every day.

32:17 So I don't

32:20 know, Jeremy, Jeremy's, I think, have you ever worked in an office, Jeremy? You know, it was interesting. So in a very brief period of time when I worked for Petro DE, there was an office in

32:28 Broomfield and everybody else went into the office all the time. So if I didn't go in there like, Hey, why aren't you here? And I liked it. I actually didn't mind going in. The problem was I was

32:38 way less effective because of all the conversations in the water cooler talk And I noticed that right away because I'd been. fully remote for like eight more than half my career at that point so I

32:50 was like they've they're like we love having you here I'm like I'm I'm sure you do and I get something out of it socially I just get way less done you're setting I've told a story a few times when I

32:60 was a slumber J and quit to go to to spotfire and we were remote necessarily the first times I was in the year two thousand Sara Sara has a again you're just you're not even in the United States yet

33:14 at that point Yeah Anyway We're We're Fully Remote and I I told her but you know what's interesting is I can get done in three hours what used to take me eight at the office gape but if you tell me

33:28 what I missed what I missed about being in the office it was the distractions in the hallway absolutely since I was really tired that's a weird thing I mean you really have to work a just a little bit

33:40 harder to get that connection and I think that that's going to be that interesting challenge because you know I think Jose you may struggle with what is are you part of the company culture or aren't

33:52 you having started remote and never you know never actually being in the office the beach you know pushed away in on the remote side so at it's going to be an interesting challenge I think for you yet

34:07 you know I mentioned this to see how it turns out but an NFC I have heard the flip side of that word like oh you need that human interaction or you need that face -to -face but now you Gotta embrace

34:18 change and especially with like the way you know just look at tech a lot of tech companies went completely remote right and a lot of it regardless of your tech company regardless of how you feel about

34:29 remote work if you don't go fully remote you're going to lose all your talent though didn't really have a choice I think within one gas may or may not happen but you know say a company with the duty

34:41 if you don't if you don't want to leave Texas you don't Wanna move Berg or you're losing a ton of talent by not going for them that they finally have access to all the talent

34:52 would they limit themselves to people that only live in western Pennsylvania or whatever that is West Virginia Ohio are people who are willing to live there cause people like you your family your I

35:03 Guess you're engaged rights or your wife you want to build a family in Houston You want to be a reservoir engineer it's conscious choice right and now your options have expanded a little bit more and

35:12 it's it's cool when you go to Pittsburgh you'll have a different appreciation for it because you don't actually have to live here full -time for you for other people maybe it's the right thing maybe

35:22 they want to live there but I do have a question for you and maybe this is a lot to chew on I remember when I was I remember when I was joined G five I I felt that this immense amount of pressure and

35:36 stress in the world cause like some of my friends and people around me were just just such high achievers going out and getting so fast. And what is my place in the world? I'm confused, should I go

35:46 back to school? I don't, you know, and sort of all these things. Do you have the capacity to think like what your career could look like in 10 years? And is that you like running an oil and gas

35:58 company and oil and gas tech company? Is it working in data science? Like, have you given thought to what your career path looks like 10 years from now?

36:09 If you asked me this pre-COVID, I probably would have told you, like, strictly reservoir engineering. Yeah. Ever since I finished the master's program, you know, for a period of time, I

36:18 thought I wanted to get out of the industry, kind of go more on the tech side. Sure. Do data science and then, then I realized, you know, I want to stay within the industry. It's still kind of

36:28 up in the air, but I do know that I want to be more on the data side, whatever that looks like, say, it's reservoir engineering, kind of more data focused or data science. Well, you know, I

36:37 say data science, I guess more like data analytics.

36:42 is cause for concern comment Alison and one gathering data science has very limited use case a lot of buzzwords very overhyped and as we progress there's going to be no less data science teams more

36:56 data engineering teams data analysts the whole full picture

37:02 instead of just like the buzzword of the signs and not sure what it looks like but I do want to progress in my career however that looks like they go through a data focused cider reservoir engineering

37:17 side but the kind of veneer don't really have a concrete answer on that one

37:22 let me ask you I'M going to reverse question go back to your you said you came to the U S when you were five with your family and and at some point maybe twelve years old you start thinking about Yeah

37:34 what would I like to do so that just the fact that you are in Katy Texas Houston Texas area that you said Yeah all the Gatsby good or is it something you got to u of H and then decided Yeah I'm going

37:44 to go oil and gas what what pulled you into the industry want to cut that cheddar

37:51 and you want to do engineering you know I think back I didn't really want to do engineering cause I don't want to study for it yeah but I knew that I could do engineering and and I didn't want to like

38:06 limit myself by you know just not putting in the effort I could you know Yeah My My Dad is an engineer as well as electrical engineer

38:16 and

38:18 the idea is big and engineering are at it I wanted to go into engineering and I needed to pick a major so one of the highest paying majors the challenging was the number one guy originally I got

38:31 interested because of the Salary Ah in it Luckily I ended up liking the industry and what I was studying but

38:38 Yup I originally got into it because of the salary then I was I found it to be very interesting I liked the industry I like the people you know everything about it but originally it had to do two main

38:50 things it was the pay and it was because of Houston and you know growing up in Katie a ton of people working in oil and gas industry great twenty fifteen everyone's like getting get into the

39:00 challenging getting like that was like the big thing and then you know when I went in and twenty fifteen oil crashed and there were mass layoffs mass layoffs all of a sudden turn around like don't

39:11 show engineering and don't go into one gas and I ended up staying just because I was stubborn for the most part I how stubborn and no looking back into it oH good

39:27 Mm-hmm.

39:31 I mean, that's in part why you're here, right? Right, yeah. Yeah, you know, it's funny whenever I was still in college because I'd see other people with other majors getting internships, you

39:43 know, getting offers and I'm like, oh, you guys, there's actually getting jobs, you know, from 2015 to 2019, like nobody, at least none of my peers, a lot of people that I knew, like,

39:54 nobody was getting interviews, nobody was getting any sort of jobs. Yeah I mean, the internship is kind of like, you're like a unicorn,

40:03 but, you know, like, like Sarah Stogner. Right. Yeah. Yeah. You're like a unicorn. If you're able to find a very, actually land a job,

40:14 how did you, how did you get a job? How did you do it? I mean, I got really lucky. It was,

40:21 I mean, I guess you could make the argument that I put myself in the position to be lucky, but it was just, it's usually working.

40:29 at the end of the Day I Got Lucky Cause I know a lot of My Peers you know they did everything right and they still weren't able to find jobs and they just had to you know go out of the industry even

40:37 though they really did want to work with and August and yet there series of fortunate events just through networking I was able to land an internship and then buy an engine should planets have a job

40:47 after you know Muslim ASs and everything you know I really wanted to get hired at Bhutan and just because like you know I had one shot to do everything righteous because what my entire career just

41:02 there there aren't any jobs available at the time

41:07 but it was just a series of Unfortunate events I have a lot of people that I know that weren't able to actually break into the industry that should have in essence gotten jobs

41:17 yeah no that actually oH Tim just had a power outage wow

41:24 power and necessity wow well Yeah it's just you and me we're just going to keep rolling with it but there was a song that I

41:35 that I wrote it reminded me of something when you were saying that there was a song let me

41:45 One. MM

41:52 Yep here we go here we go here we go

42:10 There you go

42:23 Yeah, that's what you got to do, dog. Yep. That's how we do it. Yeah, that's kind of how it went down. You know what, I probably got the opportunity to enter somewhere. I was really hungry at

42:34 the time.

42:36 And luckily I was able to stay on with the industry, even through 2020. You know, that was another thing. Even people that got into the industry, you know, say they were with a service company

42:46 That point when we happened and they were out of a job. Yeah. Your head, your head, you know, it really does make a lot of sense to me. And it also explains now a little bit more on our

42:57 interactions to why you do understand the tech piece so well. Like you get right into the data fairly quickly because I guess that's your job, right? I mean, like you said, you're a data engineer

43:06 as much as a reservoir engineer. Probably at this point, you know,

43:11 which is a unique skill set to have

43:15 What advice, if. If any, would you give to somebody that's like you five years ago?

43:26 Well I do things for multiple then but the two main things are one go to as many networking events as you can but a good one Yeah I mean you know part of it Yeah I get good grades whatever really like

43:43 go to networking events Yeah I got really bad grades my My GPS in college was a two point six three I don't think it's really going to affect anything at this point for me to admit that in standard it

43:55 at this point in my career but you're right and for everybody it's different I don't think colin didn't go to college and he may at some point now get a degree but he didn't and and he's one of the

44:08 smarter business Guys I know so I mean there's there's lots of different skills that that people have that education can help or or not do do you see yourself possibly going back to school

44:20 possibly for an MBA later down the road

44:25 Yeah, I mean, well, at least for the near future, I'm kind of done with school for a little bit, kind of on a little break. But, well, going back to your original question, yeah, I'm gonna,

44:34 you know, obviously get good grades, you know, stay with them at 30 GPA, but then go to networking events, get on Twitter, you know, get on EFT, both LinkedIn, Twitter, great networking

44:44 tools. Get on, you know, I got off of Twitter recently, 'cause I found it becoming a little bit toxic. So, I can take a picture. Yeah, I can take a picture for sure Yeah. Became a two-week

44:56 break, and I just noticed when I have it, I'm just scrolling all the time. I can't get away from Twitter, man. Twitter is my biggest social media weakness. I've finally identified it. Yeah, no,

45:08 I spend an absurd amount of time on Twitter. God, the amount of hours on Twitter. Right, yeah, yeah. But I mean, you probably get your news, yeah. Well, for anyone listening to the podcast,

45:22 There's a huge - oil and gas community within Twitter Collie Ft and you know you have everything from like CEOS to people in offers people in the field

45:35 and everyone's anonymous and you know what matters in that aspect is kind of like the content that you put out so in essence like that's where the networking kind of comes into play you know there's a

45:47 ton of means it's hilarious it's just a good time there but your position doesn't really matter in the sense that you can be eighteen years old and be putting out content that people like people

46:00 people appreciate and they could thank you you know some thirty four year old reservoir engineer you pick the one who knows it's it's not so much a position but kind of like what you're saying in the

46:11 conflict you bring out there and that to me and then there's frac slap the nurse for excellent but Yeah it's just a different Avenue to network you know both Twitter, both LinkedIn and going to

46:26 actual networking events, I think,

46:31 to me, well, that on top of, you know, just being hungry and asking questions, being humble, that to me would be the biggest thing that would tell someone coming to the industry to do,

46:41 you know, just getting good grades isn't going to get you a job. Well, I don't know, maybe the hundred hundred dollar it might, but back when everyone's everyone's a genius at a hundred dollar

46:50 oil. I mean, that's the rule. Like when, uh, when I was in college from 15 to 19. Yeah, it was, it's very hard to get any sort of job. And really the only people meet me included, but

47:03 anybody that I knew that got jobs, uh, specifically, you know, with the super measures and everything was through networking. Yeah. Yeah. And you didn't come in with a network. You had to go

47:13 and find it and build it yourself. And you continue to do that. I think that's, that's, that's a big part of this. I mean, just, just the other day, Tim, um, I had lunch with Trent Green and

47:23 I've always sort of known Trent. Trent's gonna come on the podcast here sooner than later, but he said that he's fracked Wells on six different continents and 47 different countries, you know what

47:37 I mean? So like the things and, you know, and that was from continued networking. This is somebody who I'd only known tangentially over the course of the past 12, 10 years, whatever, something

47:48 like that. And then here we are having lunch. I'm like, man, you got a good story to tell on the podcast So I would agree. I mean, you and I met more recently, Jose. And I think

48:00 one of the things that's beautiful about oil and gas, too, and you summarize this about EFT, is there's really not a - I mean, there's sort of an openness about your age and your ability to

48:13 contribute and sort of the overall value you provide with a lack of judgment, right? I think a lot of people are just sort of judged on their - I believe You're producing the value that can provide

48:25 which is is what this industry is all about slot go -getters I think that's a recent change from when I dunno I think that that's A I think that's a a cultural shift over the last few years I think

48:36 that the great

48:39 crew change we talked about however long ago that was the big problem facing industry I think that really drove home the you know now it's contributions is not is not age you you you you if you can

48:50 contribute you're going to be here and be brought in Tim and or is everything okay over there you just sort of showed back up and started talking about we just anticipating like nothing I just had a a

49:01 about power blip I don't know what happened there and had to wait for the WIFI signal to reconnect and get on the Internet and all that business and so you Guys probably solve World Peace while I have

49:12 no idea what you missed it skims the greatest reason but anyways we're Gonna We're Gonna Cut It This is what do we say Tim? Usually a Houston commute. This could be a woodlands to downtown commute

49:24 right here. So yes, it's gonna be a little bit longer. It's not a, not a commute during Christmas holidays. This is a commute during full on. 100 oil commute, but Jose Rodriguez. Thank you so

49:36 much, my guy. We appreciate you. Best of luck with EQT. I know you're gonna tear it up. Yeah, I don't appreciate it. Thanks for having me here.

49:44 Yeah, no, appreciate it. Have a good one.