Roles And Responsibilities Of Safety And Maintenance Division Of Valero Energy Corporation

Competitive advantage of Safety and Maintenance Management division

Valero Energy Corporation is an organization that deals with the international marketing of petrochemical products and produces transportation fuels. It is a Fortune 50 company located in San Antonio, Texas. They are an independent ethanol producer and petroleum refiner. They have 15 petroleum refineries that produce around 3.1 million barrels each day. The refineries are located in several locations like U.S, U.K and Canada.

This report outlines a brief description about the Valero Energy Corporation. It describes the roles and responsibilities of its main division that is the Safety and Maintenance Management division of the company. It also describes the competitive advantage of this division.  It then carries out a PESTLE analysis where it focuses on the environmental and social factor that is responsible for the success of the company. This report also gives a brief idea on the contribution that this company has made in the local community.

Valero Energy Corporation is an international marketer and manufacturer of other petrochemical products and mainly transportation fuel. Valero is a Fortune 50 organization situated in San Antonio, Texas (Valero.com 2017). It is an independent refiner of petroleum with a number of 10,000 employees. The refineries are located in US, UK and Canada.

The safety and maintenance management division of the company is the most important and successful division within Valero Energy. Safety is the base for the success of the company. Safe processes are used in the refinery to maintain the employee safety (Anon 2017). Employees are considered to be the competitive advantage of the company and special care is taken to protect and secure them.

The Senior Planner of the maintenance department at the Oklahoma refinery of Valero is Mr. Dereque Jones. According to him, owning safety programs will lead to success.  He is responsible for planning, job auditing and providing occupational safety. Valero has received prestigious Silver Elite awards in 2016.

Occupational safety

Occupational safety means a safety in the work place. It is a combination of multiple fields that deals with the safety of the employees (Friend and Kohn 2014). The health and safety of the employees are very important and occupational safety promotes this (Hoyos and Zimolong 2014). Their major roles and responsibilities include tracking employees and contractors’ safety and event rates. Their strong safety performance was recorded to be 0.30. They focus on completion of work orders timely, incident investigations and safety-related action items. The Supervisor of Operations believes in continuous improvements and treating every employee like a family member by caring for their safety.

Process Safety and Reliability

Process safety is a mixture of management skills and engineering skills that prevent any accidents like collapse of a structure and fire (Aldemir et al. 2013). The process management involves this method of process safety (Thompson 2012). The processes are continuously assessed in order to find out the safety and reliability (Khan, Rathnayaka and Ahmed 2015). The equipments are also continuously managed well. They have achieved process safety excellence. The roles and responsibilities of the department are to deliver results in safe manner and find out the loopholes for improvement. Investigations are also carried out to improve the style of management. Technical methods have been implemented in order to improve the reliability performance of the refineries.

Occupational safety

Emergency Preparedness

 Emergency management takes the responsibility of preparing the employees in case of an emergency (Haddow, Bullock and Coppola 2017). The Supervisors and planners are responsible for implementing program for preparing the employees in case of an emergency. They train the employees to respond in an emergency situation in a tactful manner. They have created relationships and contracts with several contractors and suppliers. They have an emergency center of operation.

The roles and responsibilities of the Senior Process Engineer are to identify the loopholes in the design by reviewing the process and managing it and making the use of critical thinking to remove the potential hazards. The responsibilities of the Senior Process Control Engineer are to analyze the processes and rectify if there are any faults. They believe that safety of their employees is most important. Their safety leads to better performance which leads to the success of Valero.

Valero uses sophisticated and advanced technologies for monitoring and using facilities. The competitive advantage will ensure Valero to compete favorably in the global and local market. Different companies have a different competitive advantage (Peteraf, Gamble and Thompson 2014). Valero’s competitive advantage is the safety of their employees. They consider their employees to be their competitive advantage and the most precious asset of the company. Valero provides their employees a rewarding and safe work environment. Ethics and values of the company is their competitive advantage. Their core ethical values towards the safety of their employees, proper utilization of assets and accurate financial reporting form their competitive advantage. The employees of Valero maintain proper ethical behavior everywhere. Their safety environment encourages the employees to give their best leading to the tremendous success of the organization.

PESTLE analysis is a technique and tool which is used by marketers to study the effect of external or macro environmental factors that will affect their business either in a positive or negative way (Yuksei 2012). The Valero Energy Corporation plays an essential role in running the economy of the country just like any other oil and petroleum industry of the country. Proper PESTLE analysis helps the executives of the company to understand about the effect of the environment on the organization (Eva et al. 2014). The several factors on PESTLE analysis are:

Political factor: Various political factors like trade policy, taxation policy and government on the oil and gas industry play a major role in the success or failure of an industry.

Economical factor: The supply and demand of the oil price of the industry play a significant part in the success or failure of the sector or industry.

Social factor: This industry needs skilled labors. People want these types of industries to grow because that will help to improve their standards of living (Fafaliou and Polemis 2012).

Technological factor: The availability of modern technologies and techniques help an organization to grow to a large extent.

Environmental factor: The geographical location and the availability of oil and petroleum in that location have a major impact on the oil and gas industry (Sadgrove 2016).

Process Safety and Reliability

 Legal factor: The legal supports from various consultancies, agencies and government play a major role in the survival and growth of an oil and petroleum industry.

This report focuses on the environmental and social factors for the success of the Valero Energy Corporation. The environmental factor is the location of the organization and their refinery that leads to its success. The Valero Energy Corporation is located in San Antonio, Texas. Its first refinery was in Corpus Christi in Texas. Oil was discovered in Texas in the 19^th century. Initially it was discovered in the Southeast Texas but later on oil reserves were also discovered in the North of Texas. There were limited reserves during the era of 19th century but the strike that happened at Spindletop in 1901 gained the national attention resulting in the exploration and development that went on throughout the 1920s and even beyond that. This was a period of transformation of Texas (Valero.com 2017). The state had become totally rural and there were no large cities. The state had become industrialized after the end of World War II and the population of the state had increased and reached the top twenty in the list. The Houston city had benefitted the most and the area had become home for many plants. A Spanish explorer had first detected oil in Texas in 1543 floating on the water of Galveston Bay. Later in 1894, oil was discovered by accident in East Texas by an American company. Finally in 1091, the oil was discovered in Spindletop.  Texas produces crude oil and is among the leading producers of crude oil. It accounts for 22 per cent of the oil produced in U.S.

PESTLE analysis studies how the environment affects the growth or failure of the organization. The Valero Energy Corporation has benefitted because of its location that is Texas. Texas being the largest and leading oil producer has been one of the major reasons for the success of Valero Energy Corporation. Texas produces 22 per cent of the entire oil produced in US. This is how environment led to the success of Valero Energy Corporation.

The next factor which PESTLE analyzes is the social factor. The Valero Energy Corporation has helped the society in several ways. It has created job opportunities for thousands of people. Valero offers a benefit program that is considered to be best in the marketing and refining industry. The company is known for offering multiple choices for benefiting the family needs of their employees. They provide financial security to the full time as well as the part time employees. The income earned by their employees is quite valuable. They are well known for giving educational support and assistance in order to develop the personality and professionalism of their employees. The oil industry in Texas has provided millions of jobs to the people. Valero has a belief that employee development is needed for the needs of the organizational and individual as well. Employees are provided with numerous study resources in order to advance in their careers and realize their personal growth by achieving success. Every level of employee is provided with a separate level of training. There are in house training personnel who look after the growth and development of the employees. Valero believes in being a part of the community and supporting the needs of the society (Valero.com 2017). They have participated in delivering meals, mentoring youths and helping the children programs. They donate their time and money for the welfare of their employees as well as the society. Valero Energy Corporation has made major capital investments for protecting the environment. They recover usable oils from wastes and solid materials that have been already used. In the year of 2016, 14.7 million pounds of catalyst material were recycled by the Valero Energy Corporation. They have tried in several ways to use the waste water for the refinery processes. Their employees participate in several environmental protection programs. Valero Energy Corporation received best performance in protecting the environment. The Valero Foundation is responsible for providing military support, educational support to the underprivileged children and helping a lot of underprivileged in the society through donations and charities.

Emergency Preparedness

The Valero Energy Foundation project is investing a huge amount of money in preserving and enhancing the public green space of San Antonio. The Valero Energy Corporation contributes around 1 million dollars to the San Antonio Parks.

The Valero Energy Foundation provided support to around 70 programs and organizations in the U.S. for serving the military members and their families (Ontario Securities Commission 2013). In 2016, this consisted of Operation Comfort, Fisher House Foundation, Military, the American GI Forum, USO, U.S. Veterans Initiative, Soldiers’ Angels and the Coast Guard Foundation. The U.S military were given a Thanksgiving where 525 members were honored.

Valero also established another project called Valero Volunteer Council in the year 1983. They have provided enormous support for community projects, holiday events and shelter support. They are also responsible for providing food banks. Around 1.5 million pounds have been spent on food.

In the year 2016, Valero Texas Open and Benefit for Children donated around 10.5 million dollars for children’s charities. They have also raised around 4.7 million dollars for the children in Ontario, Atlantic and Quebec. Valero Volunteers have also donated for building homes for the habitat since the year 2008.

 The Valero Energy Foundation contributes around 13 to 20 million dollars on a yearly basis to several nonprofit organizations that are serving disadvantaged families and children (Euronav.com 2017). In the year 2015, the Valero Energy Foundation helped the agencies by providing 3 million dollars  to the agencies that provide basic life needs to the minorities of the society including food and shelter for their sufficiency. Support for food banks, children's homes and emergency shelters are some examples of their support.

 Valero is a strong promoter of education. They contribute and support agencies, programs or organization. This foundation provided nearly 4 million dollars for supporting programs related to education all over the U.S. The company also provides support in mentoring programs, uniform drives and school-supply. They also support in providing career counseling and internship programs for various degrees. They also provide money for scholarships which was last recorded to be around 2.1 million dollars.

Health care facilities are also provided by the foundation of Valero which amount to around 3.6 million dollars. These charitable funds are used in curing children and also curing several diseases like cancer, Alzheimer.

Valero foundation also provides support to civic programs for improving the environment and preserving the cultural heritage of the nation. Environment protection is a method of protecting the environment (Portney 2016). It has provided around 2 million dollars for the art and children museum.

The Valero Energy Foundation had organized a golf tournament for the children which raised 4.7 million dollars. This amount was given in children’s charities. The topmost fund raising teams of Valero are their cycling team. These teams are located in several locations for raising funds. In the year of 2015 this team was responsible for raising around 230,000 dollars.

Conclusion

This report concludes that the main reason behind the success of Valero Energy Corporation is the safety of their employees. Their employees are their competitive advantage. The environmental and social factors in the PESTLE analysis show their impact on the success of the company. The Valero Energy Foundation has played a significance role in helping the community to a major extent.

References

Aldemir, T., Siu, N.O., Mosleh, A., Cacciabue, P.C. and Göktepe, B.G. eds., 2013. Reliability and safety assessment of dynamic process systems (Vol. 120). Springer Science & Business Media.

Valero_SRR_Booklet., 2017. Available at:  https://www.valero.com/en us/Documents/SRR/2016_Valero_SRR_Booklet_Web.pdf [Accessed 5 Aug. 2017].

Sadgrove, K., 2016. The complete guide to business risk management. Routledge.

Euronav.com., 2017. Euronav - Community involvement. Available at: https://www.euronav.com/hsqe-society/society/community-involvement/ [Accessed 5 Aug. 2017].

Eva, M., Hindle, K., Paul, D., Rollaston, C. and Tudor, D., 2014. Business analysis. BCS.

Fafaliou, I. and Polemis, M., 2012. Market power in oil industry: the wholesale and retailing case. Econ. Finance Notes, 1(1), pp.1-18.

Friend, M.A. and Kohn, J.P., 2014. Fundamentals of occupational safety and health. Bernan Press.

Haddow, G., Bullock, J. and Coppola, D.P., 2017. Introduction to emergency management. Butterworth-Heinemann.

Hoyos, C.G. and Zimolong, B.M., 2014. Occupational safety and accident prevention: behavioral strategies and methods (Vol. 11). Elsevier.

Khan, F., Rathnayaka, S. and Ahmed, S., 2015. Methods and models in process safety and risk management: past, present and future. Process Safety and Environmental Protection, 98, pp.116-147.

Ontario Securities Commission, 2013. Valero Energy Corporation.

Peteraf, M., Gamble, J. and Thompson Jr, A., 2014. Essentials of strategic management: The quest for competitive advantage. McGraw-Hill Education.

Portney, P.R. ed., 2016. Public policies for environmental protection. Routledge.

Thompson, W., 2012. Point process models with applications to safety and reliability. Springer Science & Business Media.

Valero.com., 2017. Valero - Community.  Available at: https://www.valero.com/en-us/Pages/Community.aspx [Accessed 5 Aug. 2017].

Yüksel, ?., 2012. Developing a multi-criteria decision making model for PESTEL analysis. International Journal of Business and Management, 7(24), p.52.