– In the beginning, we were too small to justify a full-time HR position

Text: Europower Partner

– I disagreed with how the company was run, says Eirik. We had little opportunity to influence decisions, and that made me want to move on.

It wasn’t long before Eirik was offered the position of CEO at Fishbones. Fishbones provides stimulation technology to increase the production of oil and gas, thereby adding significant value to operator companies.

 Eirik thoroughly enjoyed his new job from day one.

– I had a lot of influence on decisions, and I had the opportunity to work with new technology.

 But the job turned out to be far more demanding than he had anticipated.

– The market was conservative, and we had to put a lot of effort into convincing the major players to adopt innovative technology from a challenger.

However, Eirik and his team were skilled, and the company grew.

– As Fishbones grew, we needed several support functions, he explains. “One of those was HR expertise.

He explains that the company initially wasn’t large enough to justify having its own HR function.

– Even if we had hired someone full-time, that person wouldn’t have had all the necessary skills because the HR field is so broad. You need to be an expert in many areas.

Eirik Renli (Photo: Fishbones)

Eirik went into the market to find a provider of HR services, which is how he came into contact with BUHR.

– I gathered references, and then we had a meeting with them. We liked what we heard in the meeting.

BUHR works across industries, serving everything from challengers like Fishbones to large oil and gas companies like OKEA.

At OKEA, BUHR complements the company’s own People & Organization department by handling specific tasks such as recruitment, hiring and onboarding, course bookings and administration, maintenance, control and updating of data in various systems and registers, as well as the administration of HR-related processes and documents.

Bente W. Nordeide (Photo: OKEA)

– We at OKEA are extremely pleased with the excellent collaboration we have with BUHR, says Bente W. Nordeide, Vice President People & Organization at OKEA. For a growing company, there is often an extra need for both administrative support in various processes and specialist services to support our internal P&O department. We find that BUHR delivers services of very high quality and that they have competent resources who are easy to work with.

When Eirik started at Fishbones, he was employee number three. Today, Fishbones has 38 employees and is owned by founder Rune Freyer, as well as AkerBP and Equinor Ventures.

– Now, BUHR is our HR department, says Eirik.

Photo: BUHR

Eirik explains that recruitment has been challenging in an oil industry under high pressure.

– We’ve been relatively lucky over the years, but we’ve also had to replace some people along the way. And it’s always a challenge to retain the good people. There’s low unemployment and high demand for skilled professionals in the oil industry. It’s important not to just get caught up in the salary spiral. We need to work to create a workplace where people want to stay. Here, BUHR has been a great support. They assist with everything from recruitment to building frameworks for HR.

Eirik explains that he uses lessons learned from large international corporations when building Fishbones.

– I’ve understood the value of investing in people, he says. We therefore offer both internal and external courses. Two colleagues recently completed further education at BI (Norwegian Business School). Before that, one person completed an additional master’s degree as an engineer in Germany. For us, people are the gold, Eirik concludes.

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