Oil & gas, real estate, entitlement, infrastructure and risk management!

I explained to a client today that when I'm preparing for a keynote or workshop, I often end up putting 30-40 hours of research into each talk. I'm well immersed in that process for about six upcoming presentations between now and mid-March. This morning, I've been taking an in-depth look at:

• key business trends in the oil and gas sector, including concepts such as BP's "Field of the Future" effort and Shell's "Smart Fields" programs, both of which involve significicant change throughout the exploration and development process, for an upcoming session for SAP
• issues of real estate management, and the strategic role and value of the real estate function within organizations, for my upcoming keynote for the International Asset Management Conference in Tucson
• and an examination of the "culture of entitlement" that pervades society and what it means when it comes to emerging global infrastructure risk, whcih I'll be speaking about at an upcoming annual meeting for a major insurance company

Whew! And the fascinating thing is, all of these topics tie together .... and it's a good example of the different types of issues I delve into.

Back to the books....