It is argued that productivity is the most important driver of a country’s prosperity and with it, tax revenues and personal incomes. According to the Office for National Statistics, the executive office for the U.K.’s Statistics Authority, international comparisons of productivity show the U.K.’s productivity is only ranked fifth among the Group of Seven countries. Since 2007 only Italy has seen weaker productivity growth. The persistent weakness in productivity has puzzled economists, and some believe one cause is falling productivity in the oil and gas sector.

It is crystal clear that the U.K. needs to urgently improve productivity as it undertakes Brexit. Of course, this not only applies to the U.K. With low oil prices and the World Bank not expecting prices to rise sharply in the long term together with growing alternative energy sources, many countries need to find ways to make their oil and gas businesses be more productive.

But what can be done to achieve this turnaround? Implementing processes to address data quality is arguably a very strong candidate.

Improving data through standards

The manufacturing industry needs accurate and complete technical dictionaries that incorporate comprehensive product catalog item data to order the right product at the right time and from the right supplier.

Product specification data undergoes discrete changes in format and content as it proceeds through each company in the supply chain. In some cases these changes to data may be on purpose; in other cases they may be inadvertent. From the beginning to the end of the purchasing process these changes will have been aggregated to such an extent that it is difficult to know which spares and replacement parts to purchase and from which suppliers to keep machinery running and minimize downtime.

Millions of product identifiers for all types of products and services across the global supply chain, the data cleaning work and handling of errors in the purchasing process all adds up to increased costs measured in millions of dollars per annum along with a significant loss in productivity.

The business challenge, particularly for organizations in the oil and gas sector, is to streamline the order process and eliminate these errors, thereby significantly increasing productivity while also making products and services more attractive to international buyers.

A recent study recommended the industry adopt data standards and processes and use technology, automation and industry standards for data cleansing, processing and sharing. Doing so frees up valuable time for highend data consumers and improves efficiency.

Manufacturers already use international standards for their quality management processes, such as International Organization for Standardization’s (ISO) 9001, and for manufacturing standards, such as the ISO Technical Committee’s 67, but not the data that define product specifications. It makes perfect sense for these companies to implement data standards. ISO 8000 together with ISO 22745 are fast becoming the de facto data standards for this.

The Kingdom of Saudi Arabia as part of its Vision 2030 program has developed a National Industrial Strategy with ISO 8000 at its core. During summer 2017 exporters of industrial items began to receive notifications requesting that they comply to ISO 8000. This compliance will enable Saudi Arabia to automatically charge the correct import tariff, speed up the import process and, most importantly, enable companies based in the Kingdom to benefit from product specifications meeting stringent data standards. Saudi Aramco is one of many major organizations leading this initiative.

Adoption of these ISO data-quality standards requires each company to register a unique prefix and then publish its technical dictionary and product specifications in an open searchable registry. The prefix acts like a domain name system address and points buyers to the source company. All specifications can be downloaded in machine-readable form, enabling everyone and every system in the supply chain to share the exact same data. This results in the elimination of failed orders as well as the elimination of expensive, time-consuming data cleaning services.

While adoption may first appear daunting, the onboarding process can be very quick since innovative software now exists to make implementation quick and painless.

For instance, KOIOS Master Data has launched a software suite that enables companies to structure their data in accordance with the ISO 8000 requirements. Following the launch of the KOIOS 22745 Content Engine and the KOIOS 8000 Technical Spec Converter software, companies can quickly publish an open technical dictionary and create ISO 8000-compliant product specifications.

Case study

For engineering company 3-Sci, the ability to convert its product data into ISO 8000-compliant specifications was critical. According to the company, it would have taken months to wade through the ISO standards, interpret them and then write software to create compliant specifications. The company fully met the requirements of ISO 22745 and ISO 8000 in three days.

“We are committed to quality, and that applies in equal measure to the quality of data in our technical specifications as it does to the products themselves,” said Richard Caldwell, chief electronics engineer at 3-Sci. “Having an open technical dictionary and ISO 8000-compliant technical specifications enables our customers to be totally confident about the product they are buying and know exactly what the detailed properties and values are without any misunderstanding or the need to make potentially erroneous assumptions.

“With an international customer base including clients in the Middle East, it is absolutely imperative our specifications are fully understood no matter where they are purchased. The open technical dictionary with KOIOS 22745 is fundamental to ensure everyone has a shared understanding of our products and their detailed specifications, while ISO 8000 ensures we can share our specifications electronically easily and, importantly, with a full description and in a format that is machine-readable.”