Celebrating Women in Energy:“Woman on Board!”
Harris never visualized while growing up in Sunny Side, Houston, Texas, that she could accomplish so much in her life.
Those words, blared long ago from a loudspeaker in the Gulf of Mexico, translated into Paula Harris being on the board of three NYSE publicly traded oil tool companies, in addition to her community leadership and her job as Senior Vice President of Community and Foundation Executive Director for the Houston Astros major league baseball team.
From seven years as a field engineer in the Gulf of Mexico to a global sales and marketing venture to the C-suite and serving as a board member to publicly traded oil companies, Harris never visualized while growing up in Sunny Side, Houston, Texas, that she could accomplish so much in her life.
But her dad, who served in Vietnam and later with the police force in Harris County, had BIG dreams for his daughter: He would pay for a degree at Texas A&M in petroleum engineering.
When Schlumberger (SLB) hired her to log wells in the Gulf of Mexico, she never imagined she would be the only woman and, on most rigs, the only African American. Beginning an offshore job in oil and gas as a minority has challenged every woman and every minority that has managed to survive.
Harris was embarrassed that on every rig she landed on, she heard WOMAN ON BOARD announced over the loudspeaker; even the boats unloading her logging equipment could hear it. She had hoped that one day the offshore drilling crews would accept her without blaring the announcement.
Harris did not always have a room to herself so, most of the time, she slept fully clothed until she was the senior leader of the SLB logging team. Later, she had her daughter while working in Perth, Australia, and raised her in many countries worldwide with help from her husband and parents.
In 2020, she was stunned to learn that her job as Global Director for ESG was being eliminated. She was offered a separation package; a 33-year around-the-world journey with SBL ended suddenly and without advance warning. She protested, reminding them she had worked seven years as a field engineer in the Gulf of Mexico. She then moved into sales and marketing and was asked to present papers at the prestigious Offshore Technology Conference (OTC), where she sat in the same room and on panels with CEOs, CFOs and many vice presidents.
Click here for entire feature in The OilWoman Magazine
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