With Canadian oil and gas producers facing a near-record discount for their products, productivity, efficiency, and overall business agility have become more crucial than ever. The tracking and management of land assets in Canada has historically not been on the leading edge of industry software solutions. Many traditional land management methods and even some software solutions have siloed workflows, admin-focused file solutions, and cumbersome manual processes. Retrieving data that is buried in multiple screens, reports, and spreadsheets is a common issue that the majority of Canadian land professionals face. These challenges have led E&P companies to evaluate their needs and look for ways to gain a competitive advantage. Here are the key things you should look for when evaluating land management software.

Functionality & Efficiency

Modern land management software should include tools that will help users manage the entire lifecycle of an agreement; from prospecting, to acquiring, and finally divesting. Agreements for all groups (Surface, Minerals, or JV) should be manageable across all agreement types, whether it’s a contract, a facility, a service agreement, or a mineral lease, etc. All of this should be done within a single module that can house agreements on their own, and allow for easy searching, filtering, and overall database management. Users should be able to manage master data on a single record that can be cast out to all other impacted records. This process should also enable easy management of financial obligations of the agreement, from drilling through to production, and post-production to abandonment.

Another important consideration is the ability to create and save your own custom queries without having to call IT. Ad-hoc reports should be built easily by users, eliminating the need for vendors to create custom reports, which is a process that can take days, if not weeks.

Canadian land management software should also come fully integrated with an ArcGIS mapping component so users can query their data spatially and incorporate third-party data from a variety of other services, including IHS and geoLOGIC. Having a robust mapping platform that allows for easily consumable spatial data is an important consideration in your land software solution. 

Streamlined Information

Does your current land management software have a dashboard that tells you the most pertinent tasks you should be handling based on your role in the organization? Can you easily find an agreement when a landowner contacts you? Can your software recognize what’s most important to you and allow you to be efficient with your duties that align with your role? Can you make mass changes to agreements; whether it’s adding notes, changing an agreement status, uploading documents, or changing a prospect? These should all be standard requirements for your land software evaluation.

There should also be powerful querying and reporting functions, and built-in automation notifications, that help you stay on top of payments, expirations, and other obligations. The system should even provide a recommended course of action and allow for mobile electronic signatures and approvals; things we take for granted on any modern application or device.

Integration with Related Business Units

A fully integrated platform is another important aspect to consider. Integration improves performance and visibility, and enables comprehensive enterprise insights. While many businesses struggle with data silos, a modern software solution allows for a data driven workflow that is based on a single source of truth. This can be anything from viewing leases in jeopardy, to understanding and analyzing forecast trends, or controlling budget to actual expense variance.

The software platform should allow you to uncover operational inefficiencies and maximize well profitability, while tracking production volumes and trends. All related business units should be able to work on the same platform, using the same data in real time to project, report, and plan performance.

Final Considerations

When evaluating land management software it’s important to know what to look for, what will help your users function at a higher level, and ultimately what will make your business more agile, efficient, and profitable. An optimized system should work from a single agreement management module and allow for easy maintenance and audit of data that is both comprehensive and streamlined.

Modern or “unlegacy” software is cloud-based, mobile, and promotes and enables a collaborative workplace. Culture, systems, and devices must unite to enhance users’ productivity and business efficiencies. The software should promote integration, automation, and optimization, while delivering personalized, decision-ready insights. Your business silos should be erased and allow for a clear line of sight to goals and outcomes as a business unit and collective organization.

Choosing a new land management software provider is an important decision. Some software packages that currently help Canadian producers with land management are outdated, offering little in the way of efficiency or performance. Few vendors who advertise innovative solutions actually offer the functionality, integration, and innovation that a modern energy company needs. When you are considering land software, ensure you are able to make faster, more confident decisions that lower operating and IT costs, while empowering users throughout your organization to deliver greater value. Consider Quorum Software.

It’s been 2 years since Quorum delivered its land management software into the Canadian market. Boasting credentials of having 18 of the 20 largest North American energy companies using Quorum’s Land Management system, Quorum developed a modified version of its industry leading land software to meet Canadian requirements. For more information on myQuorum Land Management, click here, or contact us to learn more.