How to Find Your Voice in a Broken System

Make sure you check out some of our most recent posts below to catch up on the new direction we’re headed:

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  4th Annual NAPE Kickoff Happy Hour presented by LandmanLife
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• 
  The Roadtrip to Nowhere and Why I’m Still Here
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  February 3, 2024

Finding Your Voice

It’s taken me well over a decade to find my voice here. A majority of that time I was voicing my dissent under the veil of secrecy. Screaming into the void, as I used to call it. Once I realized that people had started paying attention, I had to be more…discrete with my musings. Keep your head down, do your work, don’t speak up.

That’s been the profession for decades. I was operating outside of those norms, but keeping my name disassociated with LandmanLife gave me some semblance of security. True anonymity is a myth, but I was about as psuedo anonymous as you could get. Close friends and colleagues knew who I was, but they kept that under wraps for the most part.

Stay in Your Lane

There were a few times I had to take down posts that caught the attention of brokers I was working for. Usually the result of some kiss ass trying to throw me under the bus. Then, a couple of years ago…I stopped hiding behind LandmanLife. People thought I was crazy. That I’d never work again because I said things that went against the norm.

Well…I’d like to say that anybody who wouldn’t work with me on account of me speaking my mind on LandmanLife isn’t somebody I want to work with anyways. That’s not always true though. There are times I find myself tempted to just take the money and shut the fuck up. But that’s never really been who I am, or what LandmanLife stands for. Regardless…things are shit for landmen right now.

A Broken System

We have to take what we can get these days. I see it all the time. 20 year industry veterans that are begging for scraps. Yes, there has been a lot of uncertainty in the industry…and the world. That’s not something I am trying to gloss over. When you see guys that are good at their job having to “take what they can get” and settling for a fraction of what they are worth…that’s really depressing. Our system is broken.

The old guard continues to take the lions share of the industry’s work. In house landmen come into a new management role with the promise of “you can do it your way.” But then they’re handed a list of approved brokers. That’s fine, if the work is getting done well, on time, and with minimal fuss. When there’s an issue…good luck escalating that, because your boss happens to be in South America with the owner of that brokerage, and he’s not going to be checking his emails.

So that in house landman is handcuffed with shit work that they’re expected to be able to turn into “good enough.” It’s no big deal to the bosses, because they’ve already gotten their shotguns, rolexes, fishing and hunting trips…they don’t care. Hopefully the broker at least sends you a nice bottle of whiskey for Christmas, but…it might just be a koozie instead.

Keep your head down, do your work, don’t speak up.

Or…find your voice.