KARIM ZOGHBI, PROJECT DIRECTOR

I was part of the first cohort of graduates to join Petrofac in 2004… So, you could say I was part of the first experiment of employing graduate engineers! I’ve worked in commissioning for most of my career and acted as head of my department, before moving into project management and operations to work on strategic projects and their turnaround.

Before this project, I was always more involved at the backend of projects... Why did I fall in love with commissioning? As a commissioning engineer, you breathe life into a project. The project is static once the engineering and construction are completed – it’s just metal, cables, a steel structure. With commissioning, it starts running and becomes dynamic, it’s alive, and then you hand it over to the client.

So, this is the first time that I’ve worked on a project from inception... I’ll be involved from the drawing board to ordering commodities, all the way through to construction, and then turning it into a live site. I’m looking forward to seeing the project come together.

It has been a fantastic experience so far... I’ve made sure that I’ve surrounded myself with excellent people to help me through the initial set-up phase. It’s important to me that we don’t have a silo mentality but departments work together as one unit, without a culture of blame. If something good happens, it is the whole team’s success. If something bad happens, it's on me. This allows the whole team to come up with bright ideas and think outside the box.

Every project will have its challenges… but I’ve always tried to push myself, taking on new roles or moving into different disciplines. It’s important to learn from those around you and I learnt from the best.

I love cars… Some people see cars as a way to get from point A to point B, but for me it’s about the journey itself. When I get in my car in the morning, I have a small grin on my face. I love Porsches, they are engineering marvels, and I’ve had a few of them – I used to take my car to a track and have a track day. As I’m a mechanical engineer by trade, I appreciate what’s happening under the hood.

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