The Business of Energy, The Art of Leadership
Samuel Diminas has spent more than three decades navigating some of the world’s most complex energy projects. From his early years at NNPC to leadership roles at BP and Chevron, and major ventures across Africa, Europe and North America, he has built a career around solving difficult problems, managing risk and making decisions where the stakes are high.
Today, as CEO of Westpaq Group, he oversees major energy developments, but his journey extends far beyond boardrooms and balance sheets. It is a story of resilience, leadership, continuous learning and the ability to remain steady under pressure in an industry where certainty is often elusive.
In this conversation, Samuel reflects on the lessons learned over a lifetime in energy, the leadership principles that have guided him, the challenges that shaped his perspective and the values that continue to influence both his professional and personal life.
When people read your résumé, they see major companies, major projects, and leadership roles. But who is Samuel Diminas away from the office, and what matters most to you outside work?
Away from the office, I’m a family man, a mentor, and someone who cares deeply about developing people. What matters most to me is impact beyond projects, helping younger professionals grow, staying rooted in faith and community, and contributing to the progress of the environment and communities within my sphere of influence.
Over the years, what has shaped you more: the degrees and professional training, or the setbacks, pressures, and experiences that no classroom could prepare you for?
The degrees gave me my foundation and technical tools. But the setbacks and real pressures taught me judgment, resilience, and leadership. Training showed me the path, experience has taught me how to walk it when the path disappears.
Many of the biggest decisions in business are made without perfect information. Can you recall a decision that kept you awake at night—one where the technical, commercial, or human realities were pulling in different directions?
One that still stands out was during a major offshore project, when we faced a critical decision between schedule, safety, and cost.
The engineering data showed we could accelerate a phase with a modified installation sequence. It was technically feasible but carried a higher risk.
The client was under huge pressure to meet the first oil targets. Every week of delay meant millions in deferred revenue and penalty exposure.
My team had been on extended offshore rotations. Pushing harder meant fatigue, morale issues, and a real safety risk to the people I was responsible for. That decision kept me up; go fast, and you compromise safety and the team. Go slow, and you protect people, but damage client trust and project economics.
I pulled together the technical, commercial, and HSE leads, and we redesigned the sequence. We found a middle path, added a specialised crew to reduce fatigue, re-sequenced work to cut 2 weeks off the schedule without touching critical safety margins, and negotiated a phased delivery with the client to protect revenue.
The decision wasn’t about choosing technical vs commercial vs people. It was about holding all three and finding a way. That experience shapes how I lead; with data, empathy, and the discipline to look for an x-factor solution when the obvious options force a bad trade-off.
When people hear about projects like Alen Gas Monetisation or Bonga North, they see the headlines and the numbers. What has pressure taught you about yourself that success never could?
Success shows you what your team can deliver. Pressure shows you what your team actually needs from you.
On projects like Alen Gas Monetization and Bonga North, the headlines capture the numbers. But pressure taught me some important things about myself. Under pressure, I learnt that Leadership is presence, not just plans. When schedules slip and stakeholders escalate, teams need a leader who stays calm, listens, and makes decisions people can trust. Pressure taught me that my presence is a tool. Success lets you project certainty. Pressure taught me that “I don’t have all the answers, but we’ll figure it out together.” And there is always a solution. I learned that teams follow honesty faster than they follow false confidence. Pressure reminded me that the plan is only as strong as the people executing it. I learned to protect the team’s energy, morale, and safety with the same intensity I protect the budget and schedule. Pressure gave me the critical experience to develop the kind of leadership that earns trust.
Beyond technical competence, what makes a company or leader truly respected in the global energy space?
Technical skill gets you in the room. Respect comes from being predictable in a crisis, thinking long-term over quick wins, and treating every partner, big or small, with integrity. In energy, projects last 20+ years. People bet on leaders and companies they can trust for the long haul, not just the ones who can do the math.
How did your thinking change when you moved from delivering projects to carrying responsibility for the direction of an entire organisation like WESTPAQ?
Project delivery is about execution. Leading WESTPAQ is about architecture. My thinking moved from fixing problems to preventing them, from doing things right to choosing the right things, and from owning delivery to owning people. Projects need managers. Organisations need leaders who build systems and people that outlast any single project.
You’ve helped build projects worth billions. What does success mean to you now compared to twenty years ago?
Twenty years ago, success was simple: deliver on time, under budget, zero Lost Time Injury. Today, success means something different. Today, I am aware that outputs aren’t the same as impact. My perception has changed from achieving milestones to building a legacy.
20 years ago, I measured success by what we built. Now I measure it by what remains after we leave: Did we develop local talent? Did we improve energy access? Did we leave the community stronger?
Now I am more concerned if we did the right project, the right way? Saying “no” to bad money or cutting corners, even if it doesn’t make the headline. 20 years ago, success was “we delivered it.” Today, it’s “we delivered it, the right way, and the people are better for having done it.”
Projects like Alen Gas Monetisation or Bonga North are often described in technical or commercial summaries. What do people consistently misunderstand about what it actually takes to deliver them?
Technical and commercial summaries make it sound clean: geology, detailed engineering, capex, schedule, first gas. What they miss is the human and political complexity that decides success.
People consistently misunderstand 3 things:
It’s not a technical problem, it’s a coordination problem. The engineering is hard, but solvable. What’s harder is aligning 15 stakeholders across 5 time zones, 3 governments, and multiple cultures, all with different risk appetites. Alen Gas and Bonga North didn’t stall because we couldn’t solve the reservoir or engineering. They stalled when alignment broke. Delivery is 30% engineering, 70% orchestration.
“Time” is not just schedule, it’s trust. People think delays come from equipment or weather. More often, they come from eroded trust. When a partner stops believing you’ll be transparent about a cost overrun, decisions slow down. When a regulator doesn’t trust your HSE data, permits stall. You can buy a new rig faster than you can rebuild trust.
The plan is written in the office. The project is won in the field. Summaries assume perfect execution. Reality is decisions made at 2 am by a foreman who’s never met the CEO.
What delivers projects is frontline leadership: giving those people clarity, authority, and safety to make the right call without you in the room.
The misunderstanding is this: people think we deliver hydrocarbon. What we deliver is more that the molecules, we deliver alignment, trust, and judgment under pressure. The hydrocarbons are just the output.
At this stage of your career, is success still measured by project delivery or by something more structural like positioning, influence, or long-term impact?
Effective Delivery is a standard. At this stage, I’m measured by positioning, influence, and whether I’ve built systems and people that outlast me. Projects end; their impact and legacy last for decades after first oil and gas.
In an industry defined by capital, infrastructure, and scale, what kind of leadership actually outlives individual projects?
Projects are temporary. Leadership that outlives them does several things, including building sustainable systems, developing talent so others can lead bigger than you did, and earning trust so capital and partners follow you into the next cycle. In capital-heavy industries, while steel and mortar depreciate, systems, people, and trust appreciate.
What has this kind of career demanded from you personally that is rarely visible in the public perception of executives like yourself?
What this career demands that people don’t see includes: patience for long-term payoffs, the loneliness of decisions you can’t delegate, and the daily fight to stay human when scale rewards detachment. Titles look powerful. The reality is carrying weight quietly so others can deliver confidently.
If someone studied only your decisions across major projects and companies, what would you want them to understand about when the stakes are at their highest?
When the stakes are highest, clarity beats speed. Crisis makes everyone rush. The instinct is to “do something now.” What I learned on Alen Gas, Bonga North, and other major capital projects is that the most expensive mistakes come from fast decisions that are not clearly thought out. At max pressure, I slow down to define the problem correctly. You can’t solve the right problem at the wrong speed.
Character shows up in trade-offs, not in speeches. High stakes always force a choice: safety vs schedule, cost vs quality, short-term win vs long-term trust. Anyone can talk values when margins are fat. Your real values show when you walk away from money, delay first gas, or protect people at the expense of the KPI. If you study my decisions, you’ll see where I chose integrity over expedience. That’s the real scorecard.
Communication is Critical: What determines success is whether the team, partners, and board understand the “why” behind it. When the stakes are highest, people don’t fear the decision; they fear uncertainty. I over-communicate. I repeat the logic until it’s boring. That’s what keeps alignment when pressure tries to fracture it.
So my pattern would be this: pause for clarity, choose character and integrity over convenience, and communicate until alignment holds. High stakes don’t test your IQ. They test your discipline.
