A native of South Texas, Rick Garza attended the University of Texas at San Antonio and graduated with a degree in mechanical engineering in 2009. After graduation, a college friend who was a geologist logging in West Texas invited him out to the field.

“That’s where it started,” said Garza, who was immediately inspired to start in the oil and gas industry.

He took his first job as hydrocarbon well analyst in Midland, Texas, for McNeese Field Services Inc. Garza said he would identify lithology, porosity and permeability as drill cuttings from downhole were coming up to the surface, transcribing the information.

A majority of his early career was spent in Midland from 2009-2014, whether it was on the field or logging.

As a change in the industry’s climate took hold, Garza relocated to Houston to be closer to the hub where more opportunities were. His experience in field logging and downhole implementation led him to join Calgary-based RS Energy Group, an energy intelligence firm, as a solutions engineer in 2014.

In his free time, he enjoys spending time with his two kids and watching them grow up, as well as hitting the golf course whenever he can.

In a recent interview, Garza discussed his work with Oil and Gas Investor.

Investor What is your role at RS Energy Group?

Garza As a solution engineer, I assist our customer base as well as the sales team by identifying strategies that we can implement utilizing publicly sourced data.

Specifically, in correlation of the whole operational details, whether that’s drilling, completions, how the well is fracked, how the well is completed and then ultimately looking at return of product out, oil and gas. We identify how you can run some analytics inside of the readily available public data.

From an ongoing perspective in any customer base, I support them in identifying new ways of utilizing multivariate data analysis as well as unit analysis.

Investor Are more companies using data for their strategic decision making?

Garza Definitely. It’s become probably one of the fastest growing commodities—commodity meaning it’s available and it’s there. There’s a market for it. What you do with that data is kind of a strategic move.

What we specialize in is quality control as well as a validation and cleansing of that data by utilizing machine-learning as well as industry knowledge to get a better sense of that data.

Investor What challenges face E&P companies today?

Garza Challenge number one would be the validation and the aggregation of the public data. And making sure they’re not wasting their time, ultimately sifting through all the various data sources and the nuances of public data, because as great as we would like it to be, it never really is. That’s the biggest challenge they face.

Going to that source and not only trusting it, but ultimately gathering it and then being able to do the high-level analytics on it.

Investor Which plays do you think are on the verge of becoming economic?

Garza Maybe the San Juan Basin as well as some other areas in the outskirts, the Powder River Basin/Piceance-types because those are going to be relatively new areas where things are accruing but the plays are relatively shallow.

So the operational characteristics kind of shift, which allows you to mitigate the costs a little bit.

Investor Who influenced you in your career?

Garza There’s a completion advisor at Newfield Exploration named Bruce Arlington that I look up to as a person who can handle the operation details as well as statistical analysis and still be capable of having a personal conversation and putting that to the side. That’s what I think is the greatest balance that we really need, especially when you’re in the weeds in this tabular data and you get lost in that.

Ultimately, my friend who helped me get out into the oil field in the first place. That’s Danny Jones from Apache. As we advance in our careers, we challenge each other with where are you going, where do you see yourself, when are you taking the next step?

Investor What does your future look like?

Garza Being part of an organization is great, but ultimately being in control of your own destiny by owning your organization, whether it’s an analytics firm or a consulting firm.

I do see myself in five-to-10 years as a CEO or somewhere in the C-suite, either helping somebody obtain an ultimate goal or positioning myself as a leader for a company or organization that will be in the oil and gas industry on the data, financial, economic or statistical analysis side.