Meet Our People

Senior Analyst, Edinburgh

Stewart Williams

"My extensive pan-African experience now gives me the flexibility to broaden my role considerably with more client interaction, conference speaking roles and consulting origination and delivery."

I joined WoodMac in 1996 as an Upstream Research Analyst, having previously had six years’ oil industry experience in a variety of engineering and geophysical roles.

I started my career at WoodMac in the North Africa team and was initially tasked with the creation of our mapping database for Africa - a real task which remains a core WoodMac service and revenue earner to this day. Although construction of this database played on my existing strengths, I also had to climb a challenging learning curve covering all aspects of petroleum economics and the oil & gas business. Within a year of joining the company I was travelling throughout North Africa, talking to oil companies and governments as part of our data gathering for our upstream research services. After a couple of years my extensive knowledge of the region enabled me to undertake consulting projects for clients inside and outside of Africa.

After a few years covering North Africa the company offered me the opportunity to progress to our Nigeria and Central Africa team, which is my current position. My core research tasks remain broadly the same as in North Africa, but my extensive pan-African experience now gives me the flexibility to broaden my role considerably with more client interaction, conference speaking roles and consulting origination and delivery. The continent is a key oil and gas province for clients around the globe and over the last few years I have undertaken Africa-related projects in Europe, the US, Latin America, Asia, the Middle East, and Australasia as well as in Africa itself.

WoodMac works you hard and rewards you well. I enjoy the challenge of working in places that a tourist visa often won’t get you and the opportunity to influence decisions on multi-billion dollar deals and projects.

It’s not just all about hard work, however. There are plenty of events in the social calendar too. When I’m not travelling I play guitar in the WoodMac band….but it’s probably not time to give up the day job just yet!

Back to Research & Analysis roles