Often seen as part of an aging industry that's set in its ways, oil companies need to show they can offer thrilling tech careers to keep recent graduates from joining start-ups or giants such as Facebool. (Photo: Shutterstock)

Every few weeks, in a glass-walled office with a picture of an oil platform filling the east side, an unusual conversation takes place.

Bernard Looney, the 48-year-old who controls BP Plc's massive oil and gas production, sits down with a 26-year-old petrophysicist, Connor Tann, to get answers to a few fundamental questions. Among the most important: How can the oil behemoth keep up with the times?

“There's a lot of doom and gloom about the sector, and what's happening in the world in general, and all sorts of things,” Looney said. “A lot of your days get consumed in stuff like that, and to spend an hour with Connor, where he is the best and the brightest, it's energizing.”