Karen Agustiawan, Pertamina's president director since February 2009, has promised to recruit foreign talent and capable human resources and state-of-the-art technology to help meet the company's strategy.
"The basic (resources) and the plan are already there," Karen told the Jakarta Globe in an interview at her residence in Patra Kuningan, South Jakarta, on Friday.
Karen, 52, has been travelling overseas, talking to executives and industry members on the best practices of managing and operating energy companies like state-controlled Pertamina. She has invited a former executive of Petronas to share his experience in transforming the Malaysian firm into a world-class oil company.
"A former CEO of Malaysia's Petronas, Tan Sri Mohd Hassan Marican, will visit Indonesia and I want him to meet several ministers to explain the reasons behind Petronas' success, on what the Malaysian government has provided," Karen said.
Hassan, chief executive of Petronas from 1995 until 2010, has been widely credited for Petronas' rise to success.
Pertamina's ambitious plan will not be easy to achieve, though. In the five years through 2011, Pertamina's assets rose 58 per cent to 319.9 rupiah trillion (RM105.4 billion). That was a fifth of Petronas's US$153 billion (RM474.3 billion) and lower than PTT's US$44.5 billion.
Just last month it transformed itself into an energy company that encompasses geothermal and coal, broadening from crude oil and natural gas.
Still, revenue and net income at Pertamina has been increasing in the past three years. Revenue rose 36 per cent to 589.9 trillion rupiah last year. It was higher from 365.34 trillion rupiah in 2009. At the same time net income rose 22 per cent to 20.47 trillion rupiah in 2011. In 2009 profit was 16.2 trillion rupiah.
Karen said that in the past Pertamina had been implicated in various corruption practices that hurt its attempts to become a global energy player.
Pertamina, set up in 1957, has been portrayed as a cash cow for corrupt officials. During the early 1970s oil bonanza, Pertamina racked up huge debts, around US$10 billion according to some estimates, due to mismanagement and corruption.
Karen identified three major challenges - a lack of understanding, intervention and the perception of corruption that refuses to go away.
"It is unfair for Pertamina to be perceived as the same company it used to be some 50 years ago," she said, insisting that the firm had performed many good deeds for the country like paying huge amounts of tax and dividends to the state.
Karen said that Pertamina had to deal with the central government and other state-controlled companies such as electricity producer Perusahaan Listrk Negara and airline operators such as Merpati Nusantara. Doing business with those companies caused Pertamina's debts to rise to almost US$7 billion.
"With Pertamina eyeing growth many times over, this must be stopped," the president director said.
Aside from mismanagement, Pertamina must also deal with political intervention.
"Anything that we have done is constantly challenged. I do not know whether this is a product of reformation, but I personally think that it has gone to a point where it is too much," Karen said.
Such distractions will not stop Pertamina from making acquisitions locally and abroad, she insisted.
Pertamina's moves to acquire Medco Energi Internasional in 2010, the country's largest listed oil and gas company, was scrapped at the last minute due to political reasons.
"And now our plan to acquire oil assets in Venezuela is starting to be politicised, as to why Pertamina must go there when the political environment was not there," Karen said.
She added that Pertamina had improved a lot, which was exemplified by its partnership with some of the biggest names in the industry. "If the old image persists, it is impossible for Pertamina to get the best choice of partners."
Pertamina has also improved in terms of internal management, Karen says.
"Now, our board of directors are no longer perceived as untouchable and more humane, in touch with the lowest level of the company's management," she said.
Pri Agung Rakhmanto, an executive director at think-tank Reforminer Institute, said that Pertamina's image had improved in the past 10 years.
"Pertamina, however, must make more effort toward transparency, to explain its decisions to the public to completely eradicate its old image as a corrupt institution," he said.
Pri Agung also called on Pertamina to continue to display professionalism so that people would be more reluctant to intervene in its operations.
"A constant improvement in terms of efficiency is a must for Pertamina," he said.
Additional reporting by Markus Junianto Sihaloho