As male-dominated industriesgo, oil and gas production has to be near the top. That hasn'tstopped Jennifer Grigsby from becoming a veteran in the sector andputting her mark on important finance functions at OklahomaCity-based Chesapeake Energy Corp.

As treasurer since 2007 at Chesapeake, which had $9.37 billionin 2010 revenue, Grigsby, who is also senior vice president andcorporate secretary, has responsibilities that include overseeingcash and risk management, debt compliance and corporate complianceinitiatives.

Like many of her finance peers atenergy companies, much of Grigsby's time is spent monitoring swingsin oil and gas prices and looking for opportunities to hedge thecompany's future oil and gas production. “We have a very activehedging program,” she says. “When we see an opportunity to layer onfutures, we lock it in.”

That work has become easier to manage thanks to a breakthroughcommodity hedging program Grigsby spearheaded in 2009. The newfacility grew out of an earlier program in which Chesapeake usedits oil and gas interests as collateral for its futures trades, inplace of the cash that's typically used.

In the past, Chesapeake's treasury team had separate one-offhedging arrangements with each of the company's 13 counterparties,including six facilities backed by oil and gas collateral, andmanaging the multiple collateral pools was a real chore. Grigsbycame up with the idea of structuring the hedging vehicle to allowmultiple counterparties to participate in a single collateral pool,which was far easier for Chesapeake to manage. “We were able to getall counterparties on one level footing,” Grigsby notes.

“It's an amazing facility, a first of its kind,” she adds. “It'sa remarkable risk management tool for us. It allows us to hedge ourfuture production so as to lock in attractive margins, smooth ourcash flow and mitigate potential liquidity issue by having areserve-based program in place that moves in tandem with gas andoil prices.”

Last year, Grigsby was also instrumental in negotiating a $4billion revolving bank credit facility that took advantage of theimproving market conditions.

As for Chesapeake, in January it announced a “25/25″ plan togrow its oil and natural gas production (mostly oil) by 25% by theend of 2012 while reducing its long-term debt by 25% over the sameperiod.

To fund those objectives, Chesapeake continues to expand itsinternational partnerships and monetize its valuable oil and gasassets. Also in January, the company announced its sixth jointventure, with Chinese oil producer CNOOC; in March it announced thesale of its Fayetteville Shale assets to BHP Billiton for $4.75billion; and earlier this month it announced a tender offer for upto $2 billion of its outstanding debt.

Grigsby hopes the rating agencies will soon appreciate thebalance-sheet enhancing, risk-reducing goals the company is workingtoward. Certainly, Grigsby's treasury shop looks to be quite busyin the near future.

See the complete coverage of Treasury & Risk's2011 Women in Finance list here.