“You definitely have a different culture permeating through these organizations,” said Oswald Clint, an analyst at Bernstein in London. The current group of chief executives is more “focused on cost-cutting and not just building fancy toys,” he said.

Along with the bitter experience of low prices, concern about the role of fossil fuels in climate change is also influencing industry behavior.

While demand for oil has been growing strongly in recent years, the question is whether it will continue to grow as governments and societies demand a shift to a low-carbon economy that may only be achievable by reducing use of emissions-spewing fossil fuels. While the Trump administration may be trying to roll back regulation of energy producers, oil executives fear that future administrations may reapply the rules even more aggressively.

“I would argue that this is the most difficult time for the industry since the OPEC crisis and the nationalizations of the 1960s and 1970s,” said J. Robinson West, managing director of the BCG Center for Energy Impact, a consulting firm, referring to the western oil companies’ losing their lucrative concessions in countries like Iran, Libya and Saudi Arabia.

Pondering uncertainties like these, company boards are wary of approving the long term, multibillion dollar projects that used to be oil industry staples. “How do you approve these massive projects which have a 20-year life when you don’t know what the business environment will be in 20 years?” Mr. West asked.