Published in September 2005 Australian Longwall Magazine
For multinational companies with operations in many countries, the internal transfer of employees is often used to give rising stars valuable experience at different sites.
One pressing issue underlying this people movement is how to evaluate the equivalence of skill sets and educational qualifications between two different countries, particularly important when an individual is expected to take on a senior role such as mine manager.
Anglo Coal has a number of overseas employees already working in its Australian operations but issues of quality assurance and recognition of competence means it is difficult to simply plug someone into the local system without some form of evaluation.
In an attempt to streamline the process of exchanging workers between South Africa and Australia, Anglo Coal and the Queensland Department of Natural Resources & Mines (NR&M) recently mounted a collaborative effort to map the various qualifications of the two countries against each other.
Much work has already been undertaken by Carmel Bofinger of the Brisbane-based Minerals Industry Safety and Health Centre (MISHC) in mapping Australian qualifications. Bofinger recently completed a research project comparing the knowledge and skills of new Australian graduates with the national competency framework for the mining industry.
The aim was to provide mining companies with clear guidelines on what skills mining professionals might need for career development.
Bofinger, Bruce Robertson, chief mining engineer for Anglo Coal Australia and David Reece, senior inspector of mines (coal) at NR&M, visited South African universities to evaluate the qualifications produced there, using templates developed in the earlier research.
"The aim was to find some means of streamlining professional South African mining engineers or mine managers into our system in a shorter timeframe, meaning they didn't have to go and requalify or gain recognition of competency," Reece said.
Reece, Robertson and Bofinger visited the three key universities that issue mining qualifications: Pretoria University, University of Witwatersrand and Johannesburg University, which between them had an intake of roughly 300 first-year students this year.
They also spoke to the peak mining qualification authorities such as the Chamber of Mines’ Mining Qualifications Authority, in addition to mining companies.
Overall, by looking at the courses and how they were taught, the group was successfully able to map the various qualifications against the relevant Australian competencies.
The mapping process demonstrated the substantial equivalency of the undergraduate mining engineering courses between Australia and South Africa, according to Bofinger.
“There are limitations in terms of some of the knowledge and skills when compared to the expectations of the national competencies for mine managers. This is to be expected, as competence as a manager is developed with time and experience,” she said. “This does not indicate shortcomings with the undergraduate courses that aim to develop a mining engineer.”
The investigation did uncover a need for caution with the South African National Diploma, a similar qualification to the Australian TAFE Mining Certificate, but which involves a fair amount of professional development outside the formal institution.
The course of study involves two-years academic study and mentored work experience for 12 months, followed by mine's department written exams before the individual is awarded a manager's ticket.
Reece said if an individual had not been through this entire process, the National Diploma qualification on its own was not sufficient to sit for a Queensland mine manager's ticket.
These and other qualification issues will be outlined in a final report. Robertson, Reece and Bofinger hope the outcome will be a transparent roadmap for the board of examiners, for those wanting to sit exams and gain local qualifications, and as a tool for companies in developing training strategies for graduates.
The recommendations will also be provided to the National Mine Safety Framework, which guides the chief inspectors from all the states, for further consideration.
But even if someone has exactly the right qualifications, Reece still believes a 6-12 month assimilation would be advisable.
"From what we saw, South African coal miners operate in quite good conditions. There's not a lot of gas, very few instances of spontaneous combustion and strata control is far more benign. They are a very different style of operation and we need to give people time to come to terms with how mines operate here," Reece said.
At a broader level, Reece said one of the key learning points to emerge from the exercise for the Australian mining industry was an opportunity for greater involvement in qualifications and the whole process at senior level.
"One of the really impressive things about South African mining is the really strong linkage between mining companies, Chamber of Mines, and qualifications authorities and the people setting the standards. Whereas in Australia it is voluntary and disjointed with mining companies somewhat reluctant to get involved," Reece said.
Reece believes it is because the South African mining industry is more reliant on the domestic market that companies take a longer-term view of succession planning. Some have business plans 15 years out that include human resource plans outlining how many graduates the company plans to take each year. This information is fed to the universities, which then put in place plans to meet industry needs.
"In South Africa there were few inconsistencies - we gained the impression of consistency and cooperation in the training of engineers," Reece said.
While the three dominant South African mining companies compete with each other, in the area of training there is a cohesive effort. Though the larger mining houses here are implementing graduate development programmes, Reece reiterated his call for Australian companies to get involved in a much more collaborative way in mining education.
