Author page: MEC

BHP’s commitment to seeking out excellence in mining and setting itself an aspirational goal of achieving a 50/50 gender balance by 2025 company-wide, has recently reached an impressive milestone. New figures show that women now make up a fifth of its 26,000-strong workforce, an increase of 3 percentage points in the year to June 2017 (Hume, 2017). In light of this inspiring achievement, MEC General Manager of Strategy and Business Development, and Committee Chair of Women in Mining and Resources Queensland (WIMARQ), Maria Joyce reflects on not only the benefits of a diverse workforce, but also the challenges that are likely to accompany these ambitious aims.

MEC General Manager of Strategy and Business Development, Maria Joyce, attended the Women in Resources National Awards (WIRNA) dinner in Launceston, Tasmania in her capacity as Committee Chair of Women in Mining and Resources Queensland (WIMARQ) last Thursday 31^st August 2017.

MEC welcomes the return of Chris Catania to the MEC team in the role of Principal Mining Engineer.  In his role he will manage the MEC Projects team and be a key member of our leadership team. Chris previously worked with MEC as a Team Leader in the Brisbane office and returns to us after two years working for Kaz Mineral’s at their Aktogay Copper Mine in Kazakhstan. During Chris’s tenure as the Planning Superintendent in Kazakhstan he managed a large mining engineering team and was responsible for the development of mine planning processes and systems.

Markets are funny beasts, the moment you think you have it figured out, something comes along that makes you rethink your strategy.

Mike Tyson once said “Everyone has a plan ‘till they get punched in the mouth” The dynamic nature of the mining industry makes it not to dissimilar to boxing, in FY12 we got the first uppercut which sent us into a tail spin and for some it was a TKO. The strong ones staggered back to their feet and kept slogging away for a few rounds. FY17 saw the second uppercut come along as a wakeup call to get moving again.

MEC will be at The University of Queensland Engineering Undergraduate Society (UQ EUS) Careers Fair on Thursday 27 July to meet with students.

MEC’s Senior Underground Consultant, Geoff Watson, recently delivered multiple production scenarios to support a strategic business decision. Faced with “Board Level” time frames, Geoff developed and updated mine plans, assumptions and schedules for three principle scenarios over a four week timeframe. Additionally, developing six incremental opportunities for reserve optimisation and LOM planning.

MEC Announces New Management Team

MEC is pleased to announce a few key changes to their management team that will have a positive impact on the future direction of the business.

We’re all familiar with lists of organisational values but how much credence should we give them when we’re seeking out businesses to collaborate with or work for? Are “corporate values” just another example of meaningless jargon?