Mining Mindset: What Really Breaks (and Fixes) Mining Systems

From Automotive Fabrication to Mining Operations Management

William Boyd’s journey into the mining industry took an unconventional route. Starting with a focus on automotive design and fabrication in Colorado, he operated his own shop specializing in cars and four-wheel drives for a decade. Several customers from a local surface mine eventually led him to apply for a position in mining operations.

Beginning on the equipment operation side gave Boyd a ground-up understanding of how mines function. His maintenance background and hands-on experience quickly moved him into supervisory roles and eventually into the engineering department. This operational foundation provided a unique perspective that many traditional mine engineers lack – actual experience running equipment and understanding field challenges firsthand.

Systems Engineering Approach to Mine Management

Recognizing the industry’s shift toward automation, Boyd pursued systems engineering education through MIT. This coursework transformed how he views mining operations. Rather than seeing a mine as a single entity, he approaches it as a complex system where each department functions as an interconnected subsystem.

The systems engineering methodology helps identify priorities and deficiencies across the larger operation. Decision-making trees and scoring matrices become essential tools for evaluating complex, multifaceted projects. Understanding form versus function for each component allows managers to determine which changes will deliver the greatest operational impact.

A practical example illustrates this approach: upgrading a pump in the refinery might seem beneficial in isolation, but without understanding its position in the entire system, that upgrade could have no downstream effect or potentially cause problems upstream that increase reagent costs.

The Critical Role of Refinery Operations

Among all mining operations, the refinery demands the most attention. As the final stage in the production stream, minute changes in the refinery create significant impacts on recovery rates. Getting something wrong at this stage makes most upstream activities irrelevant.

Boyd uses decision structure matrices to score different refinery components. This points-based system tracks downstream impacts when evaluating changes. When examining component modifications, the matrix reveals how eleven other downstream elements might be affected, helping determine whether changing an expensive but less critical component makes sense versus investing in a more impactful component further down the process stream.

Breaking Down Departmental Silos

The hardest challenge in managing interconnected mining systems is getting people to stop operating in departmental silos. At many mines, departments have different goals and compete against each other. Some operations even structure bonuses in ways that pit departments against one another, where process optimization goals conflict with what mining and operations teams need to achieve.

Getting departments to share resources and make sacrifices for overall system optimization represents one of the biggest leadership challenges in mining. When Boyd arrived at Golden Queen, the tech services engineering department had virtually no communication with operations. He implemented cross-departmental meetings and arranged for planning engineers to ride along with mine operators, discussing issues and upcoming plans together.

Managing the Modern Mining Workforce

The incoming generation of miners and engineers presents distinct management challenges. Attendance issues and a shift in workplace expectations have changed the operational culture. The passion and pride that drove previous generations to perform well and impress supervisors appears diminished in many newer workers.

Addressing these challenges requires visibility and personal engagement. Boyd spends the first hours of each day visiting each department’s line-out meetings, getting familiar with team members individually, discussing their progress, and providing shift-by-shift recognition. Creating a sense of family and team purpose proves more effective than monetary incentives alone.

Equally important is ensuring all employees feel valued. Haul truck drivers, sometimes treated as expendable at other operations, are actually among the most critical components in the mining system. Making the entire fleet feel important motivates efficient, careful operation that saves time and reduces equipment damage.

Pit Optimization and Mine Planning Strategy

When software generates thousands of pit optimization scenarios, multiple factors determine the final selection. Mine life versus net present value, strip ratio reduction, and tax implications all influence which pit shells to pursue. At Golden Queen, balancing mine life with exploration and construction timelines takes priority over strict revenue maximization.

Software excels at showing mineralogy and projected revenue based on pit shells and wall angles. However, more complex decisions – like fleet optimization, equipment purchases, and timing of pit sequences – often require manual analysis outside the software. Determining whether to buy additional trucks or maintain current fleet size involves maintenance costs and operational factors that extend beyond standard optimization tools.

The most critical element from concept to execution is revenue viability. No investor supports a mine running at break-even for five years. Beyond profitability, the ease of executing the mine plan matters significantly. Software often underestimates operational challenges in small benches at pit bottoms, where squeezing a shovel and trucks into a bench only a couple hundred feet wide creates difficulties that decreased mine rate calculations cannot fully capture.

Building Adaptability Into Mine Plans

Perfect mine plans do not exist. Part of the planning process involves building adaptability into every design. Plans that depend on exact execution without built-in alternatives create serious problems when unexpected issues arise – equipment failures, personnel problems, accident damage, or unexpected voids.

Boyd reports achieving 80 to 85 percent compliance to long-range plans, with short-range results varying considerably more. The key to this accuracy lies in creating options. When mining multiple pits, positioning operations so that if ore does not appear or strip ratios go wrong in one area, other pits can deliver similar ore types while managing the problem.

Small planning decisions create disproportionate operational consequences. Poor bench sequencing that wastes time on temporary ramps, or cycle patterns that bounce between waste-bound and ore-bound weeks, forces constant adaptation and undermines plan compliance.

Cross-Departmental Communication and Accountability

Bridging the gap between mathematically optimized plans and field execution requires cross-departmental communication. The ego conflicts between department heads can become severe and require focused effort to manage.

With a diverse international engineering team, written documentation becomes essential. Meetings conclude with summary emails containing images, key changes, priorities, and assigned responsibilities. Assumptions about common understanding lead to weekend surprises when priorities were not actually clear.

The accountability philosophy centers on personal ownership. When operations mines the wrong area over a weekend, the leadership response should not blame the team but ask what communication failures allowed it to happen. This ownership mentality eliminates excuses and creates genuine cross-departmental cooperation.

Automation Benefits and Challenges

Automation brings significant advantages but introduces new risks. The primary challenge is personnel complacency. As systems become more automated, people pay less attention, and problems that automation continues adapting to can be run into the ground before anyone notices.

Effective automation removes manual tasks without removing human oversight. When shutting down a crusher circuit for metal contamination or blocky rock, automation stops water valves, reagent feeds, and conveyors automatically. When the system restarts, everything comes back online together. But like auto headlights that fail to turn on, automated systems that malfunction while operators are complacent create serious issues.

The refinery exemplifies well-implemented automation. Pumps, flows, and monitoring run autonomously, but when complications arise – de-scaling needs or clarifier cleaning – the system alerts personnel who can switch to manual mode and address issues directly.

Leadership in Complex Mining Systems

Managing interconnected mining systems relies less on specific tools than on balancing people and resources together. Operations must focus beyond tonnage to include product quality, process coordination, and maintenance scheduling. Equipment run without maintenance cooperation creates larger downstream problems.

The most common leadership mistake is isolating departments as independent teams with separate bonus structures. When departments only care about their own metrics, competing goals prevent site-wide optimization.

Skills for the Future of Mining

Future mining engineers need software adaptability and comfort with emerging technologies like AI, which shows promise in surveying and drill blast design. Out-of-the-box thinking that moves beyond traditional methods will separate effective engineers from those limited by past practices.

However, core engineering principles remain essential. Over-dependence on computer-generated information removes fundamental thinking from the process. Computers design impressive solutions, but without someone understanding the original goals and watching over the output, automated systems can drift significantly off track. Balancing technological capability with foundational engineering knowledge defines the skill set that will drive mining’s future.