Leadership

It is clear from the survey results the leadership and employee groups have starkly different perceptions of leadership's ability, what leadership does, and what the role of leadership will be in the future workforce. In response to the question, ‘Is leadership aware of changes necessary to evolve workplace environment and practices?', 61% of the leadership group said ‘Yes' or ‘Mostly' compared to just 44% of the employee group. In a follow-up question, respondents were asked to grade their leadership team's ability to find innovative solutions to new challenges, on a scale of 1-10. Among leadership group respondents, the average score was 7.49. Among employees, the average score was 6.55.John Murray, managing director and founding principal of executive search firm Swann Global, said many people in leadership were aware their organisations needed to change. What's stopping them, he added, is that they're not necessarily aware of how to implement change quickly."Most change, serious cultural change, is generational. There are very few ways to literally change an organisation overnight other than holding people accountable," Murray said."By holding people accountable, I mean someone's just told me they're going to produce a report by Friday 10am in the morning. I get to 11am and it hasn't been produced and I say, ‘Okay, you've got till 5pm'. If I haven't got it by 5, then I fire you. If I don't fire you, I should be fired. "Now that straightens an organisation out. As a consequence of that, there are huge legal implications, because people will say they've been treated unfairly. So, bringing about rapid change pretty ruthlessly is not easy."Where a company is based has a huge impact on its ability to implement change, according to Murray. In the developed world, companies must obey strict labour laws. In some African countries, employees can't be made redundant without government permission. In the BRICS countries, there are few things holding companies back. "I think leadership is aware that our industry has to evolve and has to start catching up with what's going on in the general community," Murray said. "But at times, one, they won't be able to do it, two, they'll struggle with the consequences of doing it quickly, and three, they're not competing in an open-playing field. It doesn't matter if you're a small penny-listed company or you're BHP - you're competing with India, China, Russia, Brazil, who don't give a rat's patootie about the Queensberry Rules."Lack of strategic thinking is another barrier to change, according to Murray. In 30 years in the mining industry, he said he'd met "probably half-a-dozen" HR people who were genuinely strategic, who looked at people as "vital assets" for the company. "If you don't have the people on side, you're stuffed. When bringing about change, it's about process and technology, but you need the people who will embrace the process, embrace the technology embrace the innovation, to make it work," he said."To do that you need somebody who's strategic who understands how to embrace the people, to encourage them to embrace the change."Even when it comes to what should be an objective measure, such as how often a company's leadership group discusses issues beyond a three-year horizon, there is a wide gap between leadership perception and employee perception. 69% of leadership respondents said their company's leadership group discusses long-term issues weekly, monthly, or quarterly. In comparison, only 49% of employees agreed.At the very least, leadership groups should be holding a regular one-hour session "simply to see what's changed", Murray said. "It might be that nothing's changed, it might be that America's just parked a warship in the (Persian) Gulf, or the Chinese economy looks like this. You at least ought to have a watching eye over it."Respondents were asked to predict which professional background would be most prevalent among future leaders - and the results closely resembled the current state of affairs in the industry. Overall, 43% of respondents predicted ‘Geology, Engineering, and Metallurgy' would provide most of the leaders in the workplace of the future. Next, 20.8% nominated ‘Financial', 17.2% said ‘Technology', and fewer than 10% selected any of ‘HR', ‘Political', or ‘Legal'.Current data is hard to come by, but a 2014 Mine Staff International study of 125 of the world's largest mining companies shows a similar breakdown. The study found that 77% of CEOs had completed a graduate university degree. Of these graduates, around 39% specialised in geology, engineering, or metallurgy, 30% in finance, 14% accounting, 11% law, and the remaining 6% other areas of study.Murray said there was "a really good mix" of leaders in the industry at the moment. Running through a few names, he noted that Barrick executive chairman John Thornton was an investment banker, Anglo American CEO Mark Cutifani was a mining engineer, Glencore CEO Ivan Glasenberg has a background in commodities trading, De Beers CEO Bruce Cleaver was a lawyer, and BHP CEO Andrew Mackenzie was a geochemist.In the workplace of the future, survey respondents believed leadership would spend more time with governments and communities than with operations, senior management, staff, or investors.Again, there was a divide of opinion between leadership and employees. Amongst the leadership group, 38.1% believe they will spend most time with government and communities in the workplace of the future. Only 29.5% of employee respondents agreed with that assessment.Murray said he wasn't surprised by the results, because it reflects current thinking about the importance of working with external actors. Naming the Church of England as an example of an organisation that influences people's investment decisions (through its investment funds and transparency report), he said mining companies would need to court such actors. "I think structures of companies might need to change so that a chief executive has time to address some of these issues and spend time with people internally and externally and that most companies will then need a chief operating officer". "I do not believe a good chief executive can do both in this current day and age. They may have been able to do it when I was a boy and throughout my career, but I think that's changing dramatically", he added.

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