Global talent mobility in mining and metals

Theo Yameogo: Welcome to the series to both of you. Today, I'm speaking with my colleagues Jo-Anne VanStrien and Christopher Gordon from our EY People Advisory Services practice. And we are going to talk about the global talent mobility strategy, and the integrated approach EY is taking to help mining companies. Jo-Anne, Chris, welcome to the episode.

Jo-Anne VanStrien: Thank you, Theo. Excited to be here.

Christopher Gordon: Thank you, Theo. Really happy to be here with you all.

Theo Yameogo: Last year's Top 10 Risks and Opportunities that EY publishes every year for mining and metals identified workforce as a key challenge. When we think about skills shortage and talent mobility, what are you seeing in the sector nowadays?

Jo-Anne VanStrien: Great question, Theo. As you know, I've been working with the mining industry for many years now. And pre-pandemic, it was all about an aging workforce and attracting talent into a sector that wasn't always the most appealing, especially to the youth.

Now we're coming out of this. We've got an increase in digitalization. We've got employees and their needs are changing, and their expectations are changing. And people are needing to be flexible and adapting to that. And so when I think about the mining industry in particular, the skill set needed has changed. I think about the IT sector in particular, and the IT-type talent, they are competing with the likes of a Shopify, of a Google. Being flexible and being creative is going to be key to success in the mining sector. As well, I want to comment that when I think about the discussions I've been having, the employees are looking for flexibility and change.

We recently did a survey of which 9 out of 10 employees want both flexibility in when and where they work, and that 54% of them would leave the organization if they didn't get the flexibility they wanted. So when I think about the mining sector in particular, and the challenges that it already had around attracting and retaining talent, adding in these layers of a different skillset, as well as the need for flexibility, is going to create even more strain on the workforce needs of the organization, and companies are going to have to adapt.

Christopher Gordon: Yeah, I agree totally, Jo. With the increase in digital mining and the need for new skills and competencies, we're beginning to see a real shift in the category of employees that mining companies are hiring and seeking to attract. And as you mentioned, Jo, mining companies are increasingly competing for highly skilled talent that just could, just as easily go to banking, IT and other engineering professions. However, these types of high-skilled labour have advantageous immigration processes, which makes it easier for companies to land them.

The biggest challenge that we're seeing in the mining sector from an immigration perspective is for the semi-skilled mine workers, the labour class, if you will, where quite frankly, there are not as many routes to advantageous immigration processes as there are for the higher-skilled labour. And so this leads to that kind of compression and pressure on that particular group in terms of ability to get them into country. This makes it more onerous for organizations, quite frankly, to hire them, and also to place them on mine sites quickly.

One of the things that we are beginning to see, is we are beginning to see countries realize that this is an issue and start to provide more advantageous immigration routes. So, for example, Singapore, we're seeing them roll out a visa class for engineers and low-level mine workers potentially, or would I say semi-skilled workers, to take advantage of the lack of that skill in the country. There are some countries that are lagging behind that. And so, quite frankly, they're going to be some winners and some losers in that as companies and countries try to grapple with the shortage in the mining sector.

Theo Yameogo: Thanks for this overview. Now let's go into specifics. When it comes to skill gaps and accommodating for flexibility, what are mining companies doing right now? Or what should they be doing to address that? Chris, I would like to start with you.

Christopher Gordon: Yeah, thanks, Theo. Really good question. It's interesting when you talk about flexibility and this whole concept of work from anywhere or remote work. Whilst work from anywhere is a reality for many industries or job roles, much of mining and much of the jobs in the mining sector still need to be performed in-person, in very remote locations several miles underground. And as mentioned, we've seen this talent supply chain disruption in the sector as a result of some of the geopolitical and COVID-related issues and pressures. But we are seeing companies start to think about how they think about talent pools maybe a little bit differently. So we're seeing various approaches to address the skills shortage and border issues that companies are experiencing. In one such approach, we're seeing companies employ more of a regional approach to managing their talent and looking at their talent supply chain. And so, for example, in Latin America, we're seeing a lot more of a pooling of talent from within the Mercosur region, which allows mining companies to have that much more flexibility about their talent pool, how quickly they can bring people into country and avoid some of the challenges around immigration, because there are more preferential immigration processes and programs that are available to those employees.

We're also seeing companies in the mining space look at programs with universities both at home and abroad in the hope of tapping into much larger pools of foreign talent, foreign labour, as the mining talent in those countries begins to age out.

And thirdly, we're beginning to see companies look at their mobility policies to include support for permanent residence and citizenship applications, which will allow for a growing number of employees to see a route to permanency in the country, which will make those roles much more attractive.

Jo-Anne VanStrien: I want to build on something that you just said around the work from anywhere and business travel. Those are two of the hottest topics that we're dealing with in the mobility space today. And I'll say that, in the conversations I'm having with clients, mobility has never been more strategic and this whole ability around the work from anywhere, which is a strategy many are using to help on the, to retain and to attract talent is big. And when I think to the mining sector in particular, when this conversation started to happen, I did not think I would have this conversation with those in the mining sector. Just in the nature of where the mines are. You can't move them. The talent does have to be onsite, many of them. But that being said, there are many roles within the organization that do not have to be onsite. And this is where I'm seeing mining companies flex. And it’s a great thing. And so where I'm seeing that flexibility is sort of twofold. One is we're seeing where companies are allowing individuals to work remotely for temporary periods of time, traditionally building on to a vacation. If they're out on vacation, they may be allowed to stay remote for up to 30 days, for example. Another strategy that some mining companies are using is really around letting the employee, especially the new hires, remain in the jurisdiction for where they currently live, and only bring them into the office as needed. Again, this is something that we are seeing more of it, typically at the corporate levels and mainly at the senior-level executives.

Theo Yameogo: Jo-Anne, I'd like to go back to what you just said around working from anywhere. Mobility seems to add risk to mining companies, and working from anywhere that we're seeing with COVID seems to add more risk to it. What kind of mitigation strategies are mining companies contemplating or implementing to actually address the challenge.

Jo-Anne VanStrien: Great question, Theo. There's actually a couple of things I'm seeing. First, companies are implementing policies, especially around a work-from-anywhere perspective. They're either limiting the amount of time an individual can work outside of country if it's meant to be temporary. They're limiting maybe the countries for which the individual can work remotely, when I think about data security in particular. Or they may even be limiting the individuals based on their roles from being allowed to participate in a work-from-anywhere type policy.

What's important is understanding the risks, and it's the multidisciplinary risks that work from anywhere can bring to the table. And so putting the necessary guardrails, whether it be around immigration, health and safety, data privacy, income tax, putting some parameters in place around those elements really does help to mitigate risk and companies are doing that. I'd be remiss to say, too, especially when you're allowing your people to work remotely, is having some process and tracking in place because there remains a duty of care to your individuals.

Second thing, and it's becoming refreshed, shall I say, is this whole concept around a global employment organization. It is not new, especially in this sector, but it is getting revived again. And what we're seeing is a lot of organizations are looking to a what we call a GEO, a global employment organization, which is a special structure put in place that really helps to facilitate in the hiring of global talent, in the payment of global talent, providing benefits to global talent and really mitigating the corporate risks that can come with that when you have employees working in jurisdictions outside of the home country. So it's being expanded. Again, we saw a lot of it when it was project or fly-in fly-out type individuals. But now this type of organization is being looked at from that global nomad or that work-from-anywhere perspective.

Christopher Gordon: Absolutely, Jo. And, you know, you and I sit and talk to clients all the time about some of these challenges. So you covered off a lot of really important points there. I'll just add a couple of thoughts to that response, if I may. Since the emergence of COVID, the focus on remote work, we've been advising companies that it's even more critical that they take, as Jo mentioned, a very holistic approach to how they plan and how they develop policy to ensure that their risk is minimized and that there's minimal friction in the mobility and the work-from-anywhere process. So as mining companies begin to address these challenges — again, the challenges of geopolitical shifts, digital workforce transformation, and this war on talent — I think there's a huge opportunity to view mobility and foreign talent as a tool to addressing these needs and to drive further growth in the mining sector. But this should be done thoughtfully and strategically with a multidisciplinary team of stakeholders from the business, HR, mobility, legal all at the table, and of course with advisors who can help you navigate through the nuance. I think it's extremely important to recognize that there are huge opportunities here. But if we think about them in a collaborative and a coordinated way, we can really navigate through some of the risks and the challenges that were mentioned throughout this conversation.

Theo Yameogo: Thank you, Chris. As you both pointed out, global talent mobility is essential in helping mining companies achieve targets and performance across the world. Thank you both for sharing your insights today.

Christopher Gordon: Thank you very much, Theo. It's been a pleasure to share with you today.

Jo-Anne VanStrien: Thank you, Theo. Always great to connect.