The human resources discipline in the areas of talent management, skills development and employee relations is evolving. Today, this field demands a more integrated approach through the business as it impacts all stakeholders. Key to this is enhancing gender equality and inclusion across our operations.

Globally we need to show that mining means progress and a long-lasting future through employment, career development and working with stakeholders to build sustainable communities.

When it comes to human resources, we are further integrating this function into the business and developing skills for the roles in which we will need them. We are working with local educational institutions to develop local talent, continuing with our mentorship programmes, providing career development, and catering for the well-being of our employees and the communities we operate in. As automation in areas of the mining industry becomes a reality, we need to ensure our employees are developing new skills.

Given the varying work environments at our sites, the adoption of new technology and appropriate training programmes will be adapted to the needs of each operation. We will work to build a highly-skilled labour force where individuals can work across a number of disciplines.

Talent management

Key to our integrated talent management strategy is the Chairman’s Young Leaders Programme (CYLP), which saw eight candidates graduate in November 2019. The programme nurtures young talent to feed into the long-term talent pipeline across a range of disciplines. The accelerated development offered by the programme prepares the participants for leadership and critical positions in the future.

Since its launch in 2016, 34 candidates from a variety of disciplines have graduated, 53% of them women. Approximately 90% were promoted or have been given a broader scope of work and 91% have stayed with the company.

Our Future Leaders Mentorship Programme was launched in 2018. It provides the foundation for establishing structured mentor/ mentee relationships aimed at skills transfer and accelerated career development. To date, 20 candidates from the CYLP have been matched and assigned to members of senior leadership as mentors across the organisation.

We continue to develop the leadership succession pool and have put in place strategies to attract, motivate and retain a skilled workforce through fair, responsible, transparent and competitive remuneration. The attraction and retention of suitable local candidates to replace expatriates are done through labour planning processes, recruitment from the local market, and bursar and graduate trainee schemes. The group talent and succession management processes, and training and development processes at all of our operations ensures we address localisation across our global footprint.

Diversity and inclusion

Regional gender assessments were conducted globally to provide added impetus to our drive to foster diversity across the business. These informed the Diversity and Inclusion Framework, the 10 key pillars of which guide managers on how to achieve a truly diverse workforce. The aim is to build a workforce free of inequality and to go beyond what is required by legislation.

Indicative of the commitment from leadership, the Social, Ethics and Sustainability Committee of the board sponsors diversity and inclusion initiatives, with the current focus being on gender equality globally. This entails understanding regional legislation, the needs of women and the barriers that prevent many from joining and actively participating in mining across our global footprint.

In a move to achieve diversity, we are introducing unconscious bias awareness training. The company’s leadership teams have started the process, which will then be rolled out across the business. We have also launched a Global Women’s Forum allowing for discussion around gender issues.

In Australia, AngloGold Ashanti participated in the Perth Gay Pride march, and in Brazil we set up a diversity committee to work with the country’s legislation that aims to support people with disabilities. AngloGold Ashanti supports the international campaign for 16 Days of Activism against Gender-based Violence, encouraging staff to sign up and support the He4She movement, an initiative of UN Women.

Employee relations

In the field of employee relations, we work with partners both in and outside the company, building positive relations through engagement. More than 90% of our employees are trade union members and we are committed to engagement with our employees’ organised labour representatives.

Also in Ghana, at Iduapriem, we work with two trade unions with which we have positive relations and the same can be said for our work with two unions at our Geita mine in Tanzania.

At our Siguiri operation in Guinea, we worked to reset the relationships with the local union there, establishing clearer boundaries around areas of responsibility, following illegal strike action by some workers from 15 May to 3 June. At Sadiola, from 11 to 13 September, there was a national strike initiated by the National Union Federation. In South Africa, there was an unprotected strike at Mponeng on 16 August and an unprotected strike at Mine Waste Solutions on 15 October.