Departing Tenke Fungurume Mining

Well, it was all over very quickly, after just 8 months it unraveled like a train wreck. To be honest, I was glad to be out as the new management was anything but professional.

This was not new to Africa, Chinese interests were purchasing existing mining operations propped up by government funding without having the knowledge and skills to manage these operations. I can comprehend their base strategy of backward integration but you need to have a plan after buying in.

They would terminate the existing management and workforce, spruik about their superior management skills whilst running the operation into the ground. They would then import low wage and low skilled workers in and totally bugger it up.

Even the managers were clueless, they had no idea apart from their own self-inflated ideals of superiority and would then blame every person and every failure on the mistakes of the former management. Cheap low-skilled workers generally exhibit minimal productivity, this was certainly the case at TFM.

At no stage did they ever take responsibility for their own actions, the blame culture inhibited any innovation whatsoever or free thought. But I'm ok, after the Chinese influx of workers, I was in no mood to stay, I had already begun to search for work and secured a position on an upcoming project - I just had to wait for the project kick-off later in the year.

The new management told premeditated lies and created distrust, teamwork and collaboration immediately evaporated - there was no incentive to perform. A culture of laziness abounded by a lack of leadership and accountability, the national workforce saw the lazy managers and staff immediately deciding to emulate their lack of effort and application.

Developing and sustaining a values driven culture was what made Tenke Fungurume Mining a valuable asset. The new Chinese management destroyed the corporate culture in a matter of months, terminated (without compensation) the contracts of the expats and begun demobilising efficient leaders and replacing them with low quality profit squanders.

Then they scratched their heads when productivity rapidly declined, costs soared despite undertaking an aggressive cost-cutting program and revenue and profits plummeted. How do I know all this? As the Maintenance Training Coordinator, I was developing the core competence of the maintenance workforce and I directly viewed the decline of machine availability.

But here is the best part, instead of searching for the brightest minds and most efficient workers they just imported more low-skilled workers from China displacing the highest performing national Congolese workers until the whole knowledge base was destroyed.

It is difficult to operate a mechanised mine when all the machines are broken down and inoperable and that is exactly what happened. This is interesting to watch unfold, as we all transition to new employment, we are in contact with the nationals who remained and they are pretty unhappy how the new culture of undermining and distrust has arisen.