How to Get a Foot in the Door of the Mining Industry.............

Breaking into the Mining Industry… one subscriber's experience.

We’ve had a lot of questions over the last few months about how to get into the Mining Industry and in particular Mining Operator roles. One of our subscribers has kindly provided us with his experience, which we hope gives you valuable tips and some insight into getting a foot in the door.

Steve had been working in Perth, WA for a number of years, in various jobs and industries and his last, approx, 8 years spent as a Courier Driver for Australian Air Express and then a Business Manager for a Wine and Spirits Company.

Steve wanted to get into the mining industry and he applied for “Dump Truck Operator” roles with three of the main Mining Companies and one Mining Contractor. Steve applied to all four companies at the same time, all as Dump Truck Operator, and he had NO EXPERIENCE. They all said there would be positions coming up and told him to keep in touch. After a few months and regular follow up calls from Steve, three of the companies advised that, actually, with no experience, they would no longer look at his application and he wouldn’t be considered further. So he put all his job search efforts into one of the companies - FMG.

He kept himself updated with what was going on with their recruitment and made regular contact with someone in recruitment. 22 months after his first application and contact with them, FMG had vacancies and would consider candidates with NO Experience. He was called to ask if he was still interested in coming in for an interview for a Dump Truck Operator role and the recruitment process started.

After a number of processes – interviews, medicals etc - Steve was put through the Richards Mining Services training – something, Steve said, FMG do with all it’s new employees, regardless of their experience. For a week, two days were spent at a local quarry, with an opportunity to use CAT 777D, Grader, IT Loader, Dozer and Excavator, then three days were spent in a Training Room, learning about FMG's approach to mining at Cloudbreak.

We asked Steve, what tips he would give others who are trying to get a foot in the door, and he said - “My honest opinion, it’s not what you know it’s who you know! (Get to know someone already in the industry to refer you; it will save you a lot of time)". He also said, "you’d be surprised at the amount of employees that don’t last very long, regardless of experience".

From a company's point of view, internal referrals are one of the preferred options for sourcing candidates, but whether they get past first base of the recruitment process,is based on what they know, or more importantly, what they have experienced. When companies open up positions to candidates with no experience, they assess thoroughly, whether the person will be able to withstand some of the hardships of working in the environment and explore this by looking at:

1. Have they experienced similar working conditions in any of their previous jobs – working in a remote
location, shift work, working in extreme temperatures, the physical demands of the work etc etc?

2. They explore the candidate’s behaviour, assessing their actions in situations that would be situations
they will face if they were employed; on the basis that past behaviour will predict future behaviour and
there will be a STRONG emphasis on SAFETY.

So for Steve, it took 22 months from application to interview – for jobs that didn’t require experience to become available. During that time he maintained contact with Recruitment and he was able to demonstrate that he could withstand some of the working conditions – ie shift work and six years as a courier driver would have advantaged him. These attributes would have been why he got the first interview, and then it was up to his performance in the numerous assessments they conducted as part of their recruitment process.

Thanks Steve, for the time you have taken to answer the questions for this blog and for those who are looking at getting a foot in the door. We have loads of information in our Inside Guide to also help you get started.