Mine monitoring or control (Part 3) – Staffing the control room

In Part 1 of this series, the benefit of having high-calibre personnel to staff a control room was discussed. In particular, as a pre-requisite to achieving ‘control’ rather than be limited to monitoring only. 

Part 2 of this series discussed the support staffing required for success in ‘Mine monitoring and control’ (MMC). 

This Part 3 article returns to the subject of the frontline control room personnel, variously known as controllers, dispatchers, coordinators or control room operators. For the purpose of this article the term ‘controllers’ will be used. The author has written on the organisational structure of control room personnel before but felt that it is worth revisiting as the perception of MMC has changed over the last 10+ years and new processes have been enabled by advances in technology. These include:

• emergence of integrated remote operations centres (iROCs)
• improved coverage and capacity of digital communications (both cabled and wireless)
• increased amount of detailed data logged electronically (still dependent upon digital communications).
• large screens as a feedback mechanism
• mobile devices both handheld and vehicle mounted
• remote controlled and autonomous mining vehicles.

It is a rather a ’chicken and egg‘ situation when discussing the required calibre of controllers against their place in an organisational structure. Factors to be considered when designing an organisational structure include:

• What authority level does the controller role have:
  • to make decisions?
  • to give instructions?
• Who does the controller report to?
• Where does the controller fit in the organisational structure?
• What are the career path considerations for controllers:
  • to become a controller?
  • promotion beyond being a controller?
• In contract situations, who is the controller’s employer?

An anecdote

A senior manager with an open pit mining contractor was responsible for mine control/dispatch systems from three different suppliers at three different operations. When asked which system gave the biggest benefits, his response was:

“It doesn’t matter which system we use, the thing that gives us benefits is the calibre of the person we put in the control room.”

To attract the required calibre of personnel with the necessary operations experience to work as controllers requires that their position within the organisational structure is commensurate with their capabilities, responsibilities and authority.

Various staffing models have been encountered over time, listed below, where the controller positions are regarded as either:

• the most senior supervisor on crew
• of equal status to field supervisors
• subordinate to a more senior supervisor in the field
• a mandatory step in career path toward either a:
  • supervisor/shifter position
  • foreperson/shift captain position
• equivalent status to an equipment operator with no formal authority
• fulfilling a clerical position to capture data.

A key question is therefore: where do our controllers fit into the overall structure of shift management hierarchy?

1. The most senior supervisor on crew

An underground mine experimented with rotating supervisors through mine control for repeated short duty periods. They discovered that some suited the role and others didn’t quite take to it. They eventually arrived at a situation where the ‘best’ supervisors took on permanent roles in mine control and were made the most senior and highest paid supervisor on the crew.

Other sites have used foreperson/shift captains in the controller role. In these situations the communication is largely between the controller foreperson and underground supervision.

An interesting case was observed by the author where mine control was located in a large room that also included the foreperson’s desks. The foreperson, rather than sit at their desks, gravitated to standing with the controllers and effectively took over the ’control’ portion of the role.

2. Of equal status to field supervisors

A second model is where the controllers are supervisors of equal standing with supervisors in the field. This approach generally doesn’t happen in situations where the controller position is permanent. However, it does however become a powerful option when the concept of rotating field supervisors through the controller role is introduced.

At this point it is appropriate to introduce a common perception that a permanent controller position can become a career dead end. Supervisors with the desirable skills to be controllers will resist being transferred into the controller role as they fear that they will be stuck there for the rest of their career.

Australian open pit mine control installations tend to use dedicated controllers, but this does not always have to be the case. The copper mines of Arizona, New Mexico and Utah and the gold operations in Nevada tend to have mine control (or dispatch) as part of the supervisor’s (shifter’s) role with various forms of rotation used within the supervisors on a crew.

This strategy to rotate field supervisors in and out of mine control would go some way to mitigating the ‘career dead end’ perception and attract high-calibre supervisors as controllers. There are a number of different regimes that have been seen including:

• supervisors swapping informally within a shift, with at least one supervisor in the control room at all times
• supervisors working a short rotation in mine control, typically three days or sometimes longer, before returning to field duties.

Rotating supervisors through the Controller role is often combined with having a secondary control room role, one that focuses more on systems and data, supporting the primary controller.

These types of rotations are dependent upon the supervisors being able to easily rotate between mine control and the field. Obviously this is not available in the case of Remote Operations Centres (ROCs).

Consider the possibility of using supervisors working one week on site as a field supervisor, followed by one week in an ROC as a controller. This would be followed by a period of rest and relaxation. This would mean that the supervisor as a controller in the ROC would have recent familiarity with the site and, importantly, relationships with the site personnel.

3. Subordinate to a more senior supervisor in the field

The idea of having controllers with some authority but subordinate to field supervisors is a reasonably common model in Australian open pits. Typically individuals come to the role of a controller from being equipment operators or, in some cases, a clerical administrative background. Selection of personnel is largely due to their ability and personality characteristics that are advantageous in the role.

The author has worked at an open pit site, using a leading dispatch system, where the controller’s formal title was ‘mine control supervisors’. They reported to the supervisors in the field and had a number of authorities which were well socialised, including directing people and equipment. In particular, they could issue written warnings, which helped sustain the quality of the mine control process.

4. A mandatory step in career path

A model that works extremely well is to make a minimum period, typically a year, in mine control a mandatory step in a career path.

There are many supervisors who spent time as a controller before becoming a supervisor. Often the model is applied informally, and it is common for a controller go on to become a supervisor. Some sites have formally made time in mine control a prerequisite to becoming a supervisor.

The career path option mitigates the ‘career dead-end’ perception of the role.

One general manager suggested that mine controller should be a promotion from supervisor and become a prerequisite for promotion to foreperson/shift captain.

5. Equivalent status to an equipment operator with no formal authority

By having the controller role without any formal supervisory authority compromises the opportunity for ‘control’ to occur. 

Another anecdote

At a large underground mine one of the control room positions was a maintenance controller. One particular shift, when an experienced underground mechanic was filling the role, the author observed the controller give an instruction by radio to an underground mechanic. There was an immediate response from underground that ‘you can’t tell me what to do!’.

Examples like this highlight the need for controller roles to have formal authority.

There are many sites where controllers are drawn from the workforce and do have operations knowledge. When they aspire to the controller role and have the desired interpersonal supervisory skills, a good degree of control can occur; however, this is not formal authority.

Something that masks this shortcoming is a perception that the controllers are operating a computer system, not running the mine. Instructions coming from the control process are seen as originating from the system rather than the controller as a person. Open pit optimised truck dispatch assignments are the most common example.

6. Fulfilling a clerical position to capture data 

Sadly, mine control is too often perceived by mine management as simply a mechanism for collecting data and is staffed accordingly.  In some cases the controller role is labeled as a ‘recorder’ or ‘tally clerk’. Personnel selected for the role are seen to require clerical/administrative skills, not necessarily mining knowledge or supervisory skills.

A particularly flawed manifestation of this model frequently occurs where the mine is operated by a contractor and mine control is staffed by the mine owner personnel. Mine control exists solely to capture data for the mine owner’s purposes, such as grade control, planning, etc. Most concerning is the use of mine control data to ‘manage’ the contractor. As contractor personnel, and equipment, are the primary source of data for the control room, this leads to a high degree of ‘gaming the system’. 

Another anecdote

A mine owner, who utilised a contractor, established a mine control capability solely to capture data, particularly for grade control. The system selected interfaced to OEM data loggers on the mining equipment, which was owned and maintained by the contractor. A location technology was introduced that relied upon RFID tags throughout the underground operations to be installed and maintained by the contractor. A review to investigate why the data quality was not good identified that 50 per cent of the OEM data loggers had not been maintained in working order – many of the RFID tags had exceeded their battery life and were no longer working. 

This example highlights how in situations where the frontline operation is not getting benefits from the ‘control’ aspect of mine control, then the process will fail. 

Summary

The basic theme of this series of articles is that there are substantial benefits to operations in having a high quality MMC process, and that the most important factor in achieving success is the calibre of the controller. This article has discussed various ways the controller role can be built into the organisational structure of a shift management team ranging from the most senior supervisor on shift to subordinate junior supervisors.

One last anecdote highlights the value of having senior decision makers and authority staffing a mine control room. In this case the controller was a shift captain, the most senior supervisor on the shift:

During the early stage of development of a very large panel cave mine in northern Asia, an incident occurred where a fully laden water truck broke down and was unable to move thus blocking the Main Access Drive (MAD). This was very early in the development and routes for travel around the mine were extremely limited so this incident had the potential to disrupt the operation significantly.  

The senior role in mine control on that shift was occupied by a senior shift captain, very high-calibre and a highly respected individual across the operations workforce.

From the control room, in liaison with underground supervision, he was able to assess the situation, plan a solution to tow the water truck and relieve the situation. The plan involved identifying capable operators, the most suitable vehicle, both in capability and location, to carry out the tow, the route to be followed and the destination for the disabled water truck. The shift captain  then coordinated the personnel involved to carry out the recovery.

What happened in this case constitutes control. He had the knowledge and authority to take action to address an out of control situation and rectify it for the benefit of the entire operation.