Quarry Southern Africa January 2018 | Page 34

ENVIRONMENT IN FOCUS Managing the non-event Alan Cluett and Colleen Cluett Throughout our year, we conduct up to 100 Environmental Management System audits across the South African surface mining industry through Aspasa About Face. We audit well-resourced group operations with both environmental and legal departments, and access to generous environmental budgets, as well as independent surface mines that may have a single environmental or HSE officer, or where the responsibility for environmental management falls to the manager. However, we recognise that budgets, head office resources and legal departments are a bonus, but are not an essential resource for success at an operation in environmental management. Rather, the consistent ‘success factor’ is the attitude of management. During the audits, we often make reference to a document entitled Managing the non-event 1 . Its message is for managers to have ‘problems that never have to be solved because they are prevented from occurring’ as opposed to having managers who ‘step in and counter the problem after it happens’. Managing the non-event The most elegant forms of managerial decisions involve problems that never have to be solved because they are prevented from occurring; they are anticipated and side stepped. Oddly, there is greater appreciation for the manager who can step in and counter the problem after it happens than one who can make it not happen. Coping is visible and dramatic. Prevention is unpopular, because it usually means changing something that is not yet failing; it is thankless, because the only testimony of its effectiveness is a non-event. Even so, the deliberate non-catastrophe is one of the most impressive contributions a manager can make. Successful managers are pro-active. They show commitment, act with consideration, are consistent in their implementation of policies or programmes and hold people accountable, especially themselves. These managers lead and empower a responsive team of informed employees, who act as the executors of the systems and contribute to their development and improvement. This is true at both the micro scale of the 1 Arend Hoogervorst, a leading South African and international consultant, provided Alan Cluett with a copy of this in the late 1990s. The original author is believed to be James Martin. 32 _ QUARRY SA | JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2018 This is the first in a series of short articles on environmental management that will feature in Quarry Southern Africa, which are targeted at operational management as well as CEOs, directors and shareholders of surface mining companies. Alan Cluett Colleen Cluett operation and the macro scale of the company or group. Through pro-active management we not only contribute to society and future generations, we also reduce our legal and financial liabilities, improve our company’s bottom line, increase employee morale and the image of the company. Examples of this are the planning and optimal use of resources, meeting legal requirements, avoiding, or where that is not possible, minimising our impact and continually improve our environmental performance. Therefore, it is as much the CEO’s responsibility as the site manager’s to be accountable for and promote environmental stewardship. The document Managing the non-event states that ‘prevention is unpopular, because it usually means changing something that is not yet failing; it is thankless, because the only testimony of its effectiveness is a non-event’. It is a sentiment that holds true today. We see examples of managers being praised for visibly coping with problems, while others aren’t congratulated for preventing the them in the first place. Fortunately, these attitudes are changing. Pro-active management or those that ‘manage the non-event’ have happier, more fulfilled staff who work in conditions that are safer for them and for society at large. Therefore, the deliberate prevention of crises should be recognised as one of the most impressive contributions a manager can make. ABOUT THE AUTHORS Cluett Consulting offers services specialist environmental and mining- related services to the surface mining industry. Alan and Colleen Cluett have a combined experience in the surface mining industry of more than 40 years. For more information, visit: www.cluett.co.za.