Training and development

At Exxaro, we believe in empowering all staff with the knowledge and skills they need to help us grow the company, but also to develop personally. In 2009, Exxaro employees have successfully completed more than 8 200 different training courses, specialist and development programmes. Exxaro’s policy is to invest an appropriate amount of total payroll each year on human resource development. In 2009, this was 5% (excluding the 1% skills levy) or an investment of
R125,6 million.

Through Exxaro’s human resource development policy, we aim to:

Develop and sustain core competencies and maximise human resources to meet the group’s strategic objectives and improve operational performance
Create a learning culture by assisting and facilitating the process in which employees and their dependants take responsibility for improving their own educational and competency levels, to the mutual benefit of the individual and the organisation
Ensure integration and uniformity in all learning and development processes by leveraging technologies
Support and reinforce our values through various learning and development initiatives
Ensure learning and development initiatives are career-focused and aligned with business objectives
Establish life-long learning as the major thrust of learning and development.

In 2009, Exxaro continued its broader focus on skills development. Where our primary focus was traditionally on engineering learnerships, our skills development objective has broadened to include other learnerships and especially skills programmes, while steadily increasing the number of engineering learnerships.

During the year, e-learning was implemented at Arnot, Matla, North Block Complex, New Clydesdale, Inyanda and Namakwa Sands, while existing systems were upgraded at remaining Exxaro business units.

In 2009, on average, 519 engineering learners were registered and trained at the Colliery Training Centre in Witbank and Grootegeluk’s Grovos training centre. Grovos has become a national trade test centre, where members of the public can complete any trade test.

To put this contribution into perspective, Exxaro alone constitutes more than 25% of all engineering learnerships registered with the MQA. Exxaro’s training in engineering learnerships will lead to full artisan status in trades such as electrician, fitter, plater, diesel mechanic and millwright. Artisans are considered scarce and critical skills in South Africa and all these trades appear on the country’s scarce skills list.

The number of other learnerships and skills programmes has also increased significantly in recent years, peaking towards the end of 2009. By then, there were 33 people registered in mining learnerships, 51 in plant learnerships/bursars and 88 in administrative/services learnerships. When combined with engineering learnerships, this brought the total number of learners in learnerships/skills programmes to 691.

Exxaro’s human resources development professionals continue to contribute significantly to the national and sectoral transformation process through membership and participation in bodies such as Business Unity South Africa, Chamber of Mines’ education advisory committee, the MQA sector skills planning committee and standards-generating bodies of the MQA.

Training to assist employees in managing career endings is part of the social and labour plan for each mine, submitted to and monitored by the Department of Mineral Resources as part of the process of renewing mining licences for each mine. In these plans, Exxaro included a five-year engineering learnership plan for 2007 to 2011.

In monitoring our artisan retention strategy, the ratio of learnerships in the pipeline to the number of artisans employed in various trades is reported to Exxaro’s executive committee each month.

The impact of skills retention and availability on current production and future growth is one we keenly understand. To retain technical and engineering competence in the group, aggressive retention and succession-planning strategies are in place for technical categories, among others. We also regularly benchmark remuneration, provide comprehensive training and identify growth opportunities at every level. This includes continuously rotating and exposing our own talent to multidisciplinary project teams.

All non-bargaining unit employees receive formal performance and career development reviews bi-annually. All management members are assessed throughout the year as the basis for individual succession programmes and talent management. These assessments are also linked to reward and remuneration.

Employees in the bargaining unit are not part of Exxaro’s formal performance management system; their development is driven by individual development plans derived from an employee’s job profile, formal career plan and individual preference. The performance management process is entrenched in the culture of Exxaro.

All new management and specialist category employees receive formal training on the performance management process and system to reinforce the concept that reward is driven by performance. Performance management is also included in a web-based induction programme.

All training and development is based on a thorough needs analysis, taking cognisance of business strategy, identified skills deficiencies via the performance management process, succession planning requirements, employee career progress, and the relevant employment equity plans.

Personal development emphasises the joint responsibility of employees to manage their career growth. Accordingly, Exxaro provides financial assistance to permanent employees with potential to further their education through part-time studies of certain recognised, approved courses and programmes. Employees nominated by the company to attend courses or programmes are fully sponsored for tuition, examinations, travel, accommodation costs and study leave.

Specific strategies to ensure the accelerated learning and development of black people, women and people with disabilities include:

Fast-tracking employees with leadership and management potential
Accelerated development for occupation-based skills
Adult basic education
Life skills programmes
Learnerships.

Skills development

Skills development spend


Description	Spent
Total leviable amount (payroll)	R2 553 904 649
Total training spend	R125 659 658
Total training spend on black people	R89 154 622
Total training spend on black women	R11 320 652
Total training spend on white women	R9 211 650

Description	Number of learners on programmes
Black people	312
Black women	45
White women	1
Black disabled people	2
Black disabled women	1

Career development

Exxaro’s strategy is to ensure 80% of all new appointments are made internally. We therefore have an integrated process that is aligned with both our strategy and industry needs to provide a steady flow of qualified talent to tackle our growth and expansion projects. In 2009, there were some 252 trainees involved in programmes supporting internal advancement. The overarching objective is to ensure that trainees entering the group are empowered, challenged and appropriately rewarded:

Exxaro People Development Initiative:
The Exxaro Foundation sponsors 25 previously disadvantaged students each year for a 12-month bridging course at the University of Pretoria. Candidates must be grade 12 students from Exxaro mining communities who want to study for a mining-related degree or diploma. On completing their studies, candidates may be considered for an Exxaro bursary
Bursary programme:
2009 to school leavers interested in mining-related disciplines such as engineering, geology and mine surveying. Graduates are generally offered employment at Exxaro, depending on the current need in that field, mostly through the group’s formal three-year professionals-in-training programme. There are currently 145 bursars studying at South African institutions at a cost of R10 million: more than two-thirds are historically disadvantaged South Africans and 26% are women
Professionals-in-training programme:
The three-year programme bridges the gap between academic theory and the work environment. Each professional-in-training has a mentor who supervises exposure to the various commodities, leadership and management training, and formal training from professional bodies. In 2009, there were 81 professionals in training throughout Exxaro in a R30-million programme: 77% are from designated groups and 26% of those are women

Communities of practice

Exxaro has communities of practice for effective development and sharing of knowledge, best practices and lessons across the group. The focus is primarily on core competencies required for Exxaro’s sustainability. In practice, these communities have lowered the risk of losing key knowledge workers, and brought new people up to speed more rapidly.

Leadership development

Exxaro has ongoing formal leadership development initiatives, mentorship programmes and succession-planning workshops involving senior management and employees. Building and retaining a pool of current and future leaders is a priority for the group and appropriate initiatives include a comprehensive succession-planning process and enhancing strategic leadership competencies.

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