A 2013 report published by the Mining Industry Human Resources Council projects the industry will need to hire 145,000 people in the next 10 years; more than half of its current workforce will have to be replaced. And the report notes that, if the industry expands more than expected, the actual number of new hires could be nearly 200,000 in an era when Canada’s population is aging and many Canadians are retiring.
Bright minds in HR have, of course, developed strategies and tactics in response to the situation. They’re trying to keep retirement-age workers. They’re recommending the placement of foreign workers. They’re recruiting from under-tapped sections of Canadian society – for example, First Nations.
Another part of the solution is to make mine camps more attractive by installing more of the urban comforts to which many of us have grown accustomed: truly good food, private bathrooms, big-screen televisions, cable/satellite TV channels, sophisticated fitness centres, high-speed Internet, etc.
Such “extras” aren’t really extras at all to the typical Canadian worker. They have, in fact, become an expected part of living in our affluent country. And when you’re away from loved ones and the neighbourhood Tim Hortons for weeks and months at a time, a few urban comforts can make the experience much more bearable. Having those comforts at the mine camp could be the difference between “Yes” and “No way!” when a job is offered.
'Hotelier Mindset’
PTI Group, a subsidiary of Texas-based Oil States International, has become a leader in creating comfortable workforce accommodations. Out of facilities in Edmonton, PTI designed and manufactured 120,000 square feet of living space for 400 workers at De Beers Canada’s Snap Lake diamond mine in the Northwest Territories, and then installed it on-site.Designed with (according to PTI’s website) “a hotelier mindset,” the Snap Lake project included 400 private bedrooms in three-storey dormitories, as well as a two-storey structure containing recreation facilities, dining space, a training centre, a TV area and more.
“High-end” comforts are at the core of the accommodations that ATCO Structures & Logistics (ATCO S&L) has contracted to install at BHP Billiton’s Jansen potash project near Lanigan, Saskatchewan. It includes a 20,000-sq.-ft. sports complex with a gymnasium, weight room, raised running track, golf simulator and squash courts. There’s also a separate pre-engineered building to house a movie theatre.
The core building has a 1,200-person dining room and a separate private dining area, as well as a lounge, library, convenience store, medical centre and full laundry service. Living quarters feature bedrooms with private washrooms. Each room includes TV, phone and wireless Internet capabilities.
“A contract to build a mining accommodation of this scope and scale reinforces our long-standing reputation for having the capacity to deliver a large and comfortable workforce housing lodge,” ATCO S&L Chief Operating Officer Harry Wilmot said when the contract, which includes operating the facilities, was announced in 2012.
“Generally, the industry has asked for more of the creature comforts of home or what would be found at any hotel in an urban centre inside their accommodations,” Craig Alloway, ATCO S&L’s Vice President of Sales – North America, remarks from Calgary. “Generally the industry is moving toward what you refer to as posh accommodations. Typically a scenario where everyone gets his own washroom is probably the biggest differentiator from things that happened even as little as five years ago.”
With Satellite TV
“It’s not like the Hilton, but it’s closer than you’d expect” is how Haveman Brothers’ website describes the experience of staying at one of the Ontario company’s remote exploration camps. Features at a Haveman Brothers “turnkey remote camp solution” include indoor plumbing, phone and Internet access with WiFi, satellite TV, full bedrooms and dining areas. The firm pledges “four-season, super-insulated structures” that handle cold winters better than “your typical prospector tent.”Haveman Brothers’ Muketei camp, about five kilometres from Noront Resources’ Eagle’s Nest project in the Ring of Fire region, responds to the mining sector’s need to appeal to potential recruits with living comforts. “They do ask for the flush toilets and Internet and all that, because they want their people to be more comfortable so they can attract better employees,” President Dave Haveman says from his office near Thunder Bay.
Winnipeg-based Expeditorsplus Incorporated has facilitated a “home away from home” feel for a Hudbay Minerals camp in northern Manitoba, says Expeditorsplus Vice President Jason White.
Originally a firm servicing fly-in fishing and hunting lodges, Expeditorsplus branched out into logistics for mining and mineral exploration camps “seven or eight years ago,” White says. “It’s an interesting industry to be in. It’s such a unique kind of niche industry.”
For the minerals sector they provide staffing, supplies, catering, housekeeping and other ingredients for operating a remote camp. The Hudbay camp includes TV, Internet and phone service, and every room has a TV with DVD player, White says.
First Nation-owned Athabasca Catering provides housekeeping and janitorial services, camp supply and management and (of course) catering to uranium mining giant Cameco and others in northern Saskatchewan. Its Manager of Business Development and Marketing, Kevin Danchuk, says seeing that employers are comfortable has become “pretty critical” to mining and exploration companies.
“They know that when you’re working in isolated areas with long hours, the food and services are very important,” he remarks from Saskatoon. “We’ve been servicing Cameco for 20 years already. The parameters of the contract have changed over the years. There’s more emphasis on the quality of food and healthy options. Certainly expanding the options is important.”
Danchuk also observes that recreational offerings have changed over the years. There are more exercise rooms with wider assortments of equipment. There are golf simulators, weight rooms and aerobics spaces where once the rec options tended to the more sedentary or prosaic.
Danchuk opines that a good gym isn’t easily accommodated by your typical modular structure, but ATCO’s Alloway points out that the Calgary-headquartered company has made vibrant exercise spaces for its clients. “We provide numerous facilities using modular box construction for fitness areas. Typically if they want a gymnasium or a court-style fitness area, those facilities require a different building technology other than wood-framed modular construction,” he says, adding ATCO provides all those building solutions.
Alloway says ATCO has been “an innovator in terms of using multiple construction strategies. … We’ll assemble multiple boxes together to create a building. We’ll also use pre-engineered building technologies to build a gymnasium or movie theatre or assembly space. We’ll also use soft-wall structures – with high-tension fabrics – to use as a facility inside a camp as well.
“We’ll match whatever our customer’s requirements are,” he states. “We can accommodate the poshest of living circumstances, or we can manage around a budget if that’s their driver.”
A nice place to hang one’s hat, a chance to surf the web and check for email, a place to practice the ol’ golf swing … add a Tims double-double and doughnut, and it sounds like home.
