Leaders improving skills at Corumbá

In a country as big and diverse as Brazil, being named recently as one of the 100 Great Places to Work says that Rio Tinto Iron Ore must being doing something right when it comes to running its Corumbá operations.

The Corumbá mine is located in the Pantanal region of Brazil near the Bolivian border and north of Paraguay. It's pretty remote, taking 14 days to ship iron ore downriver to the nearest seaport in Argentina.

It can't be easy to make the mine one of nation's great places to work when it's competing against companies in exciting cities like Rio de Janeiro.

However, a Rio Tinto Brazil programme called Professional 2010 is making a difference by helping employees enhance their personal and professional abilities to meet the company's future challenges. This unique programme involves everyone, especially the leaders in the organisation, who are getting involved in non-work related activities from dancing to origami as a way of testing different skills.

Communications Manager Sergio M. Visconti explains that Professional 2010 is important because the Brazilian operations have major growth projects either underway or on the drawing board, and it will require everyone's improved skills to ensure they are successful.

"The projects include the expansion of our mine operations and the development of a brand-new steel-making centre in Corumbá, which will help transform the local and regional economy," says Sergio.

Sergio says a comprehensive Leadership Development Programme is a key part of Professional 2010. It is helping key executives lead their teams to success and has been underway in the mine operations since April.

"Leaders in organisations throughout the world face similar situations every day and this programme gives our people the skills to deal with them. It helps them address important issues like: How do I energise my team? How do I make people understand the need to meet deadlines? How do I assign jobs and get quick results?"

The programme focuses on developing 10 types of leadership, from 'energising leadership' - influencing people and teams to ensure a good organisational atmosphere - through to 'socially sustainable leadership' - acting ethically and taking into consideration the social, economic, and environmental consequences of decisions.

Each leader's strengths and weaknesses have been identified and they are now improving their individual skills through a wide range of practical activities that even include teaching colleagues to dance, movie sessions and learning origami. Teaching dance may not sound relevant but it tests leaders' ability to involve employees in a learning process, known as 'transforming leadership', while origami tests their understanding of complex activities, which is known as 'systemic leadership'.

Sergio says leaders' partners were invited to participate in many company activities so as to help them understand what happens at work and what level of activity their partners are required to perform in the workplace. He says it also gives the company a better insight into the home life of individuals.

It seems the benefits of improved leadership are starting to flow through the company. Not only did the Great Place to Work Institute provide its recent recognition, but Corumbá also won the Industries National Confederation Work Quality Award at both state and regional levels.

While these achievements are important, the success of Professional 2010 and its Leadership Development Programme will ultimately be rated by measuring improvements to the 'work atmosphere' within the Corumbá operations, improvements in productivity and the successful delivery of growth projects.