Building strong relationships with diverse stakeholders is essential for smooth and successful mining operations and begins with effective engagement. Today, teams must continuously manage their relationships with government agencies, investors, and local communities, a responsibility that can quickly become overwhelming. This challenge is further complicated by the varying stakeholder expectations that need to be met. Successfully navigating stakeholder engagement in mining demands a strong commitment to transparency and accountability; without these, misunderstandings, diminished trust, resistance, or even costly legal issues may arise.
How important is stakeholder engagement in mining?
As the North American mining industry continues to evolve, so do regulations pertaining to sustainable development and environmental protection. Thus, mining companies must execute projects responsibly and collaboratively with Tribal Nations, Indigenous, and local communities (showing respect for the land and its people). When working in a complex industry like mining, fostering positive, long-lasting relationships is not only noble but also necessary to obtain a social license to operate, stimulate economic growth, advance reconciliation, and ensure mutually beneficial outcomes.
Today’s complex stakeholder engagement challenges call for a well-structured approach focused on building and maintaining positive relationships. In this article, we will explore the various stakeholders you may encounter in the mining industry, discuss communication challenges you might experience with them, and explain why mining companies should use Jambo Stakeholder Relationship Management (SRM) software to overcome them.
Who are the stakeholders that mining companies need to engage?
Stakeholders refer to any individual, group or company that is interested in, is affected by, or can influence a company’s operations. For the mining industry, stakeholders can include:
- Government and NGOs
- Shareholders and investors
- Local and Indigenous communities
- Environmental agencies and groups
- Suppliers and customers
- Other mining companies
- Internal stakeholders such as employees, management, and executives
What are the five major stakeholder engagement challenges faced by mining companies?
1. Information overload and scattered data
Effective management of vast stakeholder data is a common operational challenge for mining companies. It’s common for mining teams to rely on disparate spreadsheets, email correspondences, handwritten notes, and individual record-keeping methods when working on engagement projects. This creates silos of information that can hamper the ability to:
- Retrieve complete records of past engagements
- Prevent duplication of work or keep a consistent key message to stakeholders
- Track concerns, commitments, and ensure follow-ups
- Respond on time to regulatory requirements or requests for information
- Provide accurate project progress reports
2. Ineffective stakeholder engagement processes
When teams engage with multiple stakeholders, it often involves several points of contact across the company. Without a centralized information system, individuals are responsible for manually recording each interaction. Relying on scattered tracking methods increases the risk of human error and inconsistent, incomplete, or inaccurate reporting. Consequently, stakeholders may be asked the same questions repeatedly, or their concerns might go unaddressed, leading to stakeholder fatigue and a loss of trust.
3. Complex and diverse stakeholder needs
Mining companies usually engage with stakeholders with diverse needs, interests, priorities, and degrees of influence over projects. Balancing varied and often competing expectations can present significant challenges. For instance, Indigenous communities and Tribal Nations prioritize their rights, benefit-sharing, the preservation of traditional knowledge, and environmental stewardship, which may be very different from the needs of local communities that may be focused on things like economic opportunities and social impacts.
4. Evolving social expectations and rising activism
More than ever, mining companies operate in an era of heightened social expectations and radical activism. Stakeholders demand more meaningful participation, demonstrations of environmental stewardship, and the delivery of shared benefits. Mining companies must remain vigilant to these expectations, adapting engagement practices to proactively and transparently address concerns to maintain their social license to operate.
5. Regulatory and compliance risks
North American states and provinces face complex and evolving regulations for conducting comprehensive and well-documented stakeholder consultations (particularly with Indigenous communities and Tribal Nations). Without the ability to show engagement activities that occurred, there is a high risk of projects not getting approved, costly fines, and possible legal action that can cause significant delays and disruptions.
How Jambo Stakeholder Relationship Management (SRM) software promotes positive stakeholder relations for mining companies
Specific to mining operations, companies are tasked with navigating complex decisions around resource extraction, environmental stewardship, social responsibility, and meaningful engagement with Indigenous and Tribal Nations and local communities. Engagement can include hundreds or even thousands of communications that need to be recorded and can generate numerous concerns and issues that must be documented and addressed to minimize the risk of escalation.
About Jambo SRM
Jambo is secure stakeholder relationship management software designed to streamline and simplify stakeholder engagement for organizations and governments. It makes it easy to log, manage, and report on engagement data such as stakeholder communications, concerns, and commitments in one place. Unlike traditional CRMs and spreadsheets, Jambo was specifically designed to address the unique challenges of stakeholder engagement data management.
- An easy-to-use interface. Jambo provides a secure and straightforward way for team members to process stakeholder engagement data: log, manage, and report. Team members can easily do this through the user-friendly interface, which stores and updates data immediately and synchronizes it into one system.
- A centralized, secure system. Jambo encourages collaboration and makes it easy to keep team members informed of stakeholder engagement and project progress. Using Jambo helps break down information silos and remove the chance of data gaps or inaccuracies.
- Keeps teams accountable. Jambo has task management features that allow teams to set reminders to meet their commitments, e.g., fulfill promises made to stakeholders. Jambo also has features to log and address feedback and concerns and pinpoint potential issues or points of friction.
- Simplified reporting and insights. Jambo makes reporting simple, as teams can compile summary reports or more comprehensive reports on all data in seconds using pre-built templates. Jambo Insights allows users to access features like analytics and custom dashboards to gain valuable insights into their stakeholder engagement data. Users can create, save, and share new dashboards for different purposes, helping teams get organized. Using Jambo Analytics, teams can monitor key performance indicators and keep on top of project progress.
What is the pathway to overcoming stakeholder engagement challenges in mining?
Leading mining companies are moving toward adopting innovative digital solutions like Jambo SRM to streamline their stakeholder relationship management and address stakeholder engagement challenges. By using Jambo, teams gain value at all stages of their project lifecycles and reduce pain points and friction along the way. Jambo is the way to minimize risk and get teams working more efficiently and cohesively.
Extra benefits of Jambo
The Jambo team is committed to providing exceptional support through its dedicated customer support team of stakeholder engagement experts, who offer seamless onboarding and ongoing support. This ensures that users have a smooth transition to using Jambo and can maximize its benefits for the most effective outcomes throughout their subscription.
If you can relate to these stakeholder engagement challenges and think your company would benefit from a software made for stakeholder relationship management, watch this 1-minute video and sign up for a demo of Jambo today.