I became interested in digitizing the mining sector in my second year as an engagement manager, right after I rejoined the firm following an education sabbatical to pursue the Sloan master’s in leadership and strategy at London Business School. My heart was still connected to McKinsey because of the exciting work I did with remarkable colleagues and clients. I chose to rejoin in Indonesia because it is at the forefront of so much innovation across sectors.
My most memorable experience so far has been leading a digital transformation for a mineral company, during which I applied my digital experience and my passion for people. The project was complex, requiring change management and capability building. What made it so exciting was that we were able to extract the maximum potential out of the mine’s assets with minimal waste—all by leveraging the latest digital tools, an effective process management system, and people interventions, such as developing change management apps which allow employee engagement at a massive scale.
When I arrived at the mine, I could barely get an internet connection and most of its operations were manual. We developed mobile applications, a drone-led mine survey process, performance management dashboards and digital fuel management systems. We trained more than 1,000 people to use these tools. These innovations led to double-digit impact on profitability.
Subsequently, I used insights from this experience to transform other mines. My most useful revelation was about why digital for the sake of digital does not work. Digital transformations only work when they address a specific business need and their usage permeates into the workflow and habits of the people using them.
Through my work, I became friends with my team and my clients as we’ve spent hours together solving complex challenges. By making resource-intensive sectors like mining more efficient, I am also helping the environment and protecting the livelihoods of workers and their families, making a fundamental difference in the economy and world in which we live.