In the first of a four-part series featuring EY Entrepreneur of the Year nominees, we spoke to Bill Beament about the extraordinary growth of Northern Star Resources.
In the first of a four-part series featuring EY Entrepreneur of the Year nominees, we spoke to Bill Beament about the extraordinary growth of Northern Star Resources.
At the start of this year, gold miner Northern Star Resources had about 100 employees and 100 contractors.
After the recent completion month of its fourth mine acquisition – Newmont’s Jundee gold mine – it has 1,200 direct employees and 500 contractors.
The company’s ambitious growth strategy brought out many doubters, however.
“We’ve had so many sceptics over the past six months,” Mr Beament told Business News.
“Have we acquired too many mines, have we bitten off more than we can chew?
“I think we put them all out of their misery when we put out a monthly update for May; we did 41,500 ounces for the month, well above our stated run rate.”
The company had been targeting production of 350,000oz in 2013-14 but is now expected to exceed that.
With the addition of Jundee, it is anticipating production of up 600,000oz next year.
Mr Beament, the Business News 40under40 First Amongst Equals winner in 2013, believes the key has been getting the new mines in tune with Northern Star’s way of doing things.
“We’ve done it by acquiring unloved, mismanaged assets and applying our skill set, increasing productivity, lowering costs and extending mine lives,” Mr Beament said.
“You need to enact change very quickly; at all the mines I’ve bought, I’ve never taken the general managers.”
He said the immediate changes were followed by broader reviews of senior management.
“If you don’t, the up-and-coming young people can’t come up through the system.”
Mr Beament said he, along with senior people at Northern Star, including directors, spoke to all of the staff at the newly acquired mines.
“It could only happen with the open arms of the incumbent workforce,” he said.
“The willingness of them to change and adopt what our company is doing has just been extraordinary.”
Early in his career, Mr Beament said, he was not a fan of workshops and strategy sessions, but after working with Carl Adams’ consulting group Momentum Partners for the past five years, he saw them as vital.
“I was never a fan because they were never conducted right; it’s like a performance appraisal, what you put in before it, you will take out 10 times when you deliver it,” he said.
Northern Star undertakes a strategy review every 12 months, and every six months if there is a big change in the business.
It enables all of the key people, including the board, to understand each other and take ownership of the strategy.
Mr Beament said a key part of the strategy was ensuring the board evolved as the company changed.
This process is under way at Northern Star, with early backers Peter Farris and Michael Fotios retiring as directors, and Mr Beament anticipated more changes ahead.
At a personal level, Mr Beament said while he was not the most innovative person, he was an ‘optimiser’.
“I always try to find the easiest way of doing things because I hate doing extra work for the sake of it, he said.
“And I hate making the same mistake twice … very rarely does it happen.”
Mr Beament is currently reaching out to experienced business people to act as mentors to help guide him through the next stage of Northern Star’s development.
“I take that really seriously and do a lot of mentoring myself,” he said.
“My first mentor was my dad; he instilled a really strong work ethic.
“You always outgrow mentors but you never forget them; I’ve still got my original mentors because they keep my feet on the ground, I do that deliberately.”
• Mr Beament is one of 12 western region nominees in EY’s Entrepreneur of the Year awards for 2014
