Matt Mullins kicked off a recent visit to Stellenbosch University with an open lecture on “How to be a successful Geo-preneur”. This well-attended lecture included examples from Matt’s 38 years of experience as a Resource Geologist; from diamonds in Canada to bauxite in Suriname, as well as copper in Chile, gold in South Africa, lead-zinc in China, and iron ore in Australia. Matt’s key career messages revolved around building a career underpinned by life-long learning, and that whilst a geological degree opens many doors, a successful career is also about aggressively acquiring new skills as quickly as possible – especially knowledge of mining, project development and finance. He also spoke about the importance of networking, of getting involved in industry structures, attending conferences, presenting papers and the need to market oneself and not being afraid to fail. Attendees would have taken home the importance of building soft skills, such as developing and honing a unique management style. Matt spent a further week at the university, delivering a course on Geostatistics to the Geology Honours Class – check back for more details on this.
