Appian resources, energy and utility account director Justin Grose reflects on future-proof mining systems with the power of an agility layer.
When embarking on any comprehensive modernisation program today, mining organisations must prioritise high levels of flexibility.
High flexibility, or organisational agility, allows companies to modify processes and technology as they evolve over time.
As mining companies grow, evolve and partner with other suppliers, processes change and are updated. Maintaining IT system flexibility in such dynamic environments is key.
Agility is critical for the effective implementation of strategic and operational priorities across a mining organisation.
The ability to rapidly integrate systems and data and create applications, workflows and reporting can be the difference between success or failure of a new initiative or organisational change.
While agility built into everyday systems and processes keeps the organisation and its people moving forward.
A key enabler of agility is the replacement of typically rigid underlying IT systems and applications with ones that support agility and remove silos across the organisation.
Regulatory changes, acquisitions, portfolio updates, new site exploration, mine construction or closure, operational changes, workforce restructures, and new joint venture formations are all relevant examples of changes that can significantly affect mining operational processes or workflows.
There is often a considerable delay before an organisation’s legacy systems can effectively support the change – this is where an agility layer plays a critical function by enabling an organisation to rapidly respond to the change.
By deploying an agility layer on top of a legacy system, IT organisations can provide technological advances and added value to their customers while still processing transactions in legacy systems without the need to move data.
For mining and metals leaders, Appian can serve as an “agility layer” by seamlessly bridging the gap between old and new systems.
Appian connects all the systems in your environment, empowering your organisation to build flexible applications and workflows, and integrate and extend the life of your systems.
Appian keeps the workflow separate from the data, with the ability to link between them at any point.
Intelligent, end-to-end process automation capabilities connect your people, systems, bots, AI, and business rules with Appian’s flexible design components.
Appian’s data fabric unifies data sources across your enterprise without the need to replicate data or move it from where it lives. It enables workflow elements to access the data they need at any point in the process.
An agility layer supports key mining challenges and priorities, including the ability to effectively manage license to operate risks, automate ESG compliance, streamline operations and safety management, maintain an effective workforce, build a resilient supply chain, manage financial risk, and enable digital innovation.
Mining organisations are presented with multiple challenges when reliant on a single legacy system. The concept of upgrading or changing to a new system increases the risk of failure.
Newly available technologies cannot be easily trailed, deployed, or integrated—and the budgetary drain these legacy systems create is significant.
Support and modification require unique and specialised consultation, and further customisation is daunting and, in many cases, impossible.
Agility is particularly important during merger and acquisition phases which require mining leaders to bring disparate systems, processes, people and ways of working together in a way that enables visibility and adds value to their operations.
In order to meet the conditions of a changing market today, mining organisations need to adopt an “agility layer” that connects old and new systems.
Deploying a modern, agile cloud platform enables miners to leverage new technologies while simultaneously integrating both legacy and new systems.
This capability was not previously an option in the market due to technology limitations. However, through advances in automation, this technique is rapidly accelerating and becoming recognised as an industry best practice for mining organisations today.
For more information download Appian’s eBook ‘Creating an Agility Layer for Mining and Metals’: https://engage.appian.com/mining-agility-ebook.
