Principal Engineer Mechanical

• Business Entity:
  Africa - Platinum Group Metals (PGMs)(BU005)

Valterra Platinum, formerly Anglo American Platinum, is a leading primary producer of platinum group metals (PGMs), with integrated mining, smelting, and refining operations in South Africa and Zimbabwe, marketing the metal we produce globally. Following our demerger from Anglo American plc, Valterra Platinum is now an independent, publicly listed company with a primary and secondary listing on the Johannesburg and London stock exchanges respectively.

As we embark on this exciting new chapter, Valterra Platinum is positioned to define and pursue its own strategy, anchored in operational excellence, sustainability, and value creation for the long-term. With full accountability for our performance and growth, we are focused on strengthening our capabilities across the entire PGM value chain, from mine to market.

Our independence empowers us to deepen our commitment to stakeholders and lead with purpose – to Unearth Value to Better Our World. We remain steadfast in our ambition to be the world’s foremost producer of platinum group metals, while embedding safety and sustainability in everything we do.

If you're driven by purpose and the opportunity to make a lasting impact, we invite you to join us. Apply today and be part of something bigger.

This role is based in 144 Oxford Road, Rosebank

To provide technical leadership and governance for reliability and mechanical engineering across platinum operations, ensuring safe, reliable and cost-effective asset performance through engineering standards, risk management, defect elimination and continuous improvement

Performance and Delivery

• Set the Guidelines and expectations for excellence in Reliability and Defect Elimination across platinum operations.
• Drive Technical best practices in the processes for Root Cause Analysis and Defect Elimination.
• Drive the social and organisational best practices to move the organisation to a High Reliability Organisation thereby transforming the company towards:
  • Having chronic unease / preoccupation with defects and failures no matter how small
  • Ensuring high quality experts with the skill and knowledge of failure mechanisms
  • The tenacity to investigate to the root cause and not stop at symptoms of a problem
  • Have a practical approach to operations and what can be implemented.
  • Creating a reliability culture that is resilient and sustainable.
• Is the custodian of the reliability CoP’s and excellence where guidance, learnings and best practices are shared.
• Oversight of RCA/DE implementation, value add across the Platinum organisation.
• Involvement with more complex RCA’s in the organisation
• Involvement with OEM’s on common problems and ensure that root causes flow back to the OEM to ensure engineering solutions are designed out of the equipment or process – monitor this.
• Via the CoP’s, Equipment Asset Owners, and the Master Data Governance Group ensure that root causes make their way back into the service strategies and tactics.
• Building of Reliability Block Diagrams, driving the discussion on opportunities and risks
• Involvement with project teams to ensure maintainability and reliability thinking are injected into new designs.

• Bachelors degree in Mechanical or Electrical Engineering
• A postgraduate degree in Failure Mechanisms or Reliability Systems (Desirable)
• Registered Professional Engineer (Desirable)
• Government certificate of Competence. (Mining and Factories) (Desirable)

Experience:

• 7 – 10 years working experience

Technical knowledge (experience) required for role:

• A demonstrated thought leader and considered an expert in reliability systems and defect elimination
• Significant knowledge of failure mechanisms, Metallurgy,…