Kinross Gold Corporation recognizes its employees through an annual awards program celebrating accomplishments within the community or workplace.Supplied
At Kinross Gold Corporation, everyone dreams of winning a LOVA (Living Our Values Award). The highly coveted annual awards are a peer-to-peer recognition program for Kinross employees who are making a difference in their workplace or the community they serve.
Nicky Pitt, director of talent and engagement, says that while internal employee recognition is woven throughout the gold mining company’s culture, the LOVA is extremely special.
“Our values guide the nomination process, whether it’s the employee’s commitment to putting people first, outstanding corporate citizenship, high performance culture or rigorous financial discipline,” says Pitt.
“We ask nominators to provide specific examples of how their colleagues are generating change to help them stand out from all the applications we receive – over 3,600 across our global operations this year. Then we select eight winners – two employees who best embody each of our four values.”
Because it’s also a global award, winners can be from any of the company’s different mine sites, offices and projects in Canada, the U.S., Brazil, Europe, Chile or Mauritania. Kinross flies all the winners and a guest of their choice (plus interpreters) to the company’s Toronto headquarters for week-long events and the opportunity to get to know the corporate office staff. This year, winners from 2020 and 2021 were celebrated alongside the 2022 winners since their in-person events had been postponed due to COVID-19.
“We want to create an amazing experience for them,” says Pitt. “For some winners, this is the first time they’ve ever travelled. There’s a big awards gala, and volunteers from our corporate office who speak different languages take them and their guests to sights around Toronto and to Niagara Falls.
“We’re always creating more opportunities for recognition, including promoting our women in mining and making sure we’re listening to their needs,” says Pitt. “We do a lot of fun things socially, but also from a conscious perspective, such as mental health week and Breast Cancer Awareness Month, as well as through the lens of diversity and inclusion. We’ve gotten a tremendous response to all those initiatives.”
Kairo Cunha, who won a LOVA in 2020 in the rigorous financial discipline category for identifying new cost-saving efficiencies on projects at Paracatu in Brazil and Bald Mountain in Nevada, says he felt humbled but also proud of himself and the people who helped him win that honour.
“If you do well, you will be recognized,” says Cunha. “Kinross also promotes internally as much as possible. I’ve seen so many people progress internally to different roles and I’ve been able to support the career development of others as well because we have that culture of prioritizing people within the organization.”
Now a senior manager, mine planning, in Toronto, Cunha joined as an intern in 2011 when he was just 19 years old and working on his mining engineering degree. What he appreciates most are the opportunities he’s had to travel and work collaboratively with the mine site teams.
“You have an opportunity here at Kinross to make an impact and do interesting projects that can actually move the needle for the company,” says Cunha. “It’s a very open culture where you can talk with people from all different levels. Plus, the company has a culture of combining what you want in terms of your own career development with what the business needs, so it’s a win-win.”
“You’re encouraged to work hard but also to balance work-life, so it’s a fair place,” he adds. “The company doesn’t just take from you, they give as well. It’s very balanced, which is where it should be.”
More from Greater Toronto’s Top Employers
Advertising feature produced by Canada’s Top 100 Employers, a division of Mediacorp Canada Inc. The Globe and Mail’s editorial department was not involved.