The OpportunityThe Chief Assayer is the senior technical leader responsible for the safe, accurate, timely, and reliable operation of the mine's assay laboratory and associated analytical functions. This role provides leadership over all assaying activities supporting exploration, geology, mining, processing, metallurgical testing, grade control, and production.
The Chief Assayer establishes and maintains laboratory standards, analytical procedures, quality assurance and quality control (QA/QC) programs, and systems necessary to ensure the integrity and traceability of assay results. The position works closely with Geology, Mine Operations, Metallurgy, Processing, Exploration, Environmental, and senior management teams to ensure analytical data supports sound operational and business decisions.
Responsibilities- Lead the day-to-day operation and technical management of the mine-site or central assay laboratory.
- Establish, implement, and maintain analytical methods and standard operating procedures for ore, concentrate, drill-core, exploration, process, and environmental samples.
- Oversee fire assay, wet chemistry, instrumental analysis, and other appropriate analytical techniques for precious metals, base metals, and other economically significant elements.
- Ensure accurate and timely assay results for grade control, exploration, resource definition, metallurgical testing, and production reconciliation.
- Develop and maintain quality assurance/quality control (QA/QC) programs, including certified reference materials, blanks, duplicates, check assays, control charts, and proficiency testing.
- Investigate analytical discrepancies, anomalous results, outliers, and quality-control failures and implement appropriate corrective actions.
- Establish appropriate sample preparation, crushing, pulverizing, splitting, weighing, digestion, fusion, cupellation, and analytical procedures.
- Review and approve assay results before their release to geology, metallurgy, mine operations, or management.
- Maintain laboratory records, analytical documentation, certificates, calibration records, and chain-of-custody procedures.
- Ensure laboratory equipment is properly operated, calibrated, maintained, and fit for purpose.
- Manage laboratory supplies, reagents, consumables, equipment requirements, and operating budgets.
- Recruit, train, supervise, and evaluate assayers, laboratory technicians, and other laboratory personnel.
- Promote a strong culture of safety, quality, accuracy, integrity, and continuous improvement.
- Ensure laboratory personnel follow applicable health, safety, environmental, hazardous-material, and waste-management requirements.
- Coordinate external check assays, referee laboratories, and inter-laboratory comparisons when required.
- Work closely with Exploration and Resource Geology teams to ensure assay methods and detection limits are appropriate for exploration and resource-development programs.
- Collaborate with Mine Geology and Grade Control teams to provide timely analytical information for ore/waste classification and production decisions.
- Support Metallurgy and Processing teams with metallurgical, plant, concentrate, tailings, and recovery-related analyses.
- Assist with laboratory audits, accreditation activities, regulatory inspections, and customer or third-party reviews.
- Identify opportunities to improve laboratory throughput, analytical accuracy, turnaround times, automation, and cost efficiency.
- Prepare laboratory performance reports, QA/QC summaries, production statistics, and other management reports.
- Maintain confidentiality and integrity of analytical data and ensure results are reported accurately and objectively.
- Perform other technical and operational duties as required by site or corporate management.
The above duties and responsibilities represent the nature and level of work assigned and are not necessarily all-inclusive.
Education and Experience- Bachelor's degree in Chemistry, Analytical Chemistry, Metallurgy, Mineral Processing, Geochemistry, or a closely related scientific discipline.
- Advanced degree in Chemistry, Metallurgy, Geochemistry, or a related field is preferred.
- Professional registration, certification, or equivalent recognized professional standing is preferred where applicable.
- 8-12+ years of progressive experience in mineral assay or analytical laboratory operations, preferably within the mining or mineral processing industry.
- Demonstrated experience in a senior supervisory, laboratory management, or Chief Assayer/Assay Manager capacity.
- Strong practical experience with fire assay techniques, including gold and silver determination.
- Experience with analytical methods for base metals and other commodities relevant to the operation.
- Demonstrated knowledge of sample preparation, digestion, fusion, cupellation, gravimetric methods, and instrumental analytical techniques.
- Experience developing and managing laboratory QA/QC programs and interpreting quality-control data.
- Experience with laboratory information management systems (LIMS), analytical databases, and electronic reporting systems.
- Experience managing laboratory personnel, budgets, equipment, vendors, and operational priorities.
- Experience working directly with mine geology, exploration, metallurgy, processing, and production teams.
- Experience implementing or maintaining laboratory quality systems and preparing for internal or external audits.
- Experience in a mine-site environment is strongly preferred.
