Josh Olmsted stressed the importance of pushing to unlock the company’s potential through expansion projects, growth and continuous employee improvement with career development, skill building and leadership training during a recent Town Hall meeting.
“When we talk about our strategic themes for 2022, our rallying cry is ‘We are Freeport, united to deliver responsibly produced copper and molybdenum, with the goal of unlocking our full potential and advancing our growth opportunities,’” Olmsted, President and Chief Operating Officer-Americas, reiterated after the meeting.
Olmsted was joined by Rick Coleman, President of the Freeport-McMoRan Mining Company, in the November 17 Town Hall, which was live streamed to more than 2,000 employees. Olmsted and Coleman presented for 30 minutes, then answered employee questions for another 30 minutes.
Olmsted outlined potential expansion projects for Bagdad, Safford and El Abra but also stressed harnessing Freeport Edge behaviors and agile ways of working along with new approaches to infusing digital technology into the company’s processes to support employees in their daily jobs.
How the company will achieve those goals allowed Olmsted to address environmental, social and governance – commonly referred to as ESG – a topic he noted is laden with acronyms and confusion, but really not that hard for Freeport employees to understand because they live it.
“ESG is really nothing more than our ability to demonstrate to the world that we operate in a responsible manner, so it’s about staying focused on continuous improvement and doing things right, in a safe, environmentally conscious, and socially responsible way,” he said. “So, yes, we have some gaps we can work on, but we’ve been extremely focused on safety for a very long time, doing the right thing ecologically for a long time, and working with our communities and building partnerships.
“So, ESG is not about something new that we need to do. It’s about staying focused on doing things right and continuous improvement.”