Northern Heart + Home was designed to celebrate the people, places and positives that set the North apart. This spotlight series focuses on exactly that: the people who are at the very heart of our Northern communities. Each profile highlights leaders who are pursuing their dreams, creating meaningful lives and truly shining in the North. This Northern Heart Q+A features Cynthia Le Sueur-Aquin – President/CEO of LAURION Mineral Exploration Inc.
Cynthia Le Sueur-Aquin is President/CEO of LAURION Mineral Exploration Inc. Since 2003 she has successfully brought her 40 years of mining experience to LAURION’s Ishkoday Gold mine in the town of Beardmore within the Greenstone Region of Northern Ontario. LAURION’s Ishkoday Gold Polymetallic Project is located 220km NE of Thunder Bay, 28km NE of Beardmore, Ontario.
During her tenure, Laurion Mineral Exploration Inc. has morphed from Explorer to Discoverer while reaching new share price heights. Past postings in South Africa, Zimbabwe, Canada, Mexico, Mozambique, Zambia, Botswana and other North African States have provided her with direct exposure to cultural, political and regulatory issues. Cynthia fuels her experience in project financing, mining property asset acquisitions and divestitures, corporate legal work and negotiations, company administration and investor relations into her work on a daily basis.
Below Cynthia explains how she became a leader in the mining industry, what’s next for LME and shares the secrets to her success in the North. PLUS we’ve included Cynthia’s interview with Investing News Network at last month’s PDAC 2020 which details why Ishkoday is the perfect project to expand.
The Northern Heart Q+A: Cynthia Le Sueur-Aquin – President/CEO of LAURION Mineral Exploration Inc.
Tell us about your role as President/CEO of LAURION Mineral Exploration Inc. and your life at LAURION’s Ishkoday Gold mine in Northern Ontario?
I am that mining President/CEO who ‘walks-her-talk’, with her ‘boots on the ground’ and ‘not afraid to get her hands dirty’ team leadership style.
I am that mining President/CEO who is happiest living and working at LAURION’s Ishkoday Gold mine remote location in the town of Beardmore within the Greenstone Region of Northern Ontario.
I am that mining President/CEO who enjoys her daily face-to-face interaction with her local First Nations and Metis Nations communities. They are my people, and we are family.
I am that President and CEO of the next ‘10-bagger’ mid-stage brownfield exploration company.
Cynthia was interviewed by Investing News Network at last months PDAC 2020. Here she shares why Ishkoday is the perfect project to expand.
How would your colleagues and contemporaries describe you?
My colleagues have told me, that my passion, my clarity of direction and purpose define me.
My contemporaries would describe me as that seasoned professional with a very storied, but solid globally diverse and progressive Precious Metals mining sector career path.
This is probably because of my proven mining exploration to mine production broad foundational experience. Stemming from the spectrum of the micro-cap exploration to blue-chip senior producing – type Gold mining companies, along with their respective underground in the stopes mining operations to their various tiers of the corporate boardroom roles, complimented with having weathered many recurring Bull to Bear to Bull market cycles, over the past 40 plus years.
You have broken barriers and persevered in a male-dominated industry. What are the keys to your success?
Unbeknownst to me at the time, my career path as a mining engineer, has prepared and equipped me for today’s challenges and opportunities in my role as President/CEO.
What I have learnt and come to recognize is that:
- my successful monetization of mining assets is my forte and my calling-card,
- my comfort level with geo-cultural and geo-political diversity experiences is my foundation,
- my attention to detail is my strength,
- my empowerment of minority groups and the disenfranchised is my motivation, and
- my reputation for fair transactions, with the ability to ‘get the job done’ is perhaps my hallmark.
What is your biggest challenge?
People management is one of the biggest challenges and is an evolving skill set. Generational differences mean adjusting my management style and thinking. I am always learning, and I am very tough on myself as I draw out the best of each of my team members.
LAURION’s success to date has been our ability as a team to embrace transformative practices while encouraging individual initiative, dismissing the notion of ‘group-think’ approach.
What will your legacy will be?
As President/CEO my legacy will be making “a NEW gold-rich base-metal discovery” on LAURION’s Ishkoday, and bringing that project towards production, against all odds. LAURION’s Ishkoday will generate these lofty results, while being corporately – environmentally and socially responsible, imbuing a productive work environment of mentorship and skills development, with sustainable approaches and initiatives.
My ethos is simple: “The only way I can predict the future . . . is to create it“.
Will it be easy? No, but absolutely worth it.
“Fortune favours the bold. In life, you can either be an observer or participant!”
I invite you to follow my journey.
LAURION Mineral Exploration Inc. is listed on the TSX Venture Exchange under the symbol LME and the OTCQX under the symbol LMEFF.
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