@Anoremulous - fair enough - the CV has 6 years of exploration...

@Anoremulous - fair enough - the CV has 6 years of exploration experience and then 5 years of business dev/business analyst stuff and a BSc and a MBA is a fair bit of stuff to pack into an 11 year career. Understandably no french speaking or West African experience but to get people (and spouses/wives) to agree to a position in anywhere in West Africa probably cuts out a huge proportion of geology and engineering staff (as events in Mali recently with RSG have shown) there would not be a line out the door of candidates with the qualifications and experience, and any that did have that plus french speaking and/or west African experience is likely already spoken for by other mining companies.

Got to look at the demographics of the mining industry, a lot of the greybeards are retiring and not a huge pool of the next generation of geologists and mining engineers in their peak earning and family stage of life in existence with the WA and world gold mining industry running hot. For a CEO position, he is on the young side, but maybe not such a bad thing? Someone with his experience and qualifications could easily get a very high-paying mid-level management position in Perth with any number of major companies, so this is a bit of a risk for him as well.