Courtney graduated from the University of Queensland with a Bachelor of Chemical and Metallurgical Engineering in 2018. Throughout university she was heavily involved with the AusIMM Southern Queensland Student Chapter and the UQ Women in Engineering program. She completed her graduate program with Newcrest Mining, gaining exposure at both Telfer Gold Mine and Cadia Valley Operations. Courtney is currently a Plant Metallurgist at Cadia Valley working predominantly in flotation.

Specialist in Operational Technology (OT) solutions converging IT with operational requirements in the mining context. This incorporates IT project management including infrastructure, application delivery, planning and team direction, however familiarity with all aspects of the IT function including staffing, budgets, application development, project & service delivery can be demonstrated. Over 25 years experience in providing technical solutions to business requirements across a range of industries, since 2008 focusing on the resources sector. Tertiary qualified in both Accounting & Finance and Computer Systems Engineering. MBA (current study). As a Senior PMP Certified Professional Project Manager, recent OT projects delivered have been in leveraging international project teams to deliver quality solutions to remote mine sites in Asia, Africa and South America. Projects are usually multi-timezone, discipline, language and currency with varying budget and ERP structures, typically using SAP. Also work experience in Australia, extensively in Papua New Guinea / Pacific Rim and the UK. The last 15 years have been in IT project delivery as a Senior Project Manager predominately in large enterprise environments, and previous to that in IT operations and service delivery. Prior leadership roles include IT Manager and various team leadership roles. A large number of successful global projects can be cited. Experience in various other industries including EPCM, Outsourced IT services, Financial, Manufacturing.

Dr. Janine Lay is a Postdoctoral Fellow at the Queensland University of Technology (QUT) in the Centre for Mining Equipment, Technology and Services (METS) Business Innovation. Her research examines the practices that enable innovation and technology adoption. She was part of the QUT team project, funded by the CRC for Optimising Resource Extraction (CRC ORE), that examined the barriers and enablers of innovation in mining and developed an Innovation Culture Assessment tool and a Process Model of technology adoption to support mining leaders. During her PhD research she spent 17 months with a team of scientists, clinicians and equipment manufacturers who were co-creating a new early diagnostic technique for cancer, to study how they developed and implemented new knowledge. Janine has over thirty years’ experience working at the interface of universities and the mining industry in the areas of collaborative research, development, and innovation. She holds a PhD in Business from the University of Queensland and a PhD in Physical Chemistry and Bachelor of Science (Hons) from the University of Melbourne.

Dr Elaine Wightman combines her specialist knowledge of automated mineral characterisation with a passion for teaching and learning. She leads the Transformational Learning Group at the Sustainable Minerals Institute (SMI) at the University of Queensland where she also coordinates the postgraduate student program. Her research activities include large scale collaborative research projects (including the AMIRA P9 project and AMSRI) and smaller scale industry-funded projects. Elaine has also developed and delivered courses with colleagues from Curtin University, The University of New South Wales and The Papua New Guinea University of Technology, and is currently involved in an MCA sponsored project to redefine the engineering curriculum.