At Kinross, his progress has been so swift — the share price has tripled in three years, to just over $16 per share — that some analysts have recently downgraded the stock from a Buy to a Hold, and the stock in early August has lost some momentum. But that hasn’t deterred Burt from staying the course. After all, as those who know him will attest, Burt is focused. “He’s very precise,” says Peter Marrone, chief executive of Yamana Gold, who has been an acquaintance of Burt’s for years. “He strikes me as the sort of person who has a detailed plan.”

Indeed, Burt, now 51, does have a plan for Kinross. “I like to define it in phases since it’s an easy rallying point,” he explains. But the key in Burt’s five-stage transformation plan is a focus on good people and quality assets.

1 ///// Know what you have

When Burt was hired, the board was concerned about two things: the delayed financial statements, and how to capitalize on rising commodity prices. Burt — who before becoming a gold exec had worked as an investment banker at Burns Fry and Nesbitt Burns, and was chairman of Deutsche Bank Canada in the 1990s — set out to identify the problems Kinross faced, and was careful not to make waves before he had gathered information. He calls this phase “the 100-day plan.” It included visiting the seven mine sites to meet the people and see the assets, and then creating a preliminary strategy. Burt also started to identify the skills the management team lacked. As a follower of Collins, Burt knew it was important to have the best team — a priority the author even puts ahead of figuring out where to lead the company.

During this time, he made just one senior management appointment, hiring Hugh Agro as vice-president of corporate development. (Burt had worked with Agro at Deutsche Bank Canada.) He also started to assess which assets made sense for the new direction of the company and made progress on the financial statements. But he was careful to avoid making any lofty declarations; instead, his tactic, as described to The Wall Street Journal in 2005, was to under-promise and over-deliver.

2 ///// Get right people + Get rid of

backlog = Get on investor radar

Toward the end of the 100-day plan, Burt was interviewed by the Journal and discussed his strategy, which included investing in five countries. He said Kinross’s excellent management team “was one of the reasons I was keen to come here.” Yet in subsequent months, that didn’t stop him from bulking up the executive team with a new CFO, a new chief legal officer and a new chief operating officer.

Collins emphasizes that “when you need to make a people change, act.” There was nothing wrong with the old management team, Burt now says, but if Kinross was going to enter the big leagues, it needed different people. The company had to contend with more complex issues, such as Sarbanes-Oxley, tougher environmental regulations and reclamation challenges related to mines that were at the end of their lives.

Burt wanted all his executives to wear two hats: they had to be subject experts and also excellent all-round managers. “This is a guy who understands talent,” says Williamson. He will hire people not just for their skills now, but also for their potential to grow. “What resonated with Collins is his focus on people,” says Burt. “Just as investment banking is a people business, so is mining.”

It’s not just the roughly 100 people at head office who are critical to Kinross’s success, but also the more than 5,000 managers and workers in its far-flung mines. A clear structure is needed to manage such an operation, says Burt. His team is divided regionally and then functionally, so everyone should know what they are accountable for. “He’s not a guy who encourages freewheeling,” says James Crossland, Kinross’s senior vice-president, government relations and corporate affairs, who joined the team a year ago. “He likes people to understand what’s expected of them, and he is very clear to people what direction he wants the company to go.” One of Crossland’s first priorities was to develop a “Kinross Way” of doing things. A year later, this was explained to staff as four values: putting people first; outstanding corporate citizenship; high-performance culture; rigorous financial discipline. It might be considered an old-fashioned approach, but for Burt a shared set of principles is necessary.

uring this phase, Burt also made good on his promise to release the long-awaited financials — freeing time to focus on Kinross’s future, as the company started to regain investor credibility. “The change was immediately visible,” says David Christie, precious-metals analyst at Scotia Capital. “They were in that big financial mess — he saw them through that. He made the appropriate management changes to get them through that. He brought the company to the next level.”

3 ///// Refine the asset base

The third phase of rebuilding Kinross lasted until the end of 2007, and focused on a priority for any gold company: create a better asset base. Burt’s strategy was to focus on low-cost, high-quality properties, and he planned to acquire, divest and gain a majority control in joint ventures, as needed. That was Burt’s attempt to implement a “hedgehog” approach — another Collins idea. It means breaking down complex issues into simple, straightforward elements.

Kinross acquired Bema Gold for a cool $3.6 billion at the end of 2006. The hefty price tag included the world-class Kupol mine in Russia, which added more than three million ounces to Kinross’s reserves, and Cerro Casale, a Chilean development project. It was the largest deal to date for both Burt and Kinross.

Then Burt made a decision that contradicted not just what he told the Journal, but also his proud Canadian sensibility. Despite saying he would look for more domestic acquisitions, Burt got rid of Kinross’s last two Canadian assets in a swap with Goldcorp. In return, Kinross got $204 million in cash and picked up the outstanding ownership of La Coipa mine in Chile it didn’t already own. (Why the flip-flop? Burt blames Canada’s high tax and labour rates.) Burt’s ability to engineer those changes in such a short period, says Christie, is evidence of his negotiation and management skills. Even the competition agrees he’s done a good job. Yamana’s Marrone says Burt has executed on a detailed plan remarkably well, and says his ability to fulfill promises is a testament to how prudent his plan is.

But Burt doesn’t spend time talking about Kinross’s success — he credits the team with a job done well. He is an unassuming man: slender frame, dark hair, plain metal glasses. In three conversations, he seems a nice guy, but reserved, not wanting the discussion to stray from the Kinross future, and reeling the conversation back when it strayed to family. Yet the lack of a gregariousness is consistent with what Collins says a leader who hopes to bridge the good-to-great gap needs. “These leaders are a paradoxical blend of personal humility and professional will,” he writes. “They are more like Lincoln and Socrates than Patton or Caesar.”

4 ///// Deliver Results

Burt is now focused on the fourth stage of his strategy. It includes shifting three assets from development to production this year: Kupol in Russia, Paracatu in Brazil and Buckhorn in Washington state. Kinross is already a third of the way there: production at Kupol started in May. The company is now the largest foreign mining investor in Russia, and although the relationship started before Burt’s tenure, he has played an integral role in building strong ties in a country not known for its openness to foreigners. But potential challenges remain. For instance, some observers are concerned that Russia’s recent subsoil legislation, which requires foreign companies to have a 50% local partner, could make it difficult to forge new developments there — or might enable the Russians to expropriate some or all of Kupol. (Kinross’s local partner now has just 25% ownership.) Burt says he’s not worried: he has a local partner, Kupol will be grandfathered under the legislation, Kinross has a strong reputation in the country, and in any event 80% of its proven and probable reserves are in South America. “The Russian government sees us as a good partner,” he says. “For us, Russia has been very predictable. I don’t want to say I’m defensive about it, but we have seen significant changes here.”

Christie, however, says Kupol will be a good test of whether Burt can deliver, since operating in Russia undoubtedly carries risk. As for the impact on future Russian endeavours, Christie says any western company, even a giant like Burt’s former employer Barrick, would want a local company to partner with. But there are other challenges, he adds. Kinross needs $4 billion to turn the Cerro Cassale property in Chile into a producing mine and unlock its 22.9 million ounces of gold. And like all gold companies, Kinross needs more of the hard-to-find yellow metal, either through exploration or acquisition. In keeping with Burt’s approach, the gold needs to be high quality and low cost.

The Aurelian bid goes a long way in helping Burt reach his goal. But its main asset adds more risk to Kinross’s profile: Ecuador halted all foreign mining operations in April, and is drafting new laws.

5 ///// Re-refine the asset base

Burt would like to see Kinross’s share price climb to $30 or $40. He won’t comment on when that will happen: “While my crystal ball doesn’t provide that information, we continue to be bullish on our prospects and the outlook for the gold price.”

Reaching those price targets will require ensuring the company has the best high-quality, low-cost assets. That process will likely include the acquisition of junior gold companies; Christie, who in May predicted Kinross would make at least one acquisition in the next year, was right on. Should the Aurelian bid be successful, the new mine will begin production in 2013.

Burt has become more confident over the years, but he continues to be motivated by the itch to be better, says his executive coach. “He’s one of those guys who has constantly reinvented himself,” Williamson explains. Burt is “much more inclusive now that he’s had a chance to build his team his own way. At Barrick, he was perhaps more of a lone ranger.”

But as Burt improves his management skills, he still struggles with one of his biggest concerns: balancing work and life. He wants to be there for his family, but he doesn’t want Kinross to miss out on any opportunities. A position like his does require a personal sacrifice, he acknowledges, but with the help of a supportive spouse, Janet, a successful businesswoman who owns a golf course and restaurant, he manages to balance his schedule. He works between 12 and 16 hours per day, travels about half of the year, has three school-age children and enjoys skiing — and sailing the Atlantica, of course.

When Burt takes his summer holiday to Nova Scotia this year to sail with his family and complete regular maintenance on the Atlantica, his mind will no doubt wander to the future of Kinross. One thing he says won’t bother him is analysts’ downgrading his stock. “There’s a good reason why there has been movement in the rating,” he says. “The stock has performed. It used to be between 80% and 90% Buys; now its 50%. [But] I can’t spend my life looking at the [stock] screens. Instead we have to stay focused and ask: Do we have the right people, the right asset?”

In an industry of charismatic cowboys, the unassuming sailor seems to have found his course. EOM

GADS!!! This is long. Feel free to delete if u find excessive. I promise I won't do this again but I've got it pasted so I'll leave it as is.