When it comes to maintaining large surface mining equipment, we don’t know what we don’t know. There are exceptional heavy equipment mechanics all over the world — safety-conscious, diligent people who put their heart and soul into the work. The job of a technical interview is to find them, and to be certain. Here is how ours work.
First, we sit and we listen
The first commitment we give is to the candidate: we commit to getting to know them, and to them getting to know us. That exchange always happens in person, face to face. It’s essential — and it’s also a requirement written into our ISO 9001:2015 Quality Management System.
Candidates can have as much time as they need to get comfortable and simply tell us how they became a tradesperson: what machines they’ve worked on and when, what work they performed on each, and where — mine site workshop or in the pit, a town-based shed, or roving field service from a branch. The candidate talks. We listen.
35 years of Caterpillar dealership experience
The people doing the listening have a passion for this equipment. One of them is Peter Pelling. Peter worked for the Caterpillar dealer Hastings Deering (Australia) Limited for over 35 years, a very senior manager who stayed hands-on. For many years he ran the dealer’s Engine Rebuild Facility and Component Rebuild Group in Rockhampton and Mackay — and he ran those workshops like Japan runs the Shinkansen, where the average train delay is under a minute a year. Peter was instrumental in the process-driven systems that delivered more than 600 engine rebuilds a year, every one of them to Caterpillar standards.
On one holiday he flew to South America just to visit the Caterpillar dealer Finning, tour their engine and component rebuild facility, and call in at the dealer facility on the Escondida copper mine in Chile. A busman’s holiday if ever there was one. To say Pete knows a bit about Caterpillar engines is like saying Taylor Swift sells a few albums.
Another 33 years alongside him
Also doing the listening is Brent Diflo. Brent worked for Hastings Deering for over 33 years, rising from the shop floor — a Caterpillar trained mechanic, just like Peter — to senior management, including Group Equipment Assembly Manager: ultimately responsible for equipment assembly not just in Australia but in Papua New Guinea, New Caledonia, Fiji and the Solomon Islands. Brent knows a bit about Caterpillar large surface mining equipment in the same way Pete knows a bit about engines.
Keeping current
It’s been said to us that things have changed since “back in the day.” We could not agree more — which is why Peter joining the interview team matters so much. After Hastings Deering, Peter spent ten years as Group Maintenance Manager at Mackellar Mining, a major Australian mining contractor, managing the maintenance of large surface mining equipment on some of the biggest sites and projects in Australia. He left that role in March 2024. Is that current enough?
Then it gets technical
The candidate starts getting detailed questions about procedures and process, and about OEM software such as Caterpillar Service Information System 2.0. We keep a laptop set up with SIS 2.0 and a login ready to go, so if there’s any doubt a candidate can use the software competently, we remove it on the spot.
Pete, Brent and Dennis are seasoned international recruitment interviewers. No question is ever quite the same; each scenario is altered just enough that you really need to know what you’re talking about. If a candidate tries to bluff something they don’t know, we will find out — and it is far better everyone finds out in their home country, over a casual chat, than after they’ve been deployed.
That’s how Skilled Migration Group interviews: ISO 9001:2015 quality-assured, process-driven procedures; 68 years of Australian Caterpillar dealership experience; ten years managing a major mining contractor’s group equipment maintenance; and an interviewer with over 25 years of hiring internationally.
So — who does your technical interviews, and verifies your applicants’ skill, knowledge and experience? If the answer gives you pause, start at Employers.