RE: Is This An Achievement?surething1111,
I don't know just what doingthejob is talking about. It may be that he was prompted by your reminder that he had not taken the challenge to list the achievements of the CEO that he worships. I had thought he had avoided that challenge, because of his concern that we would list all the "non-achievements".
As vanchester said on Agoracom, "Easy to buy a stock, always harder to sell it"; and as you say, paper profits often vanish.
Let's assess the wisdom of the Randy Man when the UMJ project is complete - then the UMJ project can be assessed on its own, and the "net benefit" of the Randy Man's contribution can be put in perspective. That would involve assessing the benefits or costs to ISM shareholder value as a result of other strategic moves for which the Randy Man can take credit or take blame. Such things as the Langmuir Project, the Jasper spin-out, the failed Metal Mines/Langmuir spin-out, the NSR purchase, the Desrosier project and related legal issues, the NCIB programs, the financial and reputation costs of failing to meet flow through exploration commitments, the delays in execution of announced projects (dewatering permits, First Nations agreements, NI43-101 reports, etc), the loans to unnamed companies and individuals, the allocation ratio of resources to management, investor relations and related administration versus exploration of prospective properties, the contingent cost and liability related to the "Employment Agreement". I have likely missed some of the issues that the Randy Man has been involved in, over the past several years - but somehow I have the idea that his legacy could stand more positives than the UMJ project, from the shareholders' standpoint. I notice that whaler has expressed some "wonder" on the Agoracom forum, involving the direction that management has taken ISM.
Randy Miller has voiced his opinion on what he feels is the inadequacy of UMJ management guidance. How would he fare under the glare of the same spotlight? It appears that UMJ has achieved the goal of reaching profitable mine production - while ISM has yet to identify one ounce of mineral reserves. This from a CEO who said in May 2007 "....we have a lot of nickel in a great location...." and " ... so one of two things will happen, either we'll do a joint venture with somebody and start producing, or someone will just buy us out... Like an Xstrata...they happen to be...you know..(hesitating)...well that's speculation..." Of course Randy did say "I think we are just scratching the surface here," Randy may have unwittingly diagnosed the flaw in his strategy - ISM was just scratching the surface, while CEO's in other exploration companies were getting permits, First Nations consensus, so they could drill and develop.
I also notice that Randy gave a rundown on the achievements of past custodians of his Langmuir property, stating: "Timmins Nickel which was public on the TSX in the early 90's, and basically they went bankrupt because of bad nickel price, bad luck and bad management I guess..a combination of all three...and they left behind just a whole...they didn't fully develop the property at all..." That "whole" was part of a mine that needed dewatering to further evaluate. Is Randy also going to just leave behind a "whole" and not fully develop the property at all? And what will the excuse be - bad nickel price, bad luck, bad management, .. or a combination of all three?