Mario Salmona Petersen | Project Management Consultant, Mining & Energy

Practice

What I work on

Consulting engagements are delivered in Spanish, for clients in Chile and Latin America. This page exists for the international project management community and for readers of my books published in English.

Organisational maturity

Assessment of project management maturity under the PMI OPM3 model, across single business units or full multi-divisional portfolios, with prioritised gap-closing roadmaps.

Quantitative risk analysis

Decision-grade Monte Carlo simulation for schedule, cost and investment appraisal, under ISO 31000, PMI and AACE International recommended practices.

Execution control

Daily Work Plan methodology integrated with Power BI dashboards, turning project control into early detection rather than retrospective reporting.

PMO design

Value-oriented project management offices, designed from stakeholder needs and a deliberate service catalogue rather than a template.

Contract administration

Full contract lifecycle models under NEC4, FIDIC and AACE practices: contracting strategy, change and claims management, payment certification and guarantees.

Training and certification

In-company programmes for project teams, including preparation for PMP, PMI-RMP, PMI-SP, PMI-PBA and PMI-CP certifications.

Credentials

Certifications, teaching and professional bodies

PMI certificationsProject Management Professional (PMP) · Risk Management Professional (PMI-RMP) · Scheduling Professional (PMI-SP) · Professional in Business Analysis (PMI-PBA)

Other credentialsStanford Certified Project Manager (SCPM), Stanford University · Agile Hybrid Project Pro · Scrum Fundamentals Certified

EducationCivil Engineer, Universidad de Chile

Postgraduate teachingPontificia Universidad Católica de Chile · Universidad de Chile · Universidad Católica del Norte — master's and diploma programmes in project management, contracts and risk

PMI Chile ChapterPresident, 2006–2007 · Vice-President of Education and Certification, 2004–2005

Standards workMember, Chilean mirror committee to ISO TC 258 (Project, Programme and Portfolio Management), Instituto Nacional de Normalización

MembershipsPMI · AACE International · IIBA · Colegio de Ingenieros de Chile

Publications

Nine technical books

Written for practitioners working on mining and industrial projects: quantitative risk, execution control, contracts, scheduling with Primavera P6, and preparation for PMI certifications in construction.

Quantitative Risk Analysis in Mining Megaprojects

From Uncertainty to Strategic Decision-Making — A Practitioner's Guide to Monte Carlo Simulation, Decision Trees, and Value at Risk.

A practitioner's treatment of quantitative risk analysis applied to copper mining megaprojects: why single-point estimates fail systematically, how to build defensible contingency curves, and how to translate percentiles into board-level decisions.

English edition — ISBN-13 979-8245548548 · view on Amazon
Spanish edition — Análisis Cuantitativo de Riesgos en Megaproyectos Mineros · view on Amazon

Mastering PMI Certification for Construction Professionals

A series aimed at construction and mining professionals preparing for PMI credentials, with cases drawn from real project environments.

Other titles

Control de Ejecución 4.0 — Daily Work Plan methodology and Power BI
Primavera P6 en Proyectos Mineros Complejos
La Gestión de Proyectos en la Industria Minera
Further titles on contracts, risk and construction management

Background

Twenty-five years inside the operation, before advising from outside it

My career began in large-scale copper mining, where over twenty-five years I worked on the direction, planning and control of investment and transformation projects. That period gave me first-hand exposure to the challenges asset-intensive organisations actually face: operational continuity, investment governance, multidisciplinary coordination, contract management, cost and schedule control, and decision-making under uncertainty.

Since 2004 I have worked as an independent consultant to mining and energy organisations, and as a postgraduate lecturer. The combination matters: the methodologies I teach and implement were tested in the field before they were written down.

My own methodological contributions — the Daily Work Plan approach to execution control, and the quantitative risk framework documented in my books — were developed from that practice rather than adapted from a generic framework licensed from elsewhere.

Every engagement is delivered personally. There are no rotating junior teams and no handover of knowledge midway through a project, which is the single most common complaint I hear about traditional consultancies in this sector.

Contact

Get in touch

For consulting enquiries, speaking invitations, or questions about the books. Consulting engagements are delivered in Spanish; correspondence in English is welcome.