I agree with Niel, this is a great question. Let's go through different steps in the mining value chain and let's do that in reverse order. Mining companies are required to produce products with specifications based on market contracts. In general the contracts have payments linked to primary metal content (and some secondary elements like S, P, etc) and often have penalties linked to gangue minerals and moisture. The concentrator/process plant then has the KPIs to produce the product/concentrate as per the product specifications. The process plant is generally designed around a fixed set of variables including ore hardness (defines mill size and efficiency), grades/recoveries(defines installed flotation capacity). Blending of ore to generate a feed blend close to the process design criteria of the process plant allows the plant to work at its best efficiency allwoing it to meet the products specs. Some times the high grade ore is blended with an ore type that has high impurities (like carbon, flourine etc). This allows an acceptable product spec to be produced which otherwise would ahve incurred commercial penalties.
Having said all of the above, the industry still operates in silos. Each unit operation across the value chain has its own model but often they don't talk to each other really well. What is actually required is an approach to integrated planning from pit to port that allows an operation to optimise for NPV of the entire value chain. There is a paper by G. Whittle (link below) which talks about "Enterprise Optimisation" that may be worth reading.
It discusses cases where you can actually increase the NPV of the operations by treating the high grade material first and then over the LOM, move to low grade material. This apprach requires you to optimise the entire value chain for best NPV which may mean running some unit operations ineffectively or not as per the design.
I'd suggest "Project Management for Mining" handbook by RJ Hickson and Terry Owen. I have not read the book personally but have been recommended by a few. Moreover its published by Society of Mining, Metallurgy and Exploration (SME) which makes a bit more trustworthy than other publications.
Another avenue to look at, will be courses conducted by professional organisations in your region.
I agree with Niel, this is a great question. Let's go through different steps in the mining value chain and let's do that in reverse order. Mining companies are required to produce products with specifications based on market contracts. In general the contracts have payments linked to primary metal content (and some secondary elements like S, P, etc) and often have penalties linked to gangue minerals and moisture. The concentrator/process plant then has the KPIs to produce the product/concentrate as per the product specifications. The process plant is generally designed around a fixed set of variables including ore hardness (defines mill size and efficiency), grades/recoveries(defines installed flotation capacity). Blending of ore to generate a feed blend close to the process design criteria of the process plant allows the plant to work at its best efficiency allwoing it to meet the products specs. Some times the high grade ore is blended with an ore type that has high impurities (like carbon, flourine etc). This allows an acceptable product spec to be produced which otherwise would ahve incurred commercial penalties.
Having said all of the above, the industry still operates in silos. Each unit operation across the value chain has its own model but often they don't talk to each other really well. What is actually required is an approach to integrated planning from pit to port that allows an operation to optimise for NPV of the entire value chain. There is a paper by G. Whittle (link below) which talks about "Enterprise Optimisation" that may be worth reading.
https://www.whittleconsulting.com.au/wp-content/uploads/2017/03/Enterprise-Optimisation.pdf
It discusses cases where you can actually increase the NPV of the operations by treating the high grade material first and then over the LOM, move to low grade material. This apprach requires you to optimise the entire value chain for best NPV which may mean running some unit operations ineffectively or not as per the design.