Yup yup! So you can either get a captain for your ship, leave the ship into the drone, click on your ship, then order it to mine. Or you can go into drone and discover a new ship. Outfit it for mining(engis/mechanics/miners), put a captain in it and send that to mine while you guard it with your original ship. In my game I have three small ships with the bare min crew requirement to mine and I just send them out while I watch for pirates. Just make sure you have a decent amount of credits, because the salaries can add up.