Meeting the needs, interests and expectations of our Stakeholders

Engaging, understanding, responding to and meeting the needs of our stakeholders to create value for them and SANBS

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The SANBS has always valued the contributions of our diverse stakeholders. Through robust engagement, we empower them to assist us in achieving our goals, mitigating risks and optimising opportunities. Stakeholder surveys are undertaken from time to time. Emphasis on these will increase going forward. The information that follows describes our frequency of engagement with our stakeholders, their needs, interests and expectations, risks and opportunities and how we respond to these. We also provide our assessment of the current relationship against a desired relationship and give details of the status of current engagements with our various stakeholders.

We group our stakeholders as follows:
  • Employees – include the people we employ, our Board and the unions that represent our people. Given the important role of each of these stakeholders – details are provided below
  • Donors – these comprise anyone who donates blood, the donor structures including National Council, Zone Donor Committees and branch donor committees. We describe the relationship with blood donors separately below
  • Regulators – comprises of the National Department of Health, SANAS, SAHPRA, SABTS and the ISO Standards
  • Medical fraternity – includes doctors, nurses, patients and medical aid schemes
  • Suppliers
  • SA and international blood partners - Local and international health and transfusion medicine
  • Given the important role the media plays in conveying SANBS’ purpose, adverts etc we include details about them below

Employees

Stakeholder Group

SANBS EMPLOYEES
Ongoing engagement

Capitals

iHEALTh

Risks

Materiality Themes

Responsible

Executive Management

Current Relationship

Good

Desired Relationship

Trusted

Needs, interests & expectations
  • Reward and recognition
  • Conducive and safe working environment/ job satisfaction
  • Job security
  • Growth and development
  • Transformation
  • Diversification
  • Integration
  • Remote and/or WFH capability
  • Regard for overall wellness
Key Risks

  • Loss of key employees
  • Disengaged Employees and underperformance
  • Industrial action
  • Damage to SANBS' reputation by disengaged employees
  • Lack of disclosure or transparency
Opportunities

  • Empower and engage
  • Skills development
  • Diverse and inclusive workforce
  • Multiskilling – cross functional teamwork
  • Performance management
  • Recognition and Reward
  • Building trust
SANBS Response
  • Talent management
  • Succession planning
  • Transformation plan
  • Effective performance management system
  • Role diversification
  • DNA
  • 360 feedback
  • Remuneration Policy
  • Implementation of heightened disclosure in Integrated Report
  • Remote Working Policy
  • Virtual training and Learning Cafe
Status of Current Engagements
  • SANBS' DNA process - In the 2020/2021 cycle 1 972 employees participated in the process (FY20: 1 805) and in our final score, we achieved our target of the 10% increase to 1.31 from the previous score of 1.19
  • 542 leaders and specialists completed a 360° assessment to help ensure sustainable leadership capability (FY20: 446)
  • SANBS is successfully instilling a feedback culture that is easier and more rewarding for participants
  • SANBS' Leadership fit to competency profile (benchmarks) identified innovation and change as areas where increased leadership development focus is required

BOARD

Stakeholder Group

BOARD
Regular engagement

Capitals

Risks

Materiality Themes

Responsible

CEO & Company Secretary

Current Relationship

Good

Desired Relationship

Trusted

Needs, interests & expectations
  • Relevant. accurate and timeous information and reporting
  • Achievement of strategic objectives
  • Improved governance and ethics
Key Risks

  • Transparency
  • Inaccurate reporting
  • Under performance
  • Poor decision making
  • Potential liability for directors
Opportunities

  • Integrated business planning
  • Digitalisation
  • Organisational alignment and transformation
  • Creation of blood committee
SANBS Response
  • Improved planning and communication
  • Performance reviews
  • Business scorecard reporting
  • Automation
  • King IV gap analysis
  • Ethics assessment and framework implementation
  • Board evaluations
Status of Current Engagements
  • Improved planning & communication
  • Performance reviews
  • Business scorecard reporting
  • Ethics assessment & framework implementation
  • Board evaluations

EMPLOYEES: UNIONS

Stakeholder Group

EMPLOYEES: Unions
Ongoing engagement

Capitals

iHEALTh

Risks

Materiality Themes

Responsible

Chief Human Capital Officer

Current Relationship

Good

Desired Relationship

Trusted

Needs, interests & expectations
  • Fair and equitable working conditions
  • Employee safety
  • Annual wage negotiations
  • Transparency
  • Consultation
  • Fair and equitable remuneration
Key Risks

  • Misaligned expectations
  • Industrial action
  • Negative publicity
  • Reputation damage
  • Genie coefficient
Opportunities

  • Improved working conditions
  • Improved engagement and planned meetings
  • Greater understanding of the SANBS environment
  • Further transparency in Integrated Report to build trust
SANBS Response
  • Continued engagement and consultation
  • Bargaining forum meetings
  • Long-term agreements
  • Communication improvement
  • DNA Formula
  • 360 Degree Assessment
  • Remuneration Policy
  • Disclosure of remuneration in Integrated Report
Status of Current Engagements
  • The relationship between business and the unions is a healthy one. With the onslaught of Covid-19 in the world and the impact it has had on business alike, both unions have been working tirelessly with business in protecting the health of our frontline staff and assisting business in its different initiatives that are aimed at minimising the impact to business and the general wellbeing of SANBS staff. We hope this current collaborative approach will continue for long after the Covid-19 pandemic
  • We have also involved the unions in one of our biggest Digi projects>BECS to be our champions of change

DONORS: BLOOD DONORS

Stakeholder Group

BLOOD DONORS
Ongoing engagement

Capitals

iHEALTh

Risks

Materiality Themes

Responsible

Executive: Transfusion Donor Services and Marketing

Current Relationship

Trusted

Desired Relationship

Trusted

Needs, interests & expectations
  • Donor pool
  • Iron deficiency
  • Platelet donors
  • Adequate donor
  • Health and education
  • Donor satisfaction levels
Key Risks

  • Insufficient pool – over bleeding
  • Donor health issues
  • Unhappy donors
  • Donor retention
  • Reputation of SANBS
  • SANBS employee sabotage
  • Eligible donors
Opportunities

  • Sustainability
  • Diversified donor pool
  • Synthetic blood
  • Pathogen inactivation
  • More frequent donations
  • Digitalisation
  • Donor education and experience (SANBS Theme Park)
SANBS Response
  • Digitalisation
  • Donor-focused research
  • Education Iron defficiency and disease prevention
  • Donor satisfaction surveys
  • Donor rewards programme
  • Increased awareness regarding platelet donation
  • Donor education and magazine Iron replacement initiative
Status of Current Engagements
  • Restrictions imposed in response to the Covid-19 pandemic had a direct impact on our ability to access donors and make blood donation convenient for existing and potential donors
  • Donor pool reduced by 22%, seeing a loss of 121 378 donors when compared with the previous year. Of particular significance is the loss of 86 583 young donors, aged 16 to 25 years, impacting on sustainability of the donor pool
  • Owing to the reduced donor pool, the frequency of donation from the retained pool increased from 1.7 to 1.9 donations, maintaining our reliance on repeat donors which in the long term is not sustainable and could negatively impact on donor health
  • The further impact on sustainability and potentially donor health was the reduced collections from new donors, dropping from 14.1% to 8.7% in 2020

DONORS: National Council, Zone Donor Committees, Branch Donor Committees

Stakeholder Group

National Council, Zone Donor Committees, Branch Donor Committees
Periodic engagement

Capitals

iHEALTh

Risks

Materiality Themes

Responsible

Executive: Transfusion Donor Services and Marketing

Current Relationship

Trusted

Desired Relationship

Trusted

Needs, interests & expectations
  • Donor interests and wellbeing taken into account
  • SANBS carries out its mandate effectively
Key Risks

  • Not adhering to prescribed governance rules and structures
  • Ineffective interaction between management and the committees
Opportunities

  • Leverage the passion and commitment of Committee members to increase our donor base
SANBS Response
  • This is a key focus area for Donor management
  • Plans put in place to strengthen interaction with Committees
Status of Current Engagements
  • Multiple Branch and Zone Donor Committee meetings held using the virtual platform
  • Committee members are active in assisting with Donor Recruitment drives, using their social media platforms and recruiting in person, where possible. Because of the limitation on face-to-face meetings, all committee meetings, including the Annual Election Meetings (AEM’s) were held using electronic means. Relevant documents were introduced to support the electronic election process
  • Donor for Life Awards functions were put on hold, in response to the limitation on gatherings, until such time that it is safe to host these functions again. Milestone donors are currently being acknowledged and celebrated at the time of the milestone donation event, and where possible, this is publicised in the local media

REGULATORS: National Department of Health

Stakeholder Group

NATIONAL DEPARTMENT OF HEALTH
Ongoing engagement

Capitals

iHEALTh

Risks

Materiality Themes

Responsible

Executive Management

Current Relationship

Good

Desired Relationship

Trusted

Needs, interests & expectations
  • Improved patient outcome
  • Improved healthcare
  • Sufficient quality blood products
  • Right product, right patient and right time
  • Monitoring of side effects
  • Information and escalation of all major decisions
Key Risks

  • Loss of licence to operate
  • Inability to meet demand
  • Morbidity/Mortality
  • Transfusion transmitted infections
  • Poor patient outcomes
  • Increased costs
  • Delayed payments
Opportunities

  • Efficiencies
  • Digitalisation
  • Pathogen inactivation
  • Product & service diversity
  • Reduce wastage
  • Use of big data
SANBS Response
  • Adherence to service level agreements
  • B-BBEE
  • Provision of data/metrics
  • Portal for debtors’ payments
  • Interdependent projects to improve blood product management
  • Scientific research and publications on utilisation patterns
Status of Current Engagements
  • A National structure to address Transfusional and related matters in DoH, is still lacking. Ongoing interactions on all matters related to PBM and Transfusion Medicine are regularly discussed in an effort to improve patient outcomes. This happens via:
    • Provincial Coordinators Forum (established and driven by SANBS and including WCBS and all 9 provinces)
    • Provincial level discussion forums – with hospital management representation
    • Individual hospital discussion forums

REGULATORS: SA National Accreditation System (SANAS)
SA National Health Products Regulatory Authority (SAHPRA) ISO Standards, SABTS

Stakeholder Group

SA National Accreditation System (SANAS)
SA National Health Products Regulatory Authority (SAHPRA) ISO Standards, SABTS
Regular engagement

Capitals

iHEALTh

Risks

Materiality Themes

Responsible

Medical Director

Current Relationship

Good

Desired Relationship

Trusted

Needs, interests & expectations
  • Compliance
  • Global interaction
  • Harmonising of standards world wide
Key Risks

  • Loss of licence to practise
  • Loss of trust from key stakeholder
Opportunities

  • Improve the quality our products and services
  • Global collaboration
SANBS Response
  • Disciplined Adherence to Standards
  • Proactive identification of global accreditation standards for implementation
Status of Current Engagements
  • ISO participation - SANBS participates in the various ISO standards’ revisions
  • SANAS – SANBS participates on the technical committee as Blood transfusion experts
  • SAHPRA engagement has been through the PEI blood project

MEDICAL FRATERNITY: Doctors, Nurses, Patients, Medical Aid Schemes

Stakeholder Group

DOCTORS, NURSES, MEDICAL AID SCHEMES
Ongoing engagement

Capitals

iHEALTh

Risks

Materiality Themes

Responsible

Executive Management

Current Relationship

Good

Desired Relationship

Trusted

Needs, interests & expectations
  • Sufficient quality blood products
  • Other services stem cells, diversity of products
  • Customer satisfaction levels
Key Risks

  • Insufficient blood stocks – morbidity & mortality
  • Insufficient quality
  • Unhappy customers
  • Reputation of SANBS
Opportunities

  • New income streams
  • SANBS RAD Academy
  • Big Data
  • Digitalisation
SANBS Response
  • Continued customer engagements to meet requirements
  • Delivery of right product at right time
  • Research and development
  • Clinical trials to improve donor and patient care
  • Accurate demand planning
  • Driving PBM in South Africa
Status of Current Engagements
  • Establishment of and support to various discussion platforms using SANBS data to improve patient outcomes and drive appropriate usage of blood products
  • Using digital platforms in the Covid era to host above meetings and educational events
  • Participating in ongoing SANBS external customer service surveys to continuously meet the expectations of our stakeholders
  • Participate at executive level in the sub-Saharan PBM forum.

SUPPLIERS

Stakeholder Group

VENDOR/SUPPLIERS
Ongoing engagement

Capitals

iHEALTh

Materiality Themes

Responsible

Chief Financial Officer

Current Relationship

Good

Desired Relationship

Trusted

Needs, interests & expectations
  • Safe transportation of blood
  • Effective logistics management
  • Quality packaging and cold chain management
  • Availability of medical consumables and testing agents
  • Integrity of information
  • Value for money
  • Payments for goods and services rendered
Key Risks

  • Goods and services not delivered at the right time, right quality and as per specifications
  • Product quality failure and wastage
  • Delayed or no blood delivery to patients
  • Cyber security risk
  • System downtime
  • Increased costs
  • Poor contract management
  • Lack of B-BBEE
Opportunities

  • Formal engagement plan for critical vendors
  • Efficiencies
  • Improved supply chain management
  • Just-in-time inventory management
  • Digitalisation
  • Improved contract management
  • Encourage B-BBEE
SANBS Response
  • Critical vendor list
  • Supply chain management improvement plan
  • Logistics management improvement plan
  • Demand planning
  • Procurement plan to address BBBEE
  • Flexible procurement and strategic partnership
Status of Current Engagements
  • New procurement policy implemented, which introduces flexible procurement and strategic partnerships
  • 2021/22 budget approved, Demand Plan to be updated accordingly
  • Preferential procurement significantly increased during the year

SA AND INTERNATIONAL BLOOD PARTNERS: Business Partners

Stakeholder Group

Business Partners
Regular engagement

  • NBI
  • WCBS

Capitals

iHEALTh

Risks

Materiality Themes

Responsible

Executive Management

Current Relationship

Trusted

Desired Relationship

Trusted

Needs, interests & expectations
  • National supply management
  • Collaboration in seamless national product and service delivery
  • Alignment of quality and safety
  • Ensuring product availability
Key Risks

  • Disparate approach to common challenges
  • Increased legal risk in the absence of collaboration
  • Reputation
Opportunities

  • Integrated South African blood services
  • Improved service delivery
SANBS Response
  • Service level agreements
  • Collaboration on common policies, procedures and standards
  • NHI response
  • Annual National Blood Safety Committee meetings
Status of Current Engagements
  • Annual National Blood Safety Committee Meeting with representatives from SANBS, WCBS and NBI ensures an ongoing platform for addressing ongoing and acute risks in transfusion medicine
  • SANBS had multiple meetings with NBI focusing on the impact of Covid-19, meeting and exceeding plasma targets, audit feedback and introduction of new products
  • Extensive collaboration with WCBS on the PROTECT-Donor and PROTECT-Patient clinical trials, various scientific publications, and ensuring a uniform approach to blood safety challenges such as Covid-19 vaccination, pathogen reduction low collections

SA AND INTERNATIONAL BLOOD PARTNERS: Local and International Health and Transfusion Medicine

Stakeholder Group

Local and International Health and Transfusion Medicine
Organisations, e.g.

  • WHO
  • ISBT
  • AfSBT
  • AABB
  • Sub-Saharan PBM
  • NICD
  • SASBT
  • SABM
  • SAGES

Regular engagement

Capitals

iHEALTh

Risks

Materiality Themes

Responsible

Executive Management

Current Relationship

trusted

Desired Relationship

Trusted

Needs, interests & expectations
  • Better understanding of African and resource constrained countries’ transfusion medicine needs
  • Appreciation of the role of blood transfusion services as a cornerstone of healthcare delivery in South Africa
  • Input from SANBS in developing transfusion medicine related guidelines
Key Risks

  • Lack of SANBS representation in key local and international decision making affecting blood service delivery
  • Inability to influence the strategic vision of organisations affecting blood service delivery
Opportunities

  • Showcase the work of SANBS at conferences and in publications of these organisations
  • Improve SANBS reputation as a centre of excellence globally
  • Continuous quality improvement through participation in expert committees
SANBS Response
  • Actively encourage participation of staff in diverse array of working parties, societies and organisations
  • Supporting staff to take leading roles in the various organisations
Status of Current Engagements
  • SANBS staff are members of a number of international societies, expert committees and working parties
  • Collectively, SANBS staff contributed to multiple international peer-reviewed publications in collaboration with various working parties with two staff members invited to co-write international book chapters
  • SANBS participated in the African Blood Regulators Forum, and it is envisaged that SANBS will be able to provide technical support to the forum
  • A WHO working group was established to address PBM implementation in Africa as part of the “WHO Action framework to advance universal access to safe, effective and quality assured blood products” to which SANBS was invited to participate

Media

Stakeholder Group

MEDIA
Ongoing engagement
impacts society at large

Capitals

iHEALTh

Risks

Materiality Themes

Responsible

Chief Marketing Officer

Current Relationship

Trusted

Desired Relationship

Trusted

Needs, interests & expectations
  • Reputation/goodwill
  • Education and awareness
  • Accurate and effective communication
  • Public Image
Key Risks

  • Negative publicity
  • Poor brand value and reputation
  • Poor communications to stakeholders
Opportunities

  • Positive brand value
  • Increased positive coverage
  • Free airtime – social media platforms
  • Bloggers
SANBS Response
  • Formal media strategy
  • Communication plan and delegated spokesperson
  • Social media policy
  • Thought leadership programme
  • Authentic brand ambassadors
Status of Current Engagements
  • Continuous media engagement in the last year
  • Tier 1 and Tier 2 media relationships favourable
  • Social media has become key to communicate with our donors during the Covid-19 pandemic
  • Increasing PR value
  • Media lists compiled and referenced on the database
  • Media drop offs during campaigns

The SANBS has always valued the contributions of our diverse stakeholders. Through robust engagement, we empower them to assist us in achieving our goals, mitigating risks and optimising opportunities.

 Stakeholder engagement is monitored by the Governance, Social and Ethics Committee.