Your Digest
Town hall Thursday, Jan. 19: Guest panelists and call for questions
The next town hall will be on Thursday, Jan. 19 from 1–2 p.m. ET. Our CEO, Dr. Graham Sher, will share organizational updates and respond to employee questions along with guest panelists: Jennifer Camelon, chief financial officer and vice-president, corporate services and Dr. Yasmin Razack, chief diversity officer. Please submit questions in advance to communications@blood.ca using the subject line ‘TOWN HALL’ or by using this anonymous form.
Participate in our latest employee experience survey
On Monday, team members across the country were invited to take part in our latest employee experience survey with a deep dive on communications preferences. The survey, open until Feb. 10, is an opportunity to hear directly from you to better understand your current experience and to learn about your communications preferences. To access the survey all employees will have received an email link from Dr. Graham Sher, sent from the address: noreply@qemailserver.com. You can also visit blood.ca/employeesurvey to participate. Staff may complete the survey during work hours on their office or home desktop computer, mobile device or tablet. Accommodations have been made with schedulers to enable frontline teams to do so. For more information, visit Connect or speak with your supervisor.
Black History Month event on Feb. 2 to focus on promoting the well-being of Black employees
To kick off Black History Month 2023, the DEI team has invited an external speaker, Dr. Bukola Salami, professor in the Faculty of Nursing at the University of Alberta, to present on the topic Promoting the well-being of Black people in the workplace. During her talk on Feb. 2 (12:30–2 p.m. ET), Dr. Salami will discuss topics including the history of anti-Black racism in Canada, the workplace and mental health experiences of Black people and the immigrant health effect. She will also share guidance on how to create and foster a work environment that supports and promotes the well-being of Black employees. Register before 5 p.m. ET on Feb. 1 to receive an Outlook invitation for this session. Employees can also submit questions for Dr. Salami when they register.
So you think you can’t donate? Check to be sure, to help us help patients
After a donor has been indefinitely deferred, they may miss important updates to our criteria that allow them to resume donating blood or plasma. In fact, in the last few months alone, around 500 callers to 1 888 2 DONATE — all of whom thought they’d likely never be able to donate again — learned they were eligible because of an update. You can check out some of the recent updates and important facts about eligibility at blood.ca, and share them with people in your network. You could inspire the next happy call to our hotline and help us fill appointments this winter.
Question of the day
Do we have a solution for last minute cancellations of appointments due to COVID, flu or not feeling well? What are our contingency plans?
Last minute cancellations and no-shows are a serious concern for Canadian Blood Services as this leaves us with vacant appointments. Those missed donations affect our collection numbers and the national blood and plasma supply.
When in-week cancellations exceed expected volumes, we adjust various levers (in isolation or in combination) to help maintain the required weekly appointment volumes.
Tools we use to mitigate the impact of late cancellations include:
- Same-day donor recruitment of target donors at fixed donor centres.
- Notifications to blood.ca and SMS texts with targeted messaging.
- Adjusting or temporarily increasing NCC resource support for in-week donor recruitment.
Our processes also include a regular review of the national standard appointment booking templates and national decisions regarding any temporary, targeted adjustments. This is because adjustments can generate unfavourable outcomes for donor flow should donor show rates increase.
Although at times we experience disruptions to donor attendance, we remain confident in the collections planning process we have in place to ensure that hospitals and patients receive the blood and blood products they need.
