Your Digest

Missed yesterday’s town hall? Watch the recording now

During the Jan. 19 CEO town hall, Graham shared insights on collections and weather impacts, our latest employee survey and updates on our diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) strategy and action plan. He and guest panelists, Jennifer Camelon, chief financial officer and vice-president, corporate services and Dr. Yasmin Razack, chief diversity officer, also responded to employee questions on topics including DEI incident reporting, our strategic plan, cybersecurity and more. In case you missed it, you can watch the recording on our employee portal. 

Curious about what’s coming up in DEI? Learn more and get involved on Connect

At yesterday’s employee town hall, some of you asked about how to access diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) resources, information and learning opportunities. We recently embarked on a major refresh of the DEI section of Connect and have a new page dedicated to information about DEI and Indigenization workshops, events and resources. While visiting this page, you can watch the recording from the DEI team’s recent workshop on workplace allyship, register for the Black History Month and Black health promotion session on Feb. 2, check out the calendar of upcoming events, explore past event recordings and access other resources. You can also learn more about the new Diversity 101 e-learning module, which is now available on LMS. The DEI workshops page will be updated often, so be sure to bookmark and check back regularly for new learning and engagement opportunities. 

Wishing Dr. Dana Devine well as she announces her retirement

Canadian Blood Services’ esteemed chief scientist, Dr. Dana Devine, is retiring at the end of this fiscal year. During her career, Dana has provided critical scientific leadership to the Canadian blood system and to the field of transfusion medicine internationally. She has been with Canadian Blood Services from the very beginning and has been a pillar of this organization since that time. Dana has contributed immense knowledge, strong leadership and an amazingly generous spirit when it came to mentorship and helping others grow their careers. Her retirement will be deeply felt by those who worked closest with her and by all of us here at Canadian Blood Services. We wish Dana all the very best. Read more about her incredible career and her contributions to the blood system here. 

Question of the day

In collections, we are still currently wiping down the information pamphlets after donors have read them, but most other COVID precautions have been lifted. Why are we still wiping down the pamphlets?

We are constantly reviewing our COVID-19 measures and guidelines and adjusting practices as appropriate.  The collections and facilities teams have reviewed our existing cleaning measures and have determined that some practices that we introduced during the pandemic — such as cleaning the donor beds after every use— were reasonable to maintain as regular practice in our operations moving forward.

The teams have operationalized the cleaning measures that they see fit to maintain and this has been reflected in the cleaning and disinfection guidelines in the collections supervisors’ playbook. We are removing the enhanced cleaning guide that outlined the additional measures that are no longer relevant – such as wiping pamphlets after every use. Laminated donor pamphlets will now be cleaned as needed.

You can expect to see these changes implemented by January 27. If you have further questions, please speak with your supervisor.