Your digest

Register for live seminars to help manage back-to-school stress and anxiety:

No doubt, the start of this school year is filled with uncertainties that are causing stress for many parents and caretakers. Whether you are feeling anxious about your kids returning to school during a pandemic, or taking on additional responsibilities as an educator, we have a number of resources, including two new live seminars on this topic to help.

We’ve added a new section on your employee wellness portal dedicated to supporting working parents and caregivers. This page is your one-stop-shop for tips, videos, articles and registration for live workshops. You can also access to our employee assistance program directly from this page to seek support from licensed professionals. If you are feeling anxious, we hope that you will sign-up for one of our two new live seminars with our EAP partner, compysch, specifically on helping parents and caregivers cope with pandemic anxiety as kids return to school:

• Register for the seminar on Monday, September 14 at 1 p.m. ET
• Register for the seminar on Thursday, September 17 at 4 p.m. ET

Would you like more support? Contact us at thrive@blood.ca so we can understand what resources would be most helpful to you.

We’ve launched our new career site: On the frontlines or working virtually — every day our dedicated teams come to work to fulfill our promise to patients across Canada. We know how important hiring the right candidate is to ensure that we can continue to fulfill that promise. We are excited to share that we’ve revamped our career page to give hiring managers the tools they need to attract the best talent and to make it easier for potential candidates to explore job opportunities and start their meaningful career with Canadian Blood Services. Check out our page by heading to blood.ca/careers, and learn more about what improvements we made for applicants and hiring managers on Connect.

Cord blood collection resumes in Vancouver: Aligned with the public health decision to ease COVID-19 restrictions in most parts of British Columbia, and in consultation with clinicians, we resumed cord blood collection in Vancouver on Monday, August 17, 2020. Mothers who have registered to donate their babies’ cord blood at The BC Women’s Hospital and Health Centre in Vancouver will be able to do so from Monday to Friday during the day and evenings. Our partner hospitals have put appropriate physical distancing measures in place and will be taking every precaution, including the use of personal protective equipment so mothers have a safe and rewarding donor experience. Learn more on Connect.

Blood donors to honour one man’s community service: Those who knew Cody Allard were not surprised to learn that he had donated his organs upon his death, improving the lives of eight people. Cody, who died last year in a motorcycle crash at age 30, was well known for his community service. A special blood donation event will be held in his honour in Surrey, B.C. on August 19, the first anniversary of his death. “Cody was always keen to help others,” says his sister Alyssa Connelly, who organized the event. “There’s nothing he wouldn’t do for people. Read more about Cody’s devotion to helping others on blood.ca/stories.

Question of the day: What are we doing for donor diversity and inclusion? Will there be an assessment on the donor side and will donor questions be translated?

As the demographics in Canada change, the patient populations we serve also change. We recognize that donor diversity is critical to meeting the needs of Canada’s increasingly diverse patient populations, and inclusion is important to growing our donor base in key urban centers and is also important to improving the donor experience.

However, to succeed at increasing donor diversity, we must also focus on employee diversity, equity and inclusion. An inclusive workplace will not only improve access to talent and meet stakeholder expectations, it will also create a better employee experience by fostering a culture of inclusion that maximizes fairness and opportunity.

To date, the Diversity, Equity and Inclusion program has completed research with donors and non-donors that represent members of diverse communities in Canada. IPSOS has gathered both qualitative and quantitative input from members of diverse communities across Canada. Additionally, we have surveyed over 1,000 respondents across the country and interviewed over 150 individuals across three cities to support our work on the donor diversity side.

The results from this research is currently being analyzed to identify specific organizational deliverables that can improve our capabilities to attract and retain donors from diverse communities. With the learnings from this research we will better understand the barriers that have prevented donors from being part of Canada’s Lifeline. Also, based on the feedback we get from diverse donors, we will be able to determine the kind of improvements we make to our language services.

As this is ongoing, a project to enable and boost our existing capabilities to manage partnerships with diverse communities is underway. Currently, we are working with an indigenous consultancy group to develop an engagement strategy that is specifically focused on establishing relationships with indigenous communities.

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About your digest   

This digest will highlight the latest policy and employee support measures, resources to help you manage our new reality and original content like articles and videos to remind us that what we do matters.  No access to email? No problem — all this information and more can be found on blood.ca/employees from any device, no login required.     

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Have questions? Check out blood.ca/employees or email us at communications@blood.ca