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Winner: Comprehensive Workplace Programs
REGION: SUB-SAHARAN AFRICA
INDUSTRY TYPE: FINANCIAL SERVICES
WEBSITE: www.standardbank.co.za
In 2001, Standard Bank began developing an HIV/AIDS policy, surveying its staff to help steer the program’s direction. The company now provides an HIV/AIDS nondiscrimination policy, a temporary and total incapacity benefit, peer education, on-site clinical and family planning services, VCT, regular health-risk assessments of employees, and HIV/AIDS treatment.
Goals
To ensure all Standard Bank staff are encouraged to ‘know their status,’ reduce stigma and ignorance around health in general and HIV/AIDS specifically, and ensure HIV positive staff access to proper treatment and monitoring.
Program Scope
The program not only affects Standard Bank’s 39,800 African employees, but also their immediate families— reaching a total of 160,000 people. The Bank now has 450 Wellness Champions in South Africa, and 265 Champions from the rest of Africa. Standard Bank’s HIV/AIDS Workplace Programme is implemented and managed by the Corporate Health department, based at the Group’s head quarters in Johannesburg. It currently spends ZAR60million a year on its Wellness Programme.
Outcomes
- Standard Bank’s research indicates that by keeping senior staff and management healthy, thereby avoiding high turnover, it saves between ZAR300,000 ($40,000) and ZAR750,000 ($100,000) per senior employee each year.
- Bankmed, Standard Bank South Africa’s official medical aid, facilitated the taking of health risk assessments with 16,000 Standard Bank staff members in 2006 and 15,000 the following year.
- The temporary and total incapacity (TTI) benefit enables individuals to receive 75% of their normal income (for up to 24 months) for the time it takes them to recuperate. In the first half of 2007, 23% of all TTI cases were HIV related.
Standard Bank is a South African-based financial services company with a global presence. It operates in 16 countries in Africa and 20 countries on other continents. The Group’s operations include personal and business banking, corporate and investment banking, investment management, and life insurance.
THE WINNING PROGRAM
The comprehensive and integrated nature of Standard Bank’s HIV/AIDS Management program makes it exceptional. Rolled out in 2002, it is now the most comprehensive in Africa. By incorporating its HIV/AIDS program into its larger workplace wellness strategy, the Bank reaches nearly 40,000 employees across 16 African countries, as well as their immediate families, and has succeeded in stabilizing HIV prevalence in its workplace.
After conducting a baseline survey of employees’ knowledge, attitudes, perceptions and behaviors (KAPB), Standard Bank realized that stigma would be a significant barrier to a successful HIV/AIDS workplace program. To address this, the Bank integrated HIV/AIDS into its Life-Threatening Diseases Policy, protecting staff from discrimination, and trained managers and internal Wellness Champions on HIV/AIDS.
The Bank provides its employees free access to vital health support services, such as on-site clinics (in South Africa), voluntary counseling and testing (VCT), subsidized special care programs for HIV-positive employees, and education and awareness campaigns. It also encourages employees to become “Wellness Champions”—peer educators who are knowledgeable, and can be vocal, on HIV/AIDS issues. This multifaceted approach encourages employees to get tested and, if they test positive, to take advantage of counseling and treatment.
CRITICAL SUCCESS FACTORS
Comprehensive Educational Programming in the Workplace
Through the Bridges of Hope program, Wellness Champions act as peer educators in the workplace, encouraging their co-workers to get tested and manage the virus effectively should they test positive. A number of other platforms contribute to the comprehensive nature of the Bank’s program: a “Know Your
Status” campaign via internal bank television and the staff magazine, and training for management on HIV/AIDS.
Central Management Training
Management and senior staff are educated about the Bank’s policy through its Global Leadership Centre, a world class in-house center offering development and training courses for executive staff, as well as through other resources such as independent counseling and services.
BROADLY APPLICABLE PRINCIPLES
Addressing Gender Reduces Risk Factors for Women
The Bank provides employees and their families access to family planning services and information about sexually transmitted infections and mother-to-child transmission of HIV. Efforts also address domestic violence, a significant factor in the high prevalence of HIV, especially among South African women.
Internal HIV/AIDS Champions Reduce Stigma
By leveraging 715 trained peer educators—Wellness Champions— the Bank has been able to effectively spread messages about HIV testing and treatment to the bank’s nearly 40,000 employees through open discussion of the disease.