Dominion Biologicals Limited

Dominion Biologicals Limited

By John MacEache

What got us involved with Light The Night from an organizational standpoint, was asking ourselves “what can we really do?”, instead of just checking a box or putting a rubber stamp on something for branding purposes. We knew what we were doing work-wise was important, and we wanted to be able to tie that together. We have a lot of plants in the US, and one thing that was common regardless of where you were was Light The Night. Blood disease is real, no matter if you’re in Canada, US, Europe, it doesn’t matter. So when we looked at that we really jumped on that. I think that a lot of people at work had a good feel from the fact that we were not just rubber stamping, and it’s something we can really get involved with. And dealing with you has been a significant change for us too because now there’s been real interaction. You would drop by to visit, and check to see how we’re doing, and you got involved with what we were doing. I think there’s a lot more involvement with not just the cause, but the people who are coordinating it.

Our staff are very creative. They’ve always been creative with regard to how to get the job done, and how do we get things done faster with continual improvement to be able to meet regulatory demands. But it’s always kind of been about the work, which is good for work, but not necessarily great for employees as well. Because it’s all bang, bang, bang, work right? When we started with Light The Night, it was another way of bringing staff together for a different reason. In the past, you would do some charity stuff like “let’s just give finance to write a cheque” or whatever, and it didn’t really do anything to bring the staff together. With Light The Night, it’s a lot more tangible actually because of what we’re doing at work. We’re manufacturing reagents for blood transfusions, bone marrow transplants, organ transplantation. So with Light The Night it definitely as a tie into what we’re doing, which I think makes them more interested in getting involved in it. There has been a significant morale boost in changing attitudes since we got involved with Light The Night, with you coming to that town hall and bringing light to the whole subject. We’ve seen staff come out of the blue and say “I got an idea for fundraising”, “are you doing this again this year?”, or “I’d like to help out”. And then there’s the whole actual walk part of it, where I took lots of pictures last year and showed them all to the staff who couldn’t make it and they were blown away. There’s a lot more people coming from different departments on this now, and this fundraising that we’re doing crosses all of that and takes down those barriers. I think it’s actually made us a lot closer. It’s just been fun to do. And I think it’s challenging people to think in different ways too, and they’re getting really involved in it. I think it’s changed our community feeling within the organization.