Human capital and transformation

AfroCentric was founded on the philosophy of empowerment and transformation. We are committed to empowering our people by investing in training to meet current and future business needs. In addition, we believe that highly skilled and motivated employees are vital in delivering the Group's strategy.

Empowerment is likewise a critical imperative. Our commitment to transformation stems from a deep commitment to sustainable development – not only within the healthcare sector, but in our wider operating environment. Furthermore, being an empowered company enables the recruitment and retention of skilled employees aligned with the Group's vision.

IMPLEMENTATION OF THE
ACTFIRST CULTURE TRANSFORMATION JOURNEY

INVESTED
R10.7 MILLION
IN EMPLOYEE TRAINING
(2020: R4.5 million)

3 038 EMPLOYEES COMPLETED THE VOICE OF THE EMPLOYEE SURVEY, WITH AN OVERALL SCORE OF
82.50%

WE LOST 19 EMPLOYEES
WHO SUCCUMBED TO COVID-19 RELATED COMPLICATIONS SINCE THE BEGINNING OF THE FIRST NATIONAL LOCKDOWN

MAINTAINED OUR
B-BBEE LEVEL 1 RATING (2020: Level 1)

MENTAL HEALTH
AROSE AS A MATERIAL HUMAN CAPITAL THEME ACROSS THE GROUP WITHIN THE CURRENT CONTEXT

Employee culture journey

To remain an employer of choice, we seek to drive a desired culture across the Group. Therefore, priority has been placed on developing strong leadership competence supporting a high‑performance culture while ensuring a highly skilled, engaged, and healthy workforce.

IMPLEMENTATION OF THE ACT FIRST CULTURE TRANSFORMATION JOURNEY

Strong Exco focus, commitment and buy-in
Well-defined culture roadmap
Well-functioning change leadership task team
Active group of staff change agents
Values reboot roll out exercise (Values ReENACT)
Human Capital team initiatives in support of a strong culture included:
- Formal leadership development programmes
- Implementation of the Grow Coaching Model
- LeadStrong Leadership Competency Model (LCM) 360 degree assessment
- Formal career planning
- Scarce and critical skills assessment
- Succession management planning

10 POSITIVE CHANGE AGENTS IDENTIFIED ACROSS THE GROUP

Employee engagement

A key driver in building a strong culture is to maintain high levels of employee engagement. We utilise surveys to gain an understanding of matters that are top of mind for our employees.

The Voice of the Employee survey was a Group-wide initiative, including subsidiaries and entities that:

Measured employees' perception against key engagement drivers
Identified key positive drivers, including strengths in:
- Supporting our leaders in managing hybrid teams and a high-performance culture
- Driving a values-based culture
- Building levels of employee engagement

3 038 EMPLOYEES COMPLETED THE SURVEY WITH AN OVERALL SCORE OF 82.50%

We sought to enhance authentic leadership engagements through more frequent and less curated communication from our leaders.

27 UPDATES
DURING THE YEAR

We administered pulse surveys in the Medscheme business unit as a pilot programme, this entailed:

Monthly measure of what employees are thinking or feeling (levels of engagement)
High levels of interest and response rates
Excellence recognised by using our Single Service Measure Awards

Skills development

We are committed to developing our people to create a high-performance culture that enables the achievement of our strategic objectives. The Group provides comprehensive learning and development opportunities, an employee wellness programme and other upliftment opportunities.

ONLINE LEARNING

FROM JULY 2020 TO JUNE 2021, 247 ONLINE COURSES
WERE UNDERTAKEN BY 3 816 EMPLOYEES

The AfroCentric Online Academy offers online training. Employees have constant access to legislative courses, Company policies and functional training courses.

LEADERSHIP DEVELOPMENT

31 LEADERS STUDYING TOWARDS A FURTHER EDUCATION AND TRAINING CERTIFICATE: GENERIC MANAGEMENT NQF4 LEARNERSHIP AND 13 LEADERS STUDYING TOWARDS A NATIONAL CERTIFICATE: GENERIC MANAGEMENT NQF5 LEARNERSHIP

Leadership development remains a key priority within the Group as part of our cultural transformation journey that started in 2019. The AfroCentric Leadership Competency Model, encompassing our five leadership competencies of ownership, credibility, influence, collaboration and entrepreneurship, drive our leadership behaviours across the Group. Leadership Competency Enablement workshops, Grow Coaching workshops and Lessons in Leadership sessions took place for all leaders across the Group to continue to educate our leaders on those competencies required of an AfroCentric leader.

Through our accredited Learning and Performance Academy, we promote a culture of learning and provide opportunities for leaders to take part in one of our two Team Leader curriculum or one Line Manager curriculum intakes throughout the year.

SKILLS DEVELOPMENT

R3.6 MILLION
INVESTED TOWARDS DEVELOPING DIFFERENTLY‑ABLED PEOPLE

During the past financial year, both Sector Education and Training Authority and industry-funded learnership initiatives were implemented and prioritised across the Group.

AfroCentric Health worked with two groups of unemployed learners with disabilities through Business Beyond Boundaries, hosting 72 learners offsite.

AfroCentric Health hosted an additional eight learners.

LEARNERSHIPS AND BURSARIES

124 EMPLOYEESAND 129 UNEMPLOYED
YOUTH PARTICIPATED IN LEARNERSHIP PROGRAMMES

The programmes help candidates earn qualifications and gain valuable working experience.

In the past financial year, we invested in bursaries for four black female medical students. As a result, one student is currently undertaking her fifth year of studies at Sefako Makgatho Health Science University while three students are undertaking their fourth year at the University of Pretoria.

Employee wellbeing

We recognise that employees feel more competent and valued when their holistic needs are catered for, including physical, mental, and financial.

Since the initial COVID-19 lockdown in South Africa, AfroCentric has been monitoring its COVID-19 infection rate closely.

To date, 530 employees of the 562 who tested positive have recovered fully. Unfortunately, one employee was diagnosed with COVID Long Haul and is on temporary disability. Regrettably, we lost 19 employees who succumbed to COVID-19 related complications since the onset of the pandemic.

Health screening has also assisted in managing the overall health of our employees. Data availability is enabled through the usage of our Health App, which assists the organisation in being proactive in advancing interventions for our employees.

1 021 EMPLOYEES TESTED ACROSS THE GROUP

AfroCentric continues to offer emotional and medical support through the monthly COVID-19 support groups facilitated by professional therapists and medical practitioners.

1 335 EMPLOYEES PARTICIPATED IN SUPPORT GROUPS

A vaccination educational drive is ongoing across the Group to encourage employee vaccination.

1 698 EMPLOYEES VACCINATED AS PART OF EARLY FRONTLINE WORKER VACCINATION ROLL OUT AND 46% OF OUR EMPLOYEES HAVE BEEN VACCINATED TO DATE.

Our business model innovations are aligned to help us deliver services using automated platforms, virtual interfaces and digital services. In addition, automation of business processes is assisting in moving our employees to areas where they can add more value.

Medscheme implemented a work-from-home pilot project to assess the viability of a permanent work-from-home model. The project will now be rolled out to the Group.

1 179 EMPLOYEES ARE WORKING FROM HOME AS PART OF THE MEDSCHEME WORK-FROM-HOME PILOT

In the current context, both physical and mental health became critical areas of focus across the business. As a result, enhancements in support, communication and education have been pursued. In addition, mental health services have been made available to our employees and their families.

MENTAL HEALTH CAMPAIGN THEMED "YOU ARE NOT ALONE"
WAS HELD TO ENCOURAGE AND SUPPORT EMPLOYEES DURING LOCKDOWN

Performance management

AfroCentric uses a balanced scorecard approach for performance management. The balanced scorecard provides the tools for management to drive competitive success. It translates the organisation's strategy into performance measures that provide the framework for a strategic measurement and management system. To be a progressive organisation, we continuously research best practice to build a high-performance culture.

When managing individual performance, we aim for a mutually beneficial environment where managers and employees share clear expectations and objectives from the outset. Employees participate in all phases of the performance management process and share ownership of the outcomes with the organisation.

Performance management process for permanent employees

Continuous conversations, feedback
and development

Managing performance is not an annual event but a continual process of feedback and collaboration. Performance discussions are therefore expected to cover more than simply performance ratings. Instead, leaders should have regular, meaningful conversations to close performance gaps and enable individuals to understand how their performance and behaviour link to the organisational strategy and how their contributions drive business growth.

Our performance management system aims to enable:

A streamlined performance management process to direct line manager's time from administrative activities to that of ongoing performance conversations
High-quality performance discussions, giving employees more frequent feedback and addressing performance gaps in real-time
The creation of a high-performance culture within the organisation
Employee lead performance management
Difficult conversations that drive positive change

Transformation and B-BBEE

As a black-owned company and the most transformed health-related business listed in South Africa, we are committed to corporate citizenship, driving transformation and upholding our social licence to operate. The Group invests in healthcare-related businesses and our contribution to healthcare extends beyond our products and services. Our social impact starts within the Group and extends to the suppliers and communities we directly impact and the broader society impacted by our health management initiatives.

B-BBEE creating opportunity while mitigating operating environment risk

The Group maintained a Level 1 B-BBEE contributor status

AfroCentric's transformation framework supports both national strategic priorities and our purpose of creating sustainable healthcare solutions to enhance our stakeholders' quality of life.

The degree of the Group's alignment of B-BBEE policies and practices to the requirements of the different transformation-related legislation in support of the South African Government's overall economic transformation includes, but is not limited to:

The National Development Plan 2030
The National Strategy for Broad-Based Black Economic Empowerment
The Revised Broad-Based Black Economic Empowerment Act 53 and related amendments
The Amended Codes of Good Practice on Broad-Based Black Economic Empowerment of 2013
The Employment Equity Amendment Act of 2014 and associated regulations
Skills Development Act and related Skills Development Levies Act
The Preferential Procurement Act

Element	Weighting	2021	2020	2019
Equity ownership	25.00	25.00	25.00	25.00
Management control	19.00	12.39	12.69	12.79
Skills development	25.00	14.97	20.10	18.24
Enterprise and supplier development	44.00	43.69	39.28	33.76
SED	5.00	5.00	5.00	4.53
Total	118.00	101.05	102.07	94.32
B-BBEE level		Level 1	Level 1	Level 3

ACT ownership profile (July 2020¹)	2021	2020	2019
Black exercisable voting rights	51.17	45.72	57.41
Black exercisable voting rights by black females	15.07	11.05	11.38
Black entitlement to economic interest	51.17	45.72	57.38
Entitlement to economic interest by black women	15.07	11.05	11.43
Economic interest that flows through to black designated groups	5.13	4.97	4.39
Involvement of ownership of the enterprise of black new entrants	2.58	2.14	2.08

¹	The 2020 B-BBEE verification certificate issued on 22 December 2020 is valid until 21 December 2021.