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Republic - The Power to Make it Happen
The power to make things happen
Nadia Williams, Social Investment Officer, is proud to be part of the team and infrastructure that develop financial and societal health among citizens through social interventions, under the pillars of ‘Power to Help,, ‘Power to Care’, ‘Power to Learn’, and ‘Power to Succeed’. She shares her journey of 22 years with the Bank.
This bank is about building successful societies everywhere we operate. In Trinidad and Tobago, Guyana, Barbados, Grenada and recently, Suriname, we hope to achieve alignment of our social investment interventions across the region. As a group, we amplify impacts and build the strength of the programmes. We believe that despite economic constraints, we must make a difference in society.
I started with Republic Bank when I was 18 as a Youth Link apprentice, graduating as valedictorian of the cohort of 1995. I became a permanent employee in 1998; since then I have worked in numerous departments within the bank. I am convinced of the purpose of the Bank’s power to make a difference, its commitment to giving back and building success with customers through relationships.
Making a difference
The current social responsibility commitment ‘Power to Make a Difference’ was developed 15 years ago. It rests on four pillars:
1. Power to help: facilitating investment, poverty alleviation and assistance for the socially marginalized;
2. Power to care: health, concern for the elderly and differently abled;
3. Power to learn: youth development, education, culture and the arts;
4. Power to succeed: sport and the environment.
These pillars have defined the criteria by which applications for sponsored projects are selected and approved. While assistance and contributions are regularly spread over all the pillars, significant social investments are focused on single pillars in five-year phases.
The first focus (2004 to 2008) was on poverty alleviation and the second (2008 – 2012) was caring for the differently abled.
The ‘Power to Learn’, the theme for the current phase, is being effected through various projects, such as a partnership with Trinidad & Tobago National Commission for UNESCO and the Ministry of Education, with the bulk of the financing in this five-year period aimed at increasing literacy among infants. The programme is refreshing the way reading skills are taught; and includes training for teachers and principals. A component for parents focuses on creating a literate environment for raising children. Developed by the Commission, the programme has built-in metrics and also allows teachers to build inter-school networks. By the end of the five years, some 200 schools will have benefitted from the training, which encourages participants to become mentors across the primary school system.
In a five-year period, approximately 40% of funding might go to the focus programmes. Such programmes don’t necessarily end after the designated period. In the Transplant Links (‘Power to Care’) programme, Republic facilitated a team of English doctors to perform kidney transplants, for children across the region. Working with teams of local doctors, these visits helped to build local competencies. The Bank now has a nine-year relationship with Transplant Links and there have been 26 successful transplants. There’s also a nine-year relationship with Hope of a Miracle Foundation, which facilitates other critical surgeries for children with a hospital in the USA.
During the Power to Care phase the Helen Bhagwansingh Diabetes Education Research and Prevention Institute (DERPI) and its programme for screening in schools took root, providing interventions for children at risk, as well as promoting healthy lifestyle changes in their families. DERPI facilitates education changes so that children learn about diabetes in schools. More recently the programme has advocated that schools stop having sweet soda drinks sold on their premises.
The Power to Make a Difference was formally introduced in 2004 with the aim of investing TT$52 million in social programmes over the period 2004 to 2008. In the second phase of this programme, our committed investment was TT$100 million. In the third phase, 2014 to 2018, we have committed TT$ 110 million.
Volunteerism and employee passion
An important component of the ‘Power to Make a Difference’ (PMAD) is employee volunteerism. Any employee with the passion to make a difference can propose a project. Once such projects are accepted for funding in the PMAD programme, other employees may choose to work alongside the employee, branch or unit to help achieve the targets.
Through the volunteerism programme, employees have worked with Habitat for Humanity to build homes in Tobago, Valencia, Carapichaima and other under-served areas.
Volunteer projects also invite young persons from schools (which may be beneficiaries of other social investment projects) to volunteer on staff projects. The volunteer groups thus created are multi-generational teams from all sectors, including community members, customers and staff. Students are grateful for the opportunities of volunteerism, and staff who are parents are encouraged and happy to bring their children to such events.
Corporate Social Responsibility is vested in the Executive Management team of Republic Bank. Once projects are selected, they are assigned to the relevant member who becomes a champion. Each assignment includes briefs and introductions to the NGOs or charities and becomes part of the team member’s portfolio.
Our outreach to a younger generation is considered and we act on it with deliberate focus. Secondary school graduates every year are invited to become apprentices through the Youth Link Apprenticeship Programme. We are aware of the issues facing each generation and have assisted in school and community campaigns to combat these issues. We understand how powerful it is for children to talk to their peers about values.
Social investment is and has always been an integral part of Republic Bank’s DNA. But investment is a shared activity as Republic sees it. The organisation encourages communities to get involved in identifying and participating in the resolution of issues; but also to support those interventions by building a system of ethics that will endure. In the spirit of mutuality, Republic believes that it “must help struggling communities enhance the quality of life for themselves and for future generations” because when communities prosper, business does well and the economy grows stronger.
Today, Republic Bank, a 180-year old institution holds its position as the premier bank in Trinidad and Tobago, and has expanded to Grenada, Guyana, Barbados, Suriname, the Cayman Islands and Ghana. Its flexibility and agility, its market position and customer loyalty, are hard-won and are now consciously and conscientiously expanded by core values which place customer and society at the centre of its strategies. The CSR programme, fittingly labeled The ‘Power to Make a Difference’, reflects the bank’s ethos in developing a healthy society through relationships that assist in putting disadvantaged persons on their feet.
