To my fellow medtech leaders
At the final 2021 SAMED member meeting, I shared SAMED’s 2022 vision i.e.
“Partnering with our stakeholders to drive the medical technology industry to new frontiers and contribute towards enabling a sustainable healthcare system.”
and a snapshot of our Association’s planned strategic initiatives.
Transformation of the Medtech sector and our society is a moral, ethical and economic imperative. It is the fundamental backbone underpinning SAMED’s 2022 strategy and is key to unlocking increased growth and sustainability of our sector.
This is our opportunity to raise the bar and show our commitment to our partners-in-healthcare, be it Parliamentary Portfolio Committees, National and Provincial Departments of Health, the Ministries of Trade, Industry and Competition, Labour and Employment, South African Health Products Regulatory Authority, Private Procurers including the Private Hospitals and others, the wider African community and the aspiring youth of our nation.
SAMED is working on a medtech sector-wide skills development initiative and is investigating employing a YES candidate who can support the association’s transformation activities (side note here, to any member company who is keen to sponsor this YES candidate, please reach out to Tanya Vogt).
At the meeting, SAMED launched two incredibly momentous CHALLENGES to you, the LEADERS IN MEDTECH.
- The SAMED CEO Forum
The first of its kind at SAMED. This will be a dedicated platform for SAMED member company leaders to share, learn and lead, through focused dialogue on the transformation of the South African medtech industry.
Change is led from the top. Change-makers and ‘wannabees’ – we challenge and invite you to share your vision, your experience, passion and hesitations around transformation. This forum will invite leaders and change-makers from other industries to share their strategies and ideas with the medtech sector.
The SAMED CEO forum aims to keep peers aligned on industry initiatives and developments – sharing innovations that can be implemented across companies. The forum also aims to provide leaders with less expertise with a network of peers to learn from and be inspired to make meaningful changes in their organisations.
We are calling on all SAMED leaders, from large, medium to small and micro enterprises to contact the office (transformation@samed.org.za) and join the SAMED CEO forum.
Let’s become the change-makers that our sector and our beloved South Africa needs.
- The SAMED CEO Challenge
SAMED partnered with the Youth Employment Service (YES) in August. The YES programme tackles youth unemployment by facilitating first work opportunities. These youth can be placed internally or sponsored at several health outreach projects. This valuable experience helps them to be absorbed into participating companies or to find employment elsewhere.
To further support this partnership, SAMED is issuing a CEO challenge – a challenge for change! We want to challenge SAMED member companies to sign up for the YES programme and become an instrumental part of improving the lives of youth, creating jobs and building the industry workforce.
The rules are simple:
- The challenge is issued – company leader to company leader. Please copy transformation@samed.org.za so that we can keep track and ensure the challenge is responded to and affirmative responses passed on to YES.
- The challenged leader’s company signs up to YES and becomes a facilitator for change.
- The challenged leader then becomes the challenger and must nominate another industry peer to join YES.
It is our hope that this CEO Challenge spreads beyond SAMED members and encourages the entire sector to say YES to youth employment, capacitating the healthcare sector and transforming the industry and effectively ending South African youth unemployment.
A tall challenge YES!
Don’t wait to be challenged! Get in touch with the SAMED team and become a YES challenger. SAMED will be publishing all accepted challenges on our website!
As your Chairperson, I issue the first challenge to my fellow Board members who have not yet signed up to YES.
Join me in leading this initiative and ensuring a meaningful contribution towards a transformed and sustainable South African medtech sector.
Your Chairperson
Marlon Burgess
