Safaricom - 2021 Sustainable Business Report

14 SAFARICOM SUSTAINABLE BUSINESS REPORT 2021 //// STANDING TOGETHER: GOING BEYOND / OUR MATERIAL TOPICS / OUR STAKEHOLDERS / KPI SUMMARY TOWARDS A CUSTOMER OBSESSED AND DIGITAL FIRST ORGANISATION Last year, we rolled out our new five-year strategy which spells out our vision of becoming a purpose-led technology company by 2025 and re-affirms our commitment to our purpose of transforming lives. One year later, we can proudly say that focus on our purpose and vision is leading to desirable results. In order to bring our vision to life, our mission is to establish a customer obsessed, digital first organisation by the end of financial year 2022. Customer obsession is our main effort and we are working to ensure that we fix the pain points in our customer journeys, resolve customer issues at the first point of contact and ensure safety for our customers when transacting on M-PESA. Our goal is to continue to deliver a wide range of products and services designed to present sustainable solutions to some of society’s most pressing challenges through being a digital-first and insights-led organisation. To support the achievement of our vision, we are evolving our organisation model towards becoming an agile organisation. We are changing our ways of working to ensure we are more agile in responding to the rapidly evolving needs of our customers. The Agile way of working will also ensure that our approach in developing products and solutions is in line with the needs of our customers. It will foster collaboration across the organisation, speed up decision making and bring us closer to our customers. I am pleased with the progress we have made so far, in transitioning the key product teams to the agile approach which is already having an impact in achieving collaboration and speed in responding to customer needs. We continue to integrate agile across the business. Our people are the driving force behind the delivery of the strategy. To build a future fit workforce, we will continue to invest in building capabilities for our people especially on key digital skills such as machine learning, IoT, Artificial Intelligence and Fintech. BEYOND 20 YEARS In October 2020, we marked our twentieth anniversary. Since inception, Safaricom has enjoyed tremendous success by leveraging the power of the mobile technology and innovation to transform lives. As we mark 20 years, I’m confident that we have embarked on the right strategy to pivot into the next twenty years and beyond. Our new strategy is anchored on four pillars – strengthening the core, becoming a fully-fledged financial services provider, winning in select digital ecosystems and staying prudent in our cost management to be able to fund a sustainable growth into the future which includes new markets and areas of business. These pillars will ensure that we run a holistic technology business for the future. These pillars will be enabled by five key strategic enablers including; people, Network and IT, partnerships, mergers and acquisitions and data and analytics. As we pursue new areas of growth, we will continue to solidify our market position through our traditional products such as voice and mobile data. Verticals such as agriculture, MSME focused opportunities and education amongst others will drive retention and continue to power our growth. We will also play a key role in driving healthcare inclusion and enabling smallholder farmers to become wealthier and commercially sustainable. At the start of the year, in partnership with our parent company Vodacom, we acquired the M-PESA brand, product development and support services via the newly formed M-PESA Africa joint venture. Through this, we plan to scale the success we have achieved on mobile money and payments by going beyond our borders to the rest of Africa. ACCELERATING OUR SUPPORT FOR SDGS IN THE DECADE OF ACTION The year 2020 marked the beginning of the Decade of Action which calls for reaffirmation of the global commitment through accelerated efforts and sustainable solutions to the world’s biggest challenges. These range from eradicating poverty, reducing gender inequality and addressing climate change. Despite the progress made in the implementation of the Sustainable Development Goals, globally we are behind on most of the targets. The private sector and businesses like ours will need to step up our contribution and support to the SDGs, if we are to close the gap by 2030. Mobile technology contributes to SDG 9 - Industry Innovation and Infrastructure, significantly both as a provider of critical infrastructure and as a catalyst for other sectors; by providing connectivity solutions and platforms which other businesses can leverage to scale their products and services. Moreover, the industry fosters the research and development of cutting-edge technology and services, enabled by the low latency and high bandwidths that technologies such as 5G provide. We remain focused in our sustainability agenda covering key issues such as addressing our impact on the climate and building an inclusive business that not only meets the needs of our customers, but also reflects the diverse nature of our society. Last year we made progress in some areas such as our target to grow 5 million trees in 5 years as part of our carbon offset program. I am pleased with the approach we have taken to streamline diversity targets across all functions in the business “Since inception, Safaricom has enjoyed tremendous success by leveraging the power of the mobile technology and innovation to transform lives.”