What Really Matters

Last year, a role came up here in Manawatū and I knew it was a step in my career that I needed to take. It was a massive decision for our family because my daughter was in her final year of school, and my husband, Rory, had a successful career in Canterbury. He agreed to resign from his role so I could progress my career. I’m incredibly lucky to have such a courageous and supportive man.

I know there are a lot of men who wouldn’t do what he did. We’ve always had a real fifty-fifty partnership all the way in our relationship. My husband and I are born and bred South Islanders. His family were sheep and beef farmers from South Otago and Rory and I met many years ago when he was halfway through an Ag Science degree at Lincoln. We’ve been together ever since and now we have two kids – Georgie, who is now nineteen, and Sam, who is twenty-one.

When I think about personal development in my career, I was often my own worst enemy. I was always telling myself that I couldn’t do things. It wasn’t until 2016, when I had the opportunity to do the Agri-Women’s Development Trust programme ‘Escalator’ that I realised there was no one telling me that I couldn’t do something – except me. It gave me the permission I needed to spend ten months figuring out what really mattered. The journey since has been challenging and sometimes difficult. It takes time, effort and reflection to change habits, and I have to regularly stop myself reverting back to old and unhelpful ways.

I’m now in my twelfth year of working for FMG. Since moving to Manawatū, I’ve been promoted into a new role that allows me to support a larger team. I love the work that I do and that it really connects me to the ag sector. I’ve been really lucky in my career – I have always been given the time I needed to do the important things with the kids so that I didn’t miss out on too much – but that doesn’t mean it was easy.

My memory of when my kids were small was just forever being busy! I was always moving from one thing to the next – and it wouldn’t be until nine or ten at night that I would sit down. I absolutely adore my kids, but I do think that when you’re a mum and you have a career it’s a constant battle, and you often feel like you aren’t doing either as well as you would like! If I’ve taken anything away from my experiences as a working mum, it would be that I wish I hadn’t been so hard on myself. I often tried to do it all on my own when I should have been putting my hand up and asking for help.

It’s a real juggle and I have real empathy for mothers in the workforce today, because I think people can forget just how tricky it can be. Now that I’m in a leadership role, I try to give my team as much support as I can because I know what it feels like when you are on that ladder. At the end of the day, mothers can’t ever turn off motherhood – so I try to give my team the flexibility they need to manage their career and family at the same time. I think when you support people like that, you get a lot in return.

Moving to Manawatū, I’ve realised that you can’t take your networks for granted and assume they’ll always be there. I’m more aware of my connections now than ever. Every week I reach out to a few people who I know have something going on for them, to check in and see how they are and see how such and such went. Every time I talk to someone, I try to remember something about them. Often, people won’t remember what you say but they’ll remember how you made them feel. AWDT’s Escalator helped me to realise that my gut has never let me down. So often in the past I have second guessed myself. But I’ve learnt now that you can’t go too far wrong when what you do comes from your heart.

This story appeared in the Takurua Winter 2021 Edition of Shepherdess.