Journey to non-typical career path breaks bias
Lines firm opens doors for women
International Women’s Day is celebrated on March 8 every year, which makes it the perfect opportunity to showcase a young woman in our community who has qualified in what could be called a nontraditional career.
Madison Harvey grew up on a lifestyle block in Raetihi, before moving with her family to Foxton at 8 years old.
Attending Horowhenua College for her secondary education, Harvey decided in Year 12 that she was done with studying, so after gaining her level 2 qualification by midyear she told her parents she wanted to leave.
“My parents said if I could show them a [job] contract then I could leave school,” said Harvey, “so I approached my boss at Hessels and asked for fulltime work.”
Fresh out of high school, Harvey became a farm manager at Hessels Poultry Farm in Foxton, a role she worked in for the next couple of years, before considering another career move.
Having always had a passion for makeup, and being in demand to do ball and wedding makeup for friends and family, Harvey had just enrolled in a beauty therapy course, when a friend told her that his work had a job opportunity she might like to consider. “He told me that Electra was looking to employ a female line mechanic and that I should chuck an application in.”
So, four years ago Harvey made the leap to another nontypical role, with New Zealand’s ninth largest lines company, and hasn’t regretted it, becoming a qualified line mechanic early last year.
“I loved the fact that it was predominately hands-on, on the job training, and I couldn’t have asked for a better starting crew of guys — really supportive and encouraging,” Harvey said.
Being the only female line mechanic at the company had some challenges initially, from what to do when you need to go to the toilet on site, to building up physical strength, although it only took Harvey a couple of months to get to the correct strength and fitness for the job, as she was already ‘farm fit’.
Harvey is excited by the opportunities and choices a career with Electra offers and encourages any other women looking at becoming a trainee in the electricity supply industry to not be intimidated and just go for it.
“You work with so many interesting people and you’ll meet a team of people on the block courses [as part of your training] that you’ll become good mates with,” she said.
With the theme for International Women’s Day in 2022 being Break The Bias, K a¯ pi ti Horowhenua’ s Electra is helping to make this happen.
I loved the fact that it was predominately hands-on, on the job training, and I couldn’t have asked for a better starting crew of guys Madison Harvey