Mentoring our wāhine career recruits
The Women’s Development team is piloting a mentorship programme with wāhine career recruits.
Update: 18 June 2024
We advised in April that the Women’s Development team would be piloting a mentorship programme with wāhine career recruits and this has now started.
The purpose of the mentorship pilot is to assist and support wāhine career firefighters through their successful completion of the recruitment process, the recruits’ course and their first six months on station.
Women’s Development National Manager, Barbara Olah said following a call for expressions of interest from our wāhine career firefighters who would like to be mentors, there has been great progress.
‘We are delighted with the response we have had from mentors and mentees. So far, we have offered the opportunity to 31 potential mentees and 21 have opted into the pilot and have been matched with mentors. Most of the mentoring relationships are distance relationships at this stage but we have three mentees who asked if it was possible to have a mentor in the same area, and we have been able to make that possible.
‘It was an unexpected but really nice surprise to find out from the career wāhine firefighters how much it meant to them to have the chance to network with this many of their peers as they had never had the opportunity before.’
Barb said two training days have been held, one at Woolston and one at Mt Wellington, which was attended by 19 mentors.
‘We asked them what motivated them to be part of the pilot and they said, ‘to set them (mentees) up for success’, to ‘help others’, and to ‘put myself out there’.
‘Evaluation of the pilot has begun, first with evaluating the mentor training day. Following on from that we will be working with the evaluators to gain insight from mentees after the current recruitment round and after a couple of mentees have completed their recruits’ course. As we learn more from these initial mentoring relationships, we will be implementing any changes for the next recruitment round.’
Here are photos from the training days.
Fire and Emergency New Zealand (Fire and Emergency) is committed to fostering diversity and inclusivity in its workforce. While wāhine (women) have been active in firefighting since the 1940s, they are still under-represented.
Recent research commissioned by Women’s Development highlighted six themes which can create either barriers or enablers for women’s experiences within Fire and Emergency and makes recommendations on ways we can work to remove the barriers.
The research indicates that, for our wāhine career firefighters, one of the barriers emerges at the recruitment stage and one of the ways to address this is through an informal mentorship. Women’s Development has, therefore, decided to pilot a mentorship programme with wāhine career recruits.
Women’s Development National Manager, Barb Olah, says the purpose of the mentorship pilot is to increase the number of wāhine career firefighters we recruit and to assist and support their successful completion of the recruitment process, the recruits’ course and their first six months on station.
‘We know that wāhine are significantly less likely to progress through the recruitment process and even if they are successfully recruited, their experience through the recruits’ course and transitioning to station life can be more challenging. We’re excited to offer this pilot to wāhine career recruits in the first instance, before we look at the possible next steps for the programme.
‘By supporting wāhine through the recruitment process, the recruits’ course, and settling into station life, we can look to provide the best possible start to a long and successful career.
‘Being mentored through this key part of a wāhine firefighter’s career will also have a positive effect on the wider culture of the organisation by helping us develop a more diverse and sustainable workforce that better reflects the communities we serve.’
Barb says the project also aligns with the Women’s Development Strategy under the strategic priority of Development and Inclusion and the focus area of Mentoring Wāhine.
‘We will soon be calling for expressions of interest from our wāhine career firefighters who would like to be mentors. This is completely voluntary and is not expected to be time consuming and we will be offering training. We will be posting the EOI on the Portal.
‘This pilot will also look to develop the framework for a formal mentorship programme that would be available to use across the organisation. A smaller pilot has been trialled in Te Kei with volunteer leadership and this project will aim to take lessons learned from that pilot and incorporate them with this pilot’s findings.’
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