30 March 2006 Jo's winning job formula a mix of degree and family farming background

The skills and experience gained growing up on a farm, combined with a formal university qualification and the practical work associated with it, have been a tremendous benefit to Rural Bank Manager Jo McCaw of the National Bank.

Jo's part of a team of ten Christchurch-based National Bank Rural Bank Managers and in her particular patch she covers coastal North Canterbury looking after some 60 clients. She's on the road three days out of five and the job involves attending to the farm finance business of National Bank customers.

Jo says that having both a Lincoln University Bachelor of Commerce (Agricultural) degree and a family background of farming has been a great benefit in relating to farmers.

"I can talk farming with them from first-hand experience and I can talk finance from the solid background of my Lincoln course. And of course practical farming experience was part of that course too, so it's all been a good mix."

On her parents' sheep, deer and cropping property in the Hakataramea Valley, South Canterbury, Jo did everything from yard work with both the deer and sheep to working in the shearing shed and feeding out. There were often hours spent sitting on a tractor cutting and baling hay and late nights helping her father with the harvest.

The other big element in Jo's life that she finds helps her with her job is sport. A keen netballer from school days – she spent five years as a boarder at St Hilda's Collegiate School in Dunedin – Jo won a Sports Scholarship to Lincoln University in 2002. Netball exposure in Canterbury was the springboard for a place in the Flames team and she was thrilled to be part of the franchise's starting line-up last season, playing in the position of wing defence. In her second year at Lincoln University she had been selected to represent Canterbury in the U-21's.

"Sport is a great ice-breaker," she says. "We're all sports mad in New Zealand and when you're working with a wide range of people, such as in my job, it's good to have a subject like sport to get a conversation going.

"Of course with the Silver Ferns winning the Commonwealth Games gold medal, netball has a really high profile and it's a great topic to talk about before getting down to the business of farm finance."

Jo was back at her old university recently for the Tasman Regional Final of the National Bank Young Farmer Contest. As a preliminary to the main event a "mini agrisports" competition was held between National Bank staff, Lincoln University staff and some former Regional winners.

Ian Collins, Communications Group, Lincoln University, Canterbury, New Zealand