“There is a huge pool of talent out there, but the big issue with women is they totally undervalue themselves,” she said.
“Getting that confidence to step up and understand the value they can add is really important to me.”
The Northland dairy farmer and chartered accountant was named as winner of the title at the Dairy Women’s Network (DWN) conference in March. O’Shea, 45, owns an accountancy firm in Whangarei and is an equity partner in a Maungatapere dairy farm with brother Shayne, where she still relief milks occasionally.
“A lot of my clients are farmers, so to put my gumboots on and to know what is happening at grassroots is pretty important.”
The siblings won last year’s Northland Supreme Ballance Farm Environment Award. In 1993, O’Shea won the Northland Sharemilker of the Year title and the North Island AC Cameron Award.
A graduate of the Agri-Women’s Development Trust Escalator Programme, O’Shea joined the trust’s board in 2013 and was recently appointed chairwoman.
Her long-term goal has always been to move into governance roles in the sector and this award could open more opportunities earlier.
She wins a Fonterra-sponsored scholarship to the Global Women, Women in Leadership programme, valued at $25,000.
The two other award nominees were Fonterra Shareholders’ Council member and Hauraki dairy farmer Julie Pirie and King Country dairy farmer and vet Joyce Voogt.
“To Julie and Joyce, you’re incredible women doing amazing things. So we are all winners in my view,” O’Shea said.
Rotorua dairy farmer Chris Paterson won the DWN Community Leadership Award, also announced at the conference. She is secretary of the Rotorua Lakes Primary Producers Collective, the chairwoman of the Kaharoa Community Association, and a member of DWN, Federated Farmers, Rural Women and Lions.
Other nominees were Northland dairy farmers Megan McCracken and Ann Kearney.
