Kua tae mai anō te nehenehenui ki Taranaki - Jahron Neha

Becoming a member of the PKW whānau set Jahron Neha on the path of discovery to a connection with Taranaki he didn’t know he had.

Jahron joined Te Rau Manawanui / the PKW Executive Management Team late last year, taking on the role of Te Raumāhorahora GM Finance and Investments. He arrived in the region with his partner Erin, a financial accountant, and daughters Elise (8) and Darcy (6), with baby Kaia born just weeks after the move, from Hamilton, where he has spent almost all his life.

“I thought we were moving away from family,” he said. “But as it turned out, I had family connections to come to!”

“I was at an uncle’s birthday party and one of my aunties came up to me and said – your grandfather would be pleased about you moving to Taranaki – and I said – why? She said – because his father Henare Rangitaawa was born at Parihaka!”

“It was such a surprise, and I would like to find out more about my Māori roots and story.”

Jahron (Ngāti Maniapoto) grew up spending a lot of time on the marae in Ōtorohonga with his grandfather, Panataua (Ben) Rangitaawa, and grandmother, Te Tatau. But his family moved to Hamilton when he started school, and slowly he lost his connection with te ao Māori.

“I went to St Paul’s Collegiate during my teens, and on reflection, there wasn’t really the space to engrain and celebrate your cultural ties at the time,” Jahron muses. “I was busy playing rugby and concentrating on my lessons.”

Numbers were always something he excelled at, and so went to Wintec and completed a degree in Business after high school, all while completing the KPMG school leavers’ programme.

A series of increasingly senior roles then followed at Tatua and AFFCO, as his ability grew in providing the right financial advice needed to inform successful decisionmaking.

“Working in those big corporate companies taught me a lot about how the different cogs of a business work together - if just one thing is off-kilter, the whole business suffers,” said Jahron.

“But, much as I enjoyed it, I increasingly felt the need to be working for a different kind of organisation, one operating for the benefit of the collective. So I began looking for a role that had that kind of kaupapa, those kinds of values. And I found PKW.”

He has enjoyed his first six months with the organisation, finding everyone he meets supportive and welcoming.

“I’ve been given time to find my feet and work out how I need and want to fulfil this role so I can give my best on behalf of our shareholders. Experiencing how Te Ara Putanga measures business success beyond the bottom line has been a very different experience, and one I have fully embraced.”

“I am looking forward to continuing the work of making sure finance is embedded into the fabric of what we do, not just an observer reporting from the side-lines, to deliver those broader outcomes that are so important to what we want to achieve as an organisation, not just now, but for generations to come.”