McConnell Dowell partnered with TupuToa in 2021 to place Māori and Pasifika graduates and interns into our business as the first step in their careers.                

TupuToa, is a social enterprise with a vision to grow Māori and Pasifika leaders who will in turn grow a greater Aotearoa. The initiative that TupuToa delivers is a nationwide programme that provides sustained support for tauira (students) so they can successfully fulfil their career aspirations and become leaders in industry and the community. 

They saw the need to see increased Māori and Pacific representation in leadership positions in the corporate sector.

Māori and Pacific peoples make up a quarter of our population yet only 17 per cent of New Zealand’s top 60 firms have an executive who identifies as other than European/Pākehā. 

The programmes aim to address the persistent inequalities facing our communities and disrupt intergenerational disadvantage. By supporting organisations to successfully recruit and onboard Māori and Pacific peoples" and supporting tauira through the process the barriers are lowered and a career in construction and engineering becomes a choice.

Featured below are McConnell Dowell New Zealand's first group of TupuToa interns with their TupuToa lead, Telayna Tapene. 

Left is Oskar Waikari, our Cadet Quantity Surveyor based at the Eastland Port Wharf 7 Project in Gisborne. Right is Conrad Winthrop a Finance Undergraduate based in our head office in Mt Wellington, Auckland.