Whanau connections at work and home for New Zealand Maori employees: Direct and interaction effects

Abstract or Summary

Maori are the indigenous people of New Zealand and represent a small but vital component of the New Zealand workforce. For Maori, whanau (extended family) is of fundamental importance and the present study tests whether working with whanau has positive effects for Maori employees. Using a sample of 197 Maori, workplace relationships amongst Maori employees and their whanau were tested. Factor analysis found two dimensions: whanau work connections and whanau home connections, which represented interactions in the workplace about work and home respectively. Four outcomes were tested: stress, anxiety, career satisfaction and life satisfaction. It was hypothesized that greater whanau connections would have a positive influence on outcomes, reducing mental health and increasing satisfaction. Direct effects were found towards stress, anxiety and career satisfaction from whanau home connections and towards life satisfaction from whanau work connections. Overall, the contribution towards mental health was moderate (6-7% variance) but consistently large for career satisfaction (14% variance) and life satisfaction (26% variance). In addition to the direct effects, interaction effects were tested between the two dimensions of whanau connections. Significant interaction effects were found towards all outcomes except life satisfaction. Towards stress and anxiety, significant interactions showed respondents with high whanau home connections and high whanau work connections reported the lowest levels of stress and anxiety. Towards career satisfaction, significant interactions showed respondents with high whanau home connections and high whanau work connections reported the highest levels of career satisfaction. The findings indicate that indigenous employees may respond with the strongest positive outcomes when interacting and working with their extended family, which has previously been unexplored. The implications for positive psychology are that social and family connectedness creates additional benefits for indigenous employees and provides an avenue for indigenous workers to improve engaging in workplace connections with whanau.