About Us

Ko Wai Mātou

There are lots of stories of families struggling to balance paid work and family life in Aotearoa. Our team wants to better understand the everyday challenges faced by working families and to make these challenges visible to policymakers.

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Project Background

As researchers interested in family policy, we want to represent stories of families managing paid work and care. We hope to propose solutions that improve support for families balancing non-standard work with family life.
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Research Team

Aisling Gallagher

Aisling is a social geographer at Massey University. Her research focuses on how childcare systems are designed, funded, and made accessible to working families across Aotearoa. She has worked in this area for fifteen years. Originally from Ireland, Aisling has been living in Aotearoa since 2009 with her partner and two children.

Deanna Haami

Deanna (Ngāti Tūwharetoa, Tapuika) is a researcher at Massey University. Her work examines intergenerational trauma and healing from a Mahi Wairua perspective, with a particular focus on whare tangata trauma, language trauma, financial trauma, and the ongoing impacts of colonisation on systems and societies. Her research highlights how historical trauma continues to shape contemporary experiences.

Mary Breheny

Mary is a health researcher working with colleagues at Massey University. Her research explores how society shapes people’s health across the lifespan, including family life, caring, health service access, and ageing.

Susan Prentice

Susan is a social and family policy researcher at the University of Manitoba, Canada. She focuses on equitable and affordable services for working households, with a particular interest in childcare.

Goals And Objectives

At a time when more families than ever are working outside the standard ‘9 to 5’ in Aotearoa, this project seeks to:

  • Increase awareness of the challenges and resourcefulness of families working unsocial and/or unpredictable hours while raising children
  • Highlight the impacts of non-standard working hours on wider whānau and relationships
  • Use this knowledge to engage with policymakers to design better supports for families working outside the ‘9 to 5’