All in a day’s work – complete with cake

Sometimes it seems like life is just one big Venn diagram and a rogue one at that. One that has a dubious humour, perhaps a wee pinch of surprise and most certainly a sense of the ridiculous when it decides on its intersections. 

How else would Nicole Pierce, a one-time tourism and travel professional, find herself dishing out her home-made mini banana cakes to drivers as they – and their fully laden truck-and-trailer units – waited out a four-hour blockade and stand-off with a well-known activist?

The Whakatane office of Waiotahi Contractors had been told that an activist was on his way to shut down the exit from the river, where the civil construction company was in mid-river extraction.

Nothing, says Nicole, spices up a workday quite like a heads up that someone plans to park themselves in your way.

So, she headed out to the river site and sure enough, there he was, right on schedule and blocking all six of the Waiotahi Contractor trucks, which were fully loaded but clearly going nowhere, with the muttering drivers leaning on their bull bars.

Both sides called the police and for the next few hours the paperwork was flying while permits were checked, inspected, re-checked and, sighs Nicole, likely even read upside down just to be safe.

“It was a four-hour stand-off and a small audience formed as if we’d actually put on a free outdoor show. Time slowed to a crawl,” she laughs.

But if Nicole’s earlier career in hospitality and her now parallel career as a mother taught her anything, it is that, as endorsed by modernist novelist Franz Kafka, so long as you have food in your mouth, you have solved all questions for the time being.

And so, out came those especially baked mini banana cakes and a level of civility was maintained. Eventually the paperwork passed muster, the activist was arrested and trespassed, and the trucks finally rolled out as intended.

Another day wrapped up, another story added to the collection, she says.

“Just a day’s work – complete with cake.”

It has been just over 18 years since Nicole returned to her home town after a bit of travel, and hospitality stints in Auckland and Queenstown.

And it was five years ago that she completely changed tack and took up a job as both administration and Quality Assurer (QA) for the Waiotahi quarries at a time when the company was providing metal for the Opotiki Harbour entrance.

She got more involved in the excavation side of things and her role is now operations coordinator for the quarries as well as site manager for one of the metal pits. She has almost finished a B-grade surface management CoC and believes she has found her feet in an industry she once barely knew existed.

The day-to-day variety makes her job a standout, she believes.

“I do a bit of everything as my role has evolved; nothing has really dropped off, tasks have just kept adding.

“I fly the drone over the quarries and do the stocktakes monthly with it. I’m also the health and safety rep, and do measure and quotes to organise the quarry truck for jobs. I liaise with the council and local iwi/hapu for river extractions.

“I still do the admin and sometimes will go out and pick sticks from the metal for the concrete aggregates. It is pretty busy but I enjoy it.”

To the outsider, quarrying looks like digging a big hole and carting the contents off. Just how complex the extractive sector actually is, and what is involved on a daily basis to keep it going, was a real eye-opener for Nicole.

“Quarries are constantly evolving and plans change very quickly and you just have to roll with it,” she says.

And roll with it she has, developing skills that saw her awarded the Kristy Christensen Memorial Award at the Komatsu Women in Extractives 2026. The award, say the presenters, is for Nicole’s ability and dedication to making everyone in her team feel included and valued.

“I was totally blown away; I was not expecting it. The other nominees are amazing, so I was just really happy to be acknowledged alongside them. I didn’t have a speech prepared, so that was short and sweet.

“Talking in front of a room full of people is not my idea of a good time!”

What is Nicole’s idea of a good time is a glass of wine and a satisfying book, although her ultimate good time is getting away in the caravan – with or without her children, much as they are her heart. Music, her pets, outdoor pursuits and community involvement are other downtime activities.