Job ad calls for manager who has a wife with a 'quiet disposition'

A job advertisement for a couple to manage a holiday park in the Waikato comes with some very specific requirements for the successful applicants, particularly for the wife.

The ad, which ran in a local newspaper and featured in the Herald's Sideswipe column today, was for a couple to manage the Glenview Holiday Park in Tokoroa, which takes referrals from government agencies.

The requirements for the role read:

• Experience in management and hospitality

• Able to problem solve

• Wife - must have good knowledge of Microsoft Office, telephone, multitasking and be good in communication of a quiet disposition

• Partner - for park maintenance

Owner Allan Eaton told the Herald that he regretted the wording of the advertisement and that, "in hindsight", he could have phrased it differently.

But whoever took the office role needed to be "conciliatory" and needed to be able to handle tenants, some of whom came from challenging circumstances and had issues with managing their day-to-day affairs, particularly their rent.

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Eaton, who said he had already had half a dozen inquiries about the job, stressed that anyone in the role would need to be patient and understanding.

"I wouldn't like to think that my office person was confrontational and bombastic," adding that some tenants might not be "disposed to the administrative duties of a person in that role".

What Eaton described as the "male role" involved using the ride-on mower, fixing taps, emptying rubbish and general maintenance of the camp.

He said he would have "absolutely no problem" if a woman wanted to take the maintenance role while her husband worked in the office, adding that his own wife's strengths lay in outdoor tasks such as mowing and weed-eating rather than office work.

Eaton, who has owned the park for three years, also said he would also be happy to have a same-sex couple take on the job and said that two gay men who previously worked as cleaners at the park "did a sterling job".