An Interview with Therese Borra

I am a project manager at Sandfield. I was born and raised in Manila, Philippines and moved to New Zealand in 2019.

As corny as it sounds, Sandfield chose me! I really appreciate the culture of trust and open communication at Sandfield. Starting any job can often be overwhelming and for me, having trust and open communication with my teammates made me feel very welcomed. Whenever I needed help, someone was always there to offer support and guidance. No one at Sandfield ever makes you feel like you're not doing your job properly just because you asked questions or asked for guidance.

Sandfield has really helped my communicative skills, not just in professionally but also personally. Sandfield offers Soft Skills training that the team participate in a couple of times a year to improve our ability to work with others. As project manager, I manage  the team at Sandfield and deal with external clients everyday so it is vital that I have the effective communication skills to facilitate and foster new and existing relationships. The soft skills courses have really helped me as a project manager since I am able to articulate better and clarify things with the customer and the team.

I love our relationships with our clients at Sandfield, it’s not just back and forth and all business, but more of a true partnership that allows for collaboration on both ends. I work with the Mainfreight team, who have been vocal about how they appreciated Sandfield’s trust from the start. I really feel Mainfreight are just as invested in building and maintaining the partnership as we are, which can sometimes be rare in the tech industry.

Open communication and trust on both sides. As with many professional relationships, having trust on both sides is a testament to the evolution of a company. As mentioned, I work on the Mainfreight team, which is one of our longest serving clients, stretching back almost 30 years and so our relationship has evolved a great amount during that time and I'm really excited to see what the future holds!

I like working with people - helping build something and seeing it used by the customer. I come from a varied background in peer-to-peer messaging, banking, insurance, and most recently, aviation and so using my skills from previous roles has helped me manage a team of highly motivated individuals at Sandfield.

I think transitioning a client’s system development cycle into a set sprint format. While the system development is continuous, moving to a sprint format was one of the first things I tackled when I joined Sandfield and I am pretty happy that the client and the team have adapted and settled into the sprint seamlessly.

I play ultimate frisbee and like to hike. If im not playing ultimate frisbee you can either find me reading a new book or out on my bike having a fun adventure!