Sonya Manchiraju - A biography

Sonya is part of the marketing team at Zeald and is passionate about promoting the profile of the company.

 

Sonya has been living in Auckland for the last 15 years, since moving from India with her family. She completed her high school education at Avondale College, where she enjoyed arts, maths and English. She also developed an interest in behavioural psychology along the way, which made choosing a major at university a confusing process.

After seeking advice from a guidance councilor, Sonya decided to follow in the footsteps of her father by pursuing a career in engineering. After what she claims to be the longest and the most excruciating four years of her life, she graduated with honours in B.E. at University of Auckland, majoring in Electrical and Electronics Engineering.

Months before finishing her studies, she was recruited by Fisher & Paykel Appliances to join the Product Development team as a graduate. Within a short period, Sonya volunteered to lead a small project with the guidance of her team leader, which eventuated in her becoming a project manager on user interface related projects.

During her three year stint at F&P, Sonya realised her passion for communication and relationship building, and decided to follow this passion by going back to study at AUT to gain a graduate diploma in PR and Communications. Well, that and the fact that she missed the freedom of student life took her back to studying!

As luck would have it, while getting a hair cut one afternoon, Sonya met an account director from a leading communications agency, which jump started her PR career with an internship. The internship led to an account executive (AE) position with Mango Communications as soon as she completed her studies.

Sonya worked as an AE for a year at Mango on a number of high profile clients including Google, Bendon, AMI, Cadbury, Hasbro and Nutrimetics, where her role demanded extensive media relations and client liaison. Life of an AE at Mango meant wearing many different hats and she gained experience in everything from executing projects for various product launches through to writing media releases, pitch notes, PR proposals and post analysis reports.

One memorable experience at Mango was being given the responsibility to inspire prominent Kiwi celebrities to volunteer an hour of their time to play netball at a community Open Day. It was a daunting task as it not only involved writing persuasive letters to compel the celebrities to give up time on a Saturday but also managing their presence at the events & securing suitable media coverage. The Open Days - held at AMI Auckland Netball and AMI Netball North Harbour - were very successful with the cast from Dancing With The Stars, Shortland Street, Outrageous Fortune, Go Girls and reporters from The Erin Simpson Show participating in the games.

The move to Zeald came when Sonya saw an opportunity to focus her communications skills and be part of a team that is extremely passionate about the online space and the results it can achieve. While the drive to learn about the marketing aspects of a fast growing business further intrigued her, Zeald's values and culture sealed the deal for the change.

Sonya has had many loves (aka hobbies) in her life and is always looking for more to add to her list. Dancing has been a major interest and she has tried everything from hip hop and street jazz to salsa and ceroc. She currently spends her weekends painting while listening to her favourite music and practices yoga regularly. Sundays are usually reserved for a lazy lunch catching up with her mum and sister.

Sonya also loves to travel and has had a chance to spend some time in America traveling around California with a few American friends. She has also visited London, Paris, Greece, Thailand, Fiji, Tahiti, Singapore, India (of course) and she can't count the number of times she has been to Australia for shopping trips.