At Tait, we take great pride in serving the organizations that are so integral to our way of life: they keep communities safe, our lights on, transport flowing, and provide the raw materials for modern life. To provide them with the great support Tait is renowned for, we have a dedicated team of individuals all over the world that work hard to deliver results. In this blog we meet Margaret Grant, Services Business Development Manager at Tait.
Margaret works for Tait as a Services Business Development Manager, and is based in our head office in Christchurch, New Zealand. After previously having left Tait in 2010, she rejoined us in her current role in 2018 – we’re very happy to have her back on the team!
Want to get to know our team? You can find other Tait Staff Spotlight posts here.
Meet Margaret Grant, Services Business Development Manager at Tait
Originally from Scotland, Margaret is a repeat offender: she first started at Tait in 2003 as a Product Manager never even having set foot in New Zealand. Margaret then held various product management roles at Tait until leaving in 2010.
She then rejoined Tait in 2018 as a Services Business Development Manager for Tait New Zealand. In this capacity, she’s responsible for developing and implementing the services strategy for Tait New Zealand and ensuring the services, support and Software-as-a-Service offerings of Tait meet the expectations of our customers.
Working with people – both the fantastic team at Tait New Zealand and our customers and dealers – to overcome business challenges and making sure Tait services match customer requirements is something I really enjoy.
To find out a little more about Margaret, we decided to ask her a few questions:
Can you tell us something about your jobs outside Tait?
Before starting my first stint at Tait in 2003, I worked on the Airwave Emergency Services network in the UK. In my in-between-Tait years (2010-2018), I joined New Zealand Trade & Enterprise as a Customer Manager, working with businesses that were new to exporting or new to NZTE. There are so many innovative companies in New Zealand doing amazing things.
But ultimately, the lure of technology was just too much, and I joined Trimble as a Survey Controller Product Manager for a couple of years until I was offered a position at radio communications network company TeamTalk (now Vital), who had been a favourite customer of mine when I was at Tait the first time around. At TeamTalk, I compiled the RFP and managed the procurement process for their new DMR Tier 3 network.
How do you spend your time outside of work?
Horses! My daughter and I both ride. She likes showing and show jumping whereas I prefer dressage. I served on our local Pony Club committee when my daughter was a member.
Now I volunteer as a writer for Dressage Canterbury and have recently been invited to train to become a dressage judge.
Do you have any skills or talents that most people don’t know about?
I am an industry qualified wine taster. I hold an Advanced Certificate (Level 3) in wine tasting from the UK Wine & Spirit Education Trust, so you can understand the attraction of moving from Britain to a wine growing country like New Zealand.
Not long after I arrived, I met a fellow Scots-woman at a wine tasting event. She told me “you’ll love it here – it’s just like Scotland, but with better weather, and wine!” And guess what? She was right!
What is the biggest professional challenge you’ve faced this year? How did you overcome it?
I think that for most people COVID has been the biggest challenge this year. I usually don’t like working from home, but we all had to do it during lockdown. You do have to make more of an effort to stay connected with colleagues but it was OK because everyone was in the same situation.
I’m very grateful that the lockdown in New Zealand only lasted a few weeks. I know overseas colleagues have had much longer lockdowns so I can’t really complain.
What do you enjoy most about your job?
The people. Coming back to Tait felt like coming home because I knew so many of the people working there already. We have a fantastic team at Tait New Zealand, split across our Christchurch and Wellington offices.
I work closely with St John Ambulance, New Zealand Police, our distributor Logic Wireless and the New Zealand dealers and while there may be business challenges, the customer representatives are always great to deal with.
And if I’m allowed a second reason, it would be the variety. My job involves services strategy, service definition, sales and support contracts, project management, market research, account management, pricing, writing case studies, and lots of things in between.
Favourite quote/saying or any parting words?
Winston Churchill’s “When you are going through hell, keep going” has got me through a few tough times.
Ever since returning to Tait, Margaret has been an integral part of the Tait New Zealand team. Margaret reports to Andrew Watson, General Manager of Tait New Zealand.
Get in Touch with Tait
If there’s anything Margaret or the team at any of our regional offices can do to help you, please don’t hesitate to contact us.
