Victoria Lessing

Selwyn Cook enjoyed a career as a Shell and then Z Retailer in the Waikato owning and operating a multiple service station business for twenty seven years. His discovery of the talent pool that identified with disability had a significant impact on the positive performance of his business.

Introducing NZ Speaker – Victoria Lessing

Image of a smiling blonde woman, Victoria Lessing.
Image: Victoria Lessing, CEO Merge NZ

Victoria identifies as culturally Deaf and she is a social advocate for the Deaf community. Victoria is a qualified New Zealand Sign Language (NZSL) teacher. She has been teaching NZSL for almost 20 years and has been involved in the development of NZSL teaching curriculum.

Currently studying a BA double major in education and business, Victoria is also fluent in five languages. Victoria has a huge passion in inspiring people through teaching language and Deaf culture programmes.

Victoria now leads Merge NZ, which is a social enterprise with the aim to normalise NZSL in many towns and cities in New Zealand so organisations, service providers, businesses, schools and individuals can appreciate one of the official languages in NZ.

Find out more…