Michael Allen
Michael Allen is 29 and lives in Auckland. He is currently an Internal Communications Executive at Air New Zealand and is getting married in June 2013.
After finishing school as head boy at Lynfield College, Michael spent a gap year travelling and working in the UK then came home to study for a Bachelor of Communication Studies at AUT. He majored in public relations and worked extra hard to prove he could make it in the tough communications industry despite his hearing loss.
In the final year of his degree, he landed a PR internship at Coca-Cola Oceania and was named the top public relations graduate in 2005. He went on to become a consultant at a PR agency in Auckland and worked on Fonterra communications before joining the marketing and communications team at The University of Auckland Business School.
Michael was born profoundly deaf and wore hearing aids in both ears until he received a cochlear implant at the age of 16. Ten years later, he received the gift of a second cochlear implant. He never had a mentor when he was growing up, so he is excited about Hear For You and this opportunity to help young people overcome their hearing challenges and live life to the full.
