Moira de Roche

Moira de Roche matriculated from Jeppe High School for Girls. She has completed most of a B.Comm through Unisa, majoring in Industrial Psychology.

She started her career in ICT as a Computer Operator and later became an analyst/programmer at The Star.

Feeling a pull towards training and education, she joined ICL Education and Training as a lecturer. After three years of training on COBOL programming and other subjects, she moved to Barlow Rand Computer Services as Training Officer and was later promoted to Training Manager. Subsequent to that, she moved to Cape Town and spent several years with a supplier of video and computer based training products.

Laragh Skills are her current employers, and she has been with the company for over 15 years, first in the role of Regional Manager, and now General Manager and Director. Laragh Skills are distributors for SkillSoft, the world's largest e-Learning company.

In her position at Laragh Skills (formerly known as SmartForce Africa), she has worked with several clients as a strategic account manager to assist with e-learning implementations. Laragh Skills works to the same business model as SkillSoft; providing not only training software, but the resources to help ensure return on investment. Moira firmly believes that a blended learning programme is the only way to encourage and ensure lifelong learning.

Moira is a Professional Member of Computer Society South Africa. She is immediate Past President, having been President for 4 years. Prior to this she served as Chairman of Western Cape Chapter for 3 of the 6 years she was on the Chapter Committee. In this capacity, she served on the Executive Council, and more recently as Vice President: Professional Development, before being elected President. Since stepping down as President, she once again holds the Professional Development portfolio. She received the Award for Outstanding Achievement in Information & Communications Technology in November 2009, and was made a Fellow of the Society.

Moira is a Trustee of the South African Computer Olympiad Trust, a CSSA project which runs the Olympiad in South Africa. She is also a Trustee of the Siyakhula ABET Trust, whose purpose is to drive computer literacy in South Africa.

Moira was a Director of the ICDL in South Africa for a 3 year period.

She is currently Chairman of the Board of Career Planet, a not-for-profit dedicated to bringing career information to learners from disadvantaged communities.

Moira has also served on the IP3 (International Professional Practice Partnership) Task Force, which was founded at the beginning of 2007 by the International Federation of Information Professionals to further the aims of professionalism in the industry on an international scale. Her primary role on IP3 has been marketing. Given the opportunity, she would also like to spearhead IP3 related activities in Developing Countries.

Moira's was elected onto the Council of the Cape Regional Chamber of Commerce and Industry in November 2009.

Learning and people development are her passion as well as her profession.