Established 1991
St. Albert, AB, Canada
Mission Computers Inc. was established in 1991 in St. Albert, Alberta Canada. We ran a Computer classroom with at least 7 classes a week until 2003.
Now we have a computer training and consulting business where we go to the customer and have a full online remote classroom.
Mission Computers Inc. was originally started by Connie Clark and Darlene Jones. In 1994 Darlene Jones had to leave the business due to an illness.
Mission Computers started with their first classroom at the Business Development Centre, BDC (now known as Northern Alberta Business Incubator, NABI).
DOS, WordPerfect, and Windows were the most popular courses until 1994. For instance, there were 650 people taught WordPerfect in 1993.
From 1994 – 1999 Windows, Word and Excel became the most popular programs to teach – 1,600 people took Windows training from 1995 to 1999.
In 2000, these programs remained popular and Maximizer training was introduced because of a customer inquiry.
Ten thousand (10,000) people took training in our classroom environment – Mission offered training in the mornings, afternoons, and evenings.
Mission had taught approximately 50 different courses (because of all the different versions of software) and Mission has employed over 20 instructors.
Our youngest student was 6 and our oldest student (that we know) was 81.
KIDS CAMP
Summer was the perfect time to teach kids technology.
LAPTOPS MEANT TRAVEL
Mission also offered training at customer sites locally and province-wide. Connie traveled to Devon, Lamont, BonAccord, and other small towns to offer beginner computer courses.
As one of the instructors, Connie spent a great deal of time in front of the students and learned from the interaction in the classroom. It was this feedback that helped the company to offer the best solutions. Since 1991, Mission Computers has provided FREE telephone support and training manuals (written by Connie). Not only does this help bridge the learning from the classroom to the office (or computer desk) but this helps Connie stay connected to the client.
As one of the instructors, Connie spent a great deal of time in front of the students and learned from the interaction in the classroom. It was this feedback that helped the company to offer the best solutions. Since 1991, Mission Computers has provided FREE telephone support and training manuals (written by Connie). Not only does this help bridge the learning from the classroom to the office (or computer desk) but this helps Connie stay connected to the client.
In 2003, Mission Computers moved out of their classroom environment (& office) and adopted a ‘virtual office’. This was due to the shifting demand for customized, on-site courses and the three-year-old in Connie’s life. Connie wanted to have the flexibility of being at home with her daughter whenever she could and going out for training (or sending other instructors out) when scheduled.
Maximizer CRM (Client Relationship Management) consulting encompassed 50% of Mission’s business from 2002 through to 2006.
From 2007 to 2010 Connie spent the majority of her time teaching Maximizer, Working Smart with Microsoft Outlook (for Priority Management), and QuickBooks accounting.
Today the training we offer still includes Maximizer and QuickBooks along with a host of other software and technology.
Our Corporate clients, our Small and Medium-sized business clients call on us a lot for Microsoft Office training. The most popular group training we do is Microsoft Excel training, usually intermediate to advanced Excel. But we also do a fair bit of training on Microsoft Word, PowerPoint, and Outlook, Teams, SharePoint, OneNote and OneDrive.
In the last few years more and more clients have been introduced to Cloud-type applications. Our favorite apps to teach are Microsoft OneNote, OneDrive, SharePoint and Teams! We feel that this is the future of business information, collaboration and communication.
Aside from on-site training at a client’s office, the popularity of remote training via Zoom Meetings (on-line) has increased. Now Connie has the ability to reach another market – those further away or those who need hourly training. Within minutes Connie can share screens with her student’s and help them learn a new concept or fix an existing problem.
Although we were already offering a lot of ONLINE training options, COVID pushed us further into this.
Now we have complete training programs for individuals / companies to take so they can learn online 100% at their own pace and in their own environment.
We continue to offer our support and consulting services and we will still customize training for clients as well.
Our Online Training Portal has many courses for our clients these days.
In addition to working in her business, Connie has spent many hours volunteering in her community. Connie has sat on the board at the St. Albert Chamber of Commerce and the St. Albert Further Education Association. Personally, she served as the Treasurer for the local playschool and chairperson for the local community league.
The next 20 years of computers will change drastically and it is this change that is so exciting. Mission Computers is passionate about helping people manage their data and organize their information so that they get results and increase their efficiency and effectiveness.
Recording from Client site
Working from Home
Recording Videos for Online Courses