Doris Ratliff 
A nearby tech corporation founder hopes 2023 is a year of advancement for the company’s services and outreach amid the electronic momentum of new many years.
Grant Austin, alongside with his spouse Katie, launched RGA Tech Help in 2017 with relatively of a special mission — to present empowerment by way of tech-concentrated training.
In addition to delivering a wide variety of tech support providers these kinds of as laptop or computer and cell machine aid, new know-how installations, Wi-Fi assistance, clever household integration and fraud help, RGA Tech Aid presents workshops and education to empower shoppers.
“I never believe it’s a all-natural focus for an IT enterprise, and that is a area of interest we’re definitely energized about filling,” Austin claimed.
Austin’s personal pleasure for know-how originated from his childhood. His moms and dads operated a retirement household although he was growing up, and Austin located a way to integrate his increasing enthusiasm into support for other individuals.
“I understood there was a substantial opportunity to support with VCRs, clock programming, Television set troubleshooting and other things for the people who identified as my parents’ facility home,” he explained. “I invested a great deal of my childhood rolling up my sleeves and encouraging them understand technology as it was evolving.”
Austin commenced to witness a increased need to help older grown ups with evolving know-how when he took a job at an Apple Retailer just after faculty.
“There were being a ton of folks coming in for assist and bringing in goods that ended up not Apple items and had challenges we could not assist with in the retail store,” he reported.
Now, although the organization has expanded its client foundation to serve some modest companies and other folks, most of RGA Tech Support’s consumers are more mature grown ups. Austin explained the business hopes to assist them in acquiring the most out of their technology and battle a key barrier.
“Fear is quite considerably a serious barrier we deal with with our shoppers,” Austin mentioned. “If they force the mistaken button, if they open up the erroneous e mail, if they do any quantity of matters, the worry is that they’ll get their gadget to a issue where by it can not functionality, and they will not have the means to guide.”
Austin stated the company’s solution is intentional just one-on-one particular assist, making certain purchasers are “in the driver’s seat” and guiding them by means of the system.
“We would be extremely capable of coming in, repairing all the issues and then driving absent,” Austin stated. “But our aim is to make certain that if this comes about once again, if they have to cross this bridge once more, they’re self-assured to say, ‘Okay, this is how I acquired myself out of this condition final time.’”
RGA Tech Help presents in-dwelling assistance for customers as well as assist out of its office environment at 601 Maryland Ave. NE in Grand Rapids. The firm at this time rents the house from Tech Defenders, which opened the new facility in 2019.
Possessing the new place gave RGA the possibility to host its workshops, which consist of subjects this sort of as Iphone 101, digital stability, smartphone pictures, an introduction to streaming companies and the historical past of the electrical motor vehicle.
In gentle of the pandemic, Austin said the company experienced to pivot its company method to distant assist through cell phone simply call or FaceTime, which helped resolve difficulties swiftly as they came up.
For RGA’s more mature and retired consumers, the pandemic also led to a one of a kind prospect in phrases of their technology journeys.
“For a ton of our senior consumers, technologies is one thing that landed in their lifetime and genuinely exploded, and if they skipped the original wave, making an attempt to bounce in was frustrating,” Austin mentioned. “Some of them, dependent on what their occupations had been, they experienced folks that could guide them for a lengthy time, like at a enable desk. But once retirement came, they all of a sudden had to start crossing some of these bridges by them selves.
“What the pandemic genuinely pressured them to do is, somewhat than currently being anxious and overcome by the fear of messing some thing up, some of them definitely experienced to buckle down and master some new techniques on speaking. A whole lot of them began employing Zoom to go to lessons to fill that social require. So, a whole lot of them sharpened these technological know-how expertise throughout the pandemic.”
Now, with amplified on the web action top to extra options for frauds, Austin claimed he hopes the business can keep on to be a source to empower consumers going through individuals hazards.
“With the prevalence of cons and spam messages that are hitting the senior inhabitants especially, if we can be proactive and make absolutely sure they know they have a resource to connect with on if anything just doesn’t feel suitable, I would depend 2023 as a superior yr if we can keep on to do that,” he reported.
With his individual journey from childhood to currently, Austin said it has been satisfying to use his passion to aid other people.
“It’s a superior feeling to have your vocation and your perception of function validated and have clientele enthusiastic about what you’re doing,” Austin claimed. “I hope we can develop this to a point the place we can serve just as quite a few people today as we can.”
