When John Stroh was hired to be the technology development officer for Alberta Innovates, he was helping build a company base in Mexico, living in Arizona, and commuted often to Medicine Hat to visit family. He’d already been in the plant production industry as operations manager for 27 years, so moving into a position to support and strengthen the innovative space in Alberta was fitting.

John Stroh

Stroh was born in Saskatchewan and raised in Medicine Hat and has always felt it was home being surrounded by family and friends. When he was offered the position with Alberta Innovates, he moved back to the Alberta city and would spend the next 11-plus years moving forward in the innovative entrepreneurial industry.

“We help them through, what we call, the commercialization pathway — what does their path to revenue and commercialization look like? We can really help accelerate that path by connecting them to programs and service providers who are better aligned for what they need at that time,” says Stroh. “We focus on the company to make sure we’re giving them the best service to help them move along as quickly as they can.”

The technology development advisor says many companies face the same challenges, whether their agriculture technology or the latest unmanned vehicle technology, or software. It all comes back to market and market fit and knowing if the product fills a gap and solves a problem for the customers. 

Many days, Stroh will have over a handful of meetings following up with companies and working on grant applications to keep them moving forward and help them scale to be bigger and export outside of Alberta and Canada.

After Stroh graduated from the trades program at Medicine Hat College, he was very fortunate to then work with a company who invested in him to take additional educational training. His early years were spent in the trades, but the bulk of his career was in plant and operations management. It’s fulfilling for Stroh to share his experience and knowledge with business owners now, and to shorten their progress timeline and help guide them through the gaps.

“It’s rewarding working with a company, seeing progress, and helping them move along in their journey. It’s also nice to contribute in a small way to a company who would be successful anyway, but we help accelerate that path for them. It’s neat to see when they really take-off and they outgrow the programs,” says Stroh. “It’s always great to see someone ‘graduate’ out of your suite of services, because it means you’ve really moved them along. Of course, they do all the heavy lifting, but it’s nice to be a part of that growth.”

And he feels, while his knowledge is passed onto his clients, he is constantly learning from his colleagues from around the province. They all offer direction from diverse backgrounds, education, and experience. Stroh feels he gets to learn everyday, from what they do and their coaching styles, where it helps him be a better technology development advisor year after year. 

“I can probably say, without a doubt, I’ve gained as much as I’ve given, certainly,” says Stroh. 

Support and guidance he’s continued to do, with over 278 active files, and 5,000 intakes Alberta-wide in the last four years, Stroh and his province-wide colleagues work endlessly to point local innovative business owners to the correct educational and financial supports. 

“We want to help companies develop new technology, and grow and scale right here in Alberta,” says Stroh.