Rob Dahm
Owner / CEOFrom the beginning, Rob was different. During his childhood, he found himself surrounded by unconditional love and support for his desire to learn about the world around him. While almost maimed by several freak accidents, Rob survived his childhood years.
Irregularities began to surface after 6th grade. His level of introversion was unusually high for a pre-teen boy. Going to a private school for 7th grade opened his eyes to the monstrous size of the world, attending many large scale field trips to places like NYC and Stratford CA. 8th grade worsened the introversion as a stint at middle school didn't fit him appropriately and he enrolled into home schooling. With ACT scores already high enough for most colleges, Robert enrolled into the local community college well before the average teen would enter high school.
Due to his inability to communicate with people, his parents chose to enroll him into high school. Met with tremendous resistance, Rob was reluctant to go. Upon enrolling in high school, he skipped 9th grade entirely and began a unique experience at Monroe High School. While never successful at winning class president, Rob quickly opened up to fellow students. His underdeveloped love for inventing, creating, and electronics blossomed at the curriculum presented in Darol Straub's computer science class.
Quickly becoming A+ certified at the age of 16, Rob's visions included working on some gigantic secretive technology and even sporadic thoughts of running his own company. With his mom's help he registered the business name "Computer Works of Monroe Inc." Doing nothing serious with the name for more than 6 months, Rob's counselor questioned his post high school goals. "Either MIT or run my own business" was his reply. Considering both of those unlikely, his counselor discussed more realistic options
He was infuriated. At that time, Rob spent his spare time fixing neighbors' computers, but for once, it appeared, his abilities had been doubted. It was a healthy amount of negative motivation. Quite possibly, it was the sole reason Computer Works actually begun full time operation.
After high school, Rob committed 2 full semesters to the local college. Even with college being one of his greatest life long passions, he chose to dedicate all of his time to the business.
Setting his sights on a vacant office space, Rob eagerly awaited his 18th birthday. Several days after turning 18, a lease was signed. Also earning his CCNA certification, this became a pivotal time in the formation of his entrepreneurial visions. While his parents were not happy with his decision and pending financial commitment, both he and his brother Kevin spent the night at their new location.
With the aid of a very dedicated employee Scott, Rob spent most of his time at the office working on any PC that would come through the door.
Neither he nor Scott took a paycheck for more than the first year in business. The company grossed more than $79K in its first year of business.
About 2.5 years into establishing a business at that location, Rob set his sights on something bigger than ever imagined � The Pet Supplies Plus building. The building and its price was well out of reach. His accountant helped him analyze numbers and decided the building was not economically feasible. The building would tank the infant company. Once again presented with the expression of doubt, Rob dove deeper into the limits of personal growth. Signing a purchase agreement without having the means of buying the building, Rob demanded forward motion. On the eve of the purchase agreement expiration date, Rob found himself without the necessary funds to purchase the building.
Bypassing sales agents, attorneys, and accountants, Rob called the VP of the holdings company that owned the building. Having legally lost the building and $20k of good faith deposit, Rob simply requested one thing from the man. "Allow me to purchase the building, make my life more challenging than less." The man agreed to extend the purchase agreement for one more month. Unbeknownst to Rob, offers of more than double his purchase price sat on the man's desk.
January 14th, 2005 is the official recorded date of the building purchase. Rob also earned the employment honors of a very talented artist on that same day.
Life got more challenging for Rob as company ownership and accounting became sufficiently complex. The building remained a hollow shell until he could pay for the renovations.
His entire family helped with insulating, painting, and laying tile, reminding him of the power of those he relied the most on. The building finished and Computer Works Inc opened for business at their new office on May 2nd 2005.
Work has recently intensified on a secret project Rob became deeply passionate about. His most loyal employees and friends have worked on the project many nights well after closing time. His future looks amazingly bright and promising as Computer Works moves toward the next big step.
Jason Jarvis
Project Manager
Daniel W. Strimpel
Project Manager of
Software EngineeringDaniel is the emerciv Project Manager, overseeing the development of our emerciv programming projects for us and our clients. He started out working for us as a software engineer in the fall of 2004. During that time, he helped to create the software used in-house by our PC Repair department and many other projects for our clients. He specializes in software development, database and coding efficiencies, and managing large-scale projects.
Daniel gained much of his expertise in his six years of college. He spent four years at the Monroe County Community College, recieving an Associate of Commerce specializing in Computer Programming, PC Repair, and Networking and an Associate of Applied Science specializing in Computer Science. He was recoginized by this institution for his exceptional work, graduating with a 3.935 GPA after 127 credits. After finishing up at the community college, Daniel went on to go to school at the University of Michigan's Dearborn campus. He studied Software Engineering and Computer & Information Science Mathematics while he went there. He graduated with a Bachelor of Science degree in both of those fields, accumulating many university honors and high distinction by graduating with a 3.98 GPA. He is currently working on his Master of Science in Software Engineering at this institution.
When Daniel is not working here, he also works part-time at Old Navy as a sales associate. He has worked there since the fall of 2000, being a full-time logistics lead until moving over to our company to work more, in the winter of 2006. He also is actively involved in his church at Stewart Road Christian Ministries Center here in Monroe. He also enjoys listening to music, dancing, reading, and hanging out with his friends
Brian Thomas
Lead DesignerBrian is currently the lead designer at Emerciv. Upon coming to the company in January of 2005 Brian's task was revitalize the image of the business, portraying professionalism through design for our own company and for our clients as well. Brian is repsonsible for much of the user interface design for incoming programming projects as well as all web and print design that comes through our doors.
In May of 2003, Brian received his Bachelor of Fine Arts Degree with a concentration in Graphic Design from Siena Heights University in Adrian, Michigan. Prior to working for Computer Works, Brian worked for Siena Heights University as a Graphic Designer. He was also the Head Graphic Designer for a small marketing company in the Monroe, MI Area. He has 6 years of professional Design Experience in the field.
Brian currently lives in the Monroe, MI area and enjoys spending time with his wife and child. When he's not working he enjoys playing sports and helping out with ministries in his church. He is an avid Ohio State Buckeye Fan.
Ryan Vandaele
Web DeveloperRyan is a web developer who has worked at Emerciv since April of 2006. Ryan has worked on several projects including
the emerciv community portal and many client projects. Ryan's development experience includes iPhone development, PHP, Javascript, AJAX, XSLT
and mySQL. Specialties include e-commerce integration and integration with third party APIs.
Ryan attended Monroe County Community College and earned an Associates Degree with specialization in Computer Programming,
he also has earned a Bachelor's of Business Administration from Eastern Michigan University.
In his free time Ryan enjoys programming, playing video games, and has a love for Macintosh computers.