Conversations For Transformation: Essays Inspired By The Ideas Of Werner Erhard

Conversations For Transformation

Essays By Laurence Platt

Inspired By The Ideas Of Werner Erhard

And More

Laurence Platt And Associates

Exertec Health and Fitness Center, Napa, California, USA

March 26, 2011

This essay, Laurence Platt And Associates, is the companion piece to A Spirit And A Soul? Really?

It is also the fifth in a sextology comprising The Laurence Platt Story:

in that order.

The Laurence Platt Story is the prequel to Wherever I Went, There I Was.

This essay continues the story of my life. The story of my life isn't who I am. Who I am is Conversations For Transformation inspired by the ideas of Werner Erhard. Sooner or later the story of my life will be told. I want to support it being told accurately.

I am indebted to Gus Chas and to Jake Ever and to Christopher "C" Fair and to Kenneth Eugene "Ken" Iverson and to Michael Frederic "Mike" Cowlishaw and to Chris Sanderson and to Steven "Steve" Snowman and to Ervin "Erv" Selk and more, and to Anthony "Tony" Devitt and to Basil "Bas" Logan and to Brian Christensen and to Brian Jenkin and to David "Dave" Alan Hutley and to David "Dave" Tovey and to Geoffrey "Geoff" Fellows and to Glynnis Rabbit and to Hewitt Billens and to Hugh Ackland and to Ian Simpson and to Ian Smith and to Jack McClarty and to James "Jim" Bernie and to James "Jim" Coyle and to "Jock" McNaught and to John Frederick "JFH" Hammond and to John Hampton and to John Sladden and to Judy Evans and to Klari Szentirmay and to Mark Haythornthwaite and to Marlene Davis and to Michael "Mike" Fallon and to Michael "Mike" Rae and to Nicholas "Nic" Joubert and to Nova Coory and to Paul McBain and to Philip Grenville "PGT" Thompson and to Ronald "Ron" Entwisle and to Thomas "Tom" Andrews and to Vivian "Viv" Sprosen and to the staff of IBM A/FE (International Business Machines, Americas / Far East) Business Systems department, The Terrace, Wellington, New Zealand who inspired this conversation.

The enterprise I named Laurence Platt and Associates, or LP and A / LP&A, the "doing business as" name ie the DBA name under which I became inexorably if not unintentionally, one of the most sought after IBM mainframe computer software trainers in these United States, started all by itself - fortuitously, if not completely by accident.

To be sure, I eventually became qualified to be an IBM mainframe computer software trainer. By that I don't mean I intentionally did what I needed to do to get myself qualified to be an IBM mainframe computer software trainer. My qualifications were shaped by the process of my life itself. And during the time they were being shaped, no one knew that's what was happening - indeed, I myself was the last one to find out.

Given my past before I created LP&A, I did have the appropriate background to be an IBM mainframe computer software trainer. But I got it in a most unconventional way. I was first exposed to computers during my university years - 1968 through 1970. In my freshman year I registered in a pure (as opposed to an applied) computer science course. It was an unmitigated disaster. Being seduced by the promise of computers even in those early days, didn't ensure I could wrap my mind around the abstracts of the course. What the course did for me was convince me a career in computers would not be a good idea. Later as part of my thesis for my psychology major, I submitted the results of my subjects' questionnaires to a computer on punched cards. I didn't need to understand how the computer would read the punched cards. I simply had to prepare the punched cards to be read. Then I had to place them in a slot ... and they were read. It was magic! This practical use of a computer went a lot easier than my ill fated study of the abstracts of computer science. The punched cards worked. The results of my research project (which was on authoritarianism, by the way) were well received.

After university during my travels in Europe, I took a job at Le Lido Cabaret de Paris, a night club on the Champs‑Élysées in Paris France, as an as an electrician / lighting technician. Le Lido was waaay ahead of the curve when it came to computing. Although their computer by today's standards was very primitive (programs and data were submitted on paper tape), their entire show was computerized. Lights came on and went off, music sequences began and ended, scenery moved, waterfalls started and stopped, ice skating surfaces extended and retracted as dictated by the computer's instructions. But say a dancer or a skater slipped, then the show's sequence had to be manually reset ie the preset computer's instructions had to be overridden. I was called on to simply push buttons to make the computer change a sequence, without needing to understand how or why it did whatever it did. Once again, as with the work on my thesis earlier, this pragmatic approach to computers suited me much better. I even began to enjoy it.

My big break into the real world of corporate business data processing, number crunching computers came in March of 1976 in Wellington on Cook Strait on the south coast of New Zealand's north island when Ian Simpson of IBM offered me a full time job as a programmer, which included all the necessary training in the process. Ian saw a potential in me which superseded my total lack of official university level qualifications. What was interesting is I wasn't speaking with Ian at the time about working for IBM. I was asking his opinion about working for ICL ie International Computers Limited, another computer company and an IBM competitor.

I never looked back. Working with IBM was like taking multiple crash courses qualifying me with multiple university degrees not so much in computer science but rather in computer savvy. And yes, the two are distinct: having one doesn't necessarily ensure the other.

Various other full time jobs in high level mainframe computer programming positions with big corporations followed in the United States and in South Africa, deepening my mainframe computer experience and acumen. Then one day during my tenure working for Pacific Bell in Oakland California, I discovered the so called contract programmer sitting at the desk next to me, was earning four to five times what I was earning doing the same work as a full time employee.

A light bulb turned on in my mind. I called all the computer contract programmer placement agencies in the San Francisco Bay Area and registered with them. From then on I worked solely as a contract programmer, continuing to do the same kind of programming as I had done before as a full time employee, except at the expanded rate a contract programmer pulls down.

Contracts, being contracts, aren't guaranteed full time permanent employment positions. A contract would last a few weeks, and then it would be time to look for another job. Effectively this was like being fired - over and over, again and again, every few weeks. In the process, I developed a thick skin and an immunity to fearing being out of work. Unbeknownst to me, this was preparing me for and educating me about taking risks. But actually the risks were quite minimal. My qualifications were by then in such high demand that the fear of my job ending leaving me out of work, never bothered me much: the next contract assignment wasn't ever far behind.

How LP&A Got Started

One day in April of 1986, Rita Garant of Garant and Associates, a computer contract placement agency I was registered with, called me with what sounded like an unusual request. She asked me not if I would like to write programs for one of her clients using the softwares in my repertoire, but rather if I would be interested in talking about a software to her client's technical staff - in other words, if I would be interested in training her client's technical staff. She offered me some serious money. Due to a prior time commitment, I was unable to consider accepting the assignment. But I was intrigued enough by it to immediately register myself with additional computer contract placement agencies who specialized in contract training assignments - until Rita's call, I had no idea I could make a decent living training technicians.

That's how I got talking with Steven Snowman in his office exquisitely situated on a thoroughbred horse breeding ranch in Marlboro, New Jersey. Not really knowing what I was getting myself into, I accepted his first offer. It was only for a three day training assignment. But the money was amazing: more than five times what I would have earned merely writing programs using the same software. And the client, General Foods (Wheaties etc), was on the other side of the country - the first time I had been flown anywhere under contract. They put me up in a five star hotel and gave me an allowance for a limo ride to and from the airport. I delivered what was my first three day seminar - on VM/CP/CMS ie Virtual Machine / Control Program / Conversational Monitoring System aka Cambridge Monitoring System - to a group of twenty technicians.

I set up a computer monitor in the front of the auditorium, connecting a projection enhancement to a large screen behind my podium, to show the participants in my seminar whatever appeared on my screen. Each participant sat at their own table with their own computer monitor and keyboard (the "mouse" hadn't been invented yet). My presentation was part discussion, part conversation, part research, lots of hands on experimenting (I provided ongoing demonstrations), and all of the above occurred inside of a spirit of common inquiry rather than inside of telling anyone what to do or lecturing at them. I sketched out key concepts on the white board and flip charts first, then taped the diagrams from the flip charts to the auditorium walls before going on to deploy the demonstrated concepts on the computer as programs. By the end of the seminar, the room looked as if it had been wallpapered with flow charts and Venn diagrams.

The General Foods techies loved it. At the end of the seminar they gave me a standing ovation and rated the value they got from seminar off the charts. A whole new vista of what was possible for me had spontaneously opened up.

From that day forward, I was only interested in training contracts, reinventing myself as Laurence Platt and Associates, or LP and A / LP&A in the process. There were no actual associates in my company per se. Rather, I chose the term associates simply to honor the people with whom I worked ie my agents and my clients, not to mention the people for whom I worked: my three children Alexandra, Christian, and Joshua. Also, in a much broader sense, associates included all the people I trained, as well as my trainer colleagues in the industry - we were all a pretty close knit bunch of mavericks. Ultimately it included everyone my enterprise gave me access to - which includes you, my family, my friends, everyone I've ever met, and everyone I've never met. In effect, the associates in Laurence Platt and Associates was my designation for the broader context within which I was working.

That said, there was this at the heart of the matter: as the foundation for all of the above, the name Laurence Platt and Associates was my expression of alignment with Werner Erhard and Associates, the entity through which Werner was making his work available in the world at that time.

At its peak, the demand for LP&A's services included requests to deliver five different three to five day seminars every week from which I could obviously only fulfill on one per week.

<aside>

Note to Self: next time around, figure out how to be in more than one physical place at the same time.

<un-aside>

This afforded me the luxury of being able to choose where I worked, with whom I worked, in which software genre I worked, and for what rate of remuneration I worked. Delivering technical seminars for many of the Fortune 1000 group of companies kept me constantly traveling for the next two decades. I've been to all but eight of these fifty United States (so far). Pretty soon I had respectable accounts with the airlines frequent flyer mileage programs, one of which, United Airlines, exceeded half a million miles and another of which, American Airlines, exceeded two million miles.

How I Kept Up With The Technology

These days, I'm no more cyber ie I'm no more digital than I absolutely have to be. Although my state of the art IBM aka Lenovo T61 laptop computer is my tool of the trade for generating these Conversations For Transformation, I actually prefer to be off line as much as possible. I have neither a Facebook nor a MySpace nor a LinkedIn account. It's a much more valuable use of my time for me to put my face in front of another real, live, breathing, flesh and blood human being's face than it is to put it in front of a social networking app on a computer screen.

It's not always been this way for me.

There were days with IBM in New Zealand in 1976 (I call them Laurence's whizz kid days) when I started work at my desk on a Monday morning at 8:00am, continued working there until after 5:00pm in the evening, stayed at my desk exploring the inner realms of the IBM 360/158 OS/VS1 ie Operating System / Virtual Storage 1 mainframe computer all through the night, eventually falling asleep at my desk, then waking up an hour or so later bolt upright and continuing on this way uninterrupted through Tuesday ... and Wednesday in the same way ... and perhaps all the way through Friday. And sometimes through the weekend as well.

When you hold or follow an exploratory train of thought continuously for a few minutes or for a few hours, you get one kind of in depth view of the material. If you continue to hold or follow an exploratory train of multi-branched thought continuously for twenty four hours a day (or at least for as much of the twenty four hours a day you can stay conscious for) over a period of days, weeks, months, and even years, you learn the material in a whole new way.

This was my unplanned learned skill / practice / training which would serve me later on my LP&A seminar presentation tours in the following way:

When the seminar presentation of the day was complete and the participants had left the room and gone home for the night, there I was: by ... my ... Self ... with no distractions and no interruptions. It was before the days of the internet so I couldn't read about new software releases online. Instead I found manuals in the company libraries, and selected ones which I could read to expand my knowledge of the softwares I was already current with, or from which I could learn new softwares which would enhance my repertoire.

Mastering that segue was the trick to staying current. Initially the only seminars I could offer were for softwares with which I already had considerable experience because I'd worked with them at companies like IBM in New Zealand or Old Mutual Life Insurance Company (the largest life insurance company in Africa) in Cape Town South Africa. But then what? Software and the computer world in general keeps evolving so fast. Take a nap for moment, take your eye off the action for just a second, and when you return you're too far behind the eight ball to ever catch up.

When I was on-site leading a seminar, having already been cleared by the host company's technical security management to work in protected regions of their mainframe computer sysplex, I could experiment with and get hands on experience of new softwares.

Pretty soon I realized having working experience with any software was only one of the many ways to master the software. In fact it was an arbitrary qualification at best. From then on, if I saw an opportunity to deliver a seminar in any particular newly released mainframe software, I simply made the time to read the manuals, then got some practice with it in the evenings between on-site seminar delivery days.

In this way, I not only kept myself current with new versions of the softwares I was already familiar with, but I also embraced and expanded into new softwares as IBM released them. The learning principle was the same as learning softwares as a full time employee of a company. The only difference was I was now becoming expert with softwares with which I had no real on the job working experience. That didn't prevent me from including them in LP&A's training curriculum with excellent results.

This approach worked - as long as I stayed within the world of IBM mainframe computer operating systems and softwares. That was where I had my base experience on which I could build and capitalize. The internet, PC, laptop, and tablet world, particularly with regard to operating systems and software training, is as much related to the mainframe world as the technology of a Boeing 747 is related to the technology of the Wright Brother's original airplane Flyer I. Allowing the Wright brother's to fly Flyer I is one thing. But to then say that's what qualifies them to fly a Boeing 747 isn't only foolish: it's irresponsible, misapplied, and inappropriate.

So as long as I stayed within the world of IBM mainframe computer operating systems and software training, I never ran out of creating new seminars I could deliver. And as soon as old softwares were retired, rendering obsolete the seminars I had created for them, I replaced them with new ones. The fact that I didn't have years and years of experience actually writing programs with these new softwares didn't make any difference to my ability to master them, to become expert in them, and to deliver them in such a way that the participants in my seminars would also master them and work with them intelligently as required by their job descriptions.

How I Presented Myself

In the olden days, the way you got it was by being around Werner.

I had no training skills. I wasn't trained to be a trainer. I certainly wasn't trained to be an IBM mainframe computer software trainer.

I did, however, have some experience writing IBM mainframe computer software. The only difference between writing IBM mainframe computer software, and training people to write IBM mainframe computer software, is opening your mouth and saying something about the software, and hopefully sounding intelligent and engaging in the process. I would have to speak the software so it came alive for people, leading to them taking it on for themselves. And to get them to take it on for themselves, I needed them to get present and to stay present.

Werner Erhard is a master of being present and staying present, and having people get present and stay present.

What I brought to LP&A seminars was being present ie being with people. I'm really not studied in education methods. But I'll bet everything I own that one of the conditions which makes for learning is being present - which in the case of LP&A applied equally to me the trainer, as it did to the participants in my seminars. That's what I got from watching Werner working with people. That's what I brought to LP&A seminars. It worked. In delivering technical seminars, it's not enough for the trainer to be present in front of the group. What also has to happen as a result of the trainer being present in front of the group, is everyone in the group has to be inspired to be present as well. And that's the condition for learning. That's the space in which the transmission of knowledge always occurs best.

There were two sections in the critiques I asked each group to complete at the end of each seminar I led. The first section critiqued my performance as the trainer. The second section critiqued whether or not the seminar delivered the technical skills it promised to deliver. I'm a human being. I always enjoyed the first section saying my performance was appreciated by the group. But I considered I had gotten my job done only when the second section said the technical skills the seminar promised to deliver, were received.

In ninety nine percent of all LP&A technical seminars delivered over two decades, both sections were rated excellent. I was satisfied with that result. But I wasn't surprised by it.

How I Grew The Business

I'm a master of keeping the physical space clean and uncluttered. That's probably why I got on so well in a rigorous environment like the Franklin House. And if I wasn't already a master of keeping the physical space clean and uncluttered before I worked in the Franklin House, there's no question this mastery comes directly from my experience there.

What I clean doesn't matter to me - it could be furniture or it could be kitchen sinks or it could be toilets. In the physical universe (in which, last time I checked, most of us live), things are either clean and uncluttered (which also means they work) or they're aren't. It's black and white. There are no gray areas. If I clean anything, I don't care if it's the kitchen sinks I'm cleaning and not the dining room table. There's mastery to be had in cleaning anything. There's mastery to be had in cleaning the kitchen sinks. Surfaces don't lie. They're either clean or they're not. You either have them be clean, or you settle for your excuses why they aren't clean. That's profound.

If Werner walked by while I was cleaning the Franklin House kitchen sinks, he'd stop and watch me. The guy whose job it is to transform the world would drop everything, risk being late, and stop and watch me clean the kitchen sinks. Maybe it was because I did it right. Maybe it was because no one else cleans kitchen sinks like I clean kitchen sinks. I've never been certain whether or not his dropping everything and watching me cleaning kitchen sinks was a training or an acknowledgement or both. It could have been neither - after all, it may simply have been one guy just watching another guy cleaning kitchen sinks.

What does being a master of keeping the physical space clean and uncluttered have to do with growing a business? In particular, what does being a master of keeping the physical space clean and uncluttered have to do with growing LP&A?

In any state of the art corporate building, one or two conference facilities, auditoriums, or training rooms are reserved for education and were assigned to visiting contract trainers like myself, and also to in-house trainers. And the thing about a training room is no one (and I do mean no one) cleaned a training room at the end of a seminar like I did. At the end of the seminar after everyone had left, I'd straighten the desks, power down the computers, collect trash from on top of and from underneath the tables, clean the white boards, reset the flip charts etc. It worked for me to leave the space pristine and impeccable and immaculate for whomever was going to use it next after I'd gone. It worked for me to leave the beach (so to speak) in a better condition than I found it.

But it was more than that, actually. It was that no one (and I do mean no one) cleaned a training room before starting delivering their seminar like I did. At first, this was just a simple necessity. The room was invariably left in a mess after the previous seminar was delivered in it. I cleaned the white boards and set up the computers, emptied the trash etc so the participants in my seminars came in to an already clear space. That paid dividends - for sure it did - to the workability of the seminar.

But pretty soon I realized it paid more than just dividends to the workability of the seminar. It provided direct links to what I'd be doing next and how LP&A would inexorably expand.

Here's what happened: when I cleaned the room before starting delivering my seminar, I found all the remaining training materials (handouts, class notes, brochures, etc) cast aside by whomever used the room the last time. Since the room was a computer training room, the cast aside materials I found were from other computer training companies, agents, trainers, and contract agencies who were all, in one way or another, offering services in areas similar to what I was offering. I scrutinized all those materials and wrote down long lists of contact names and phone numbers from them. Then in whatever spare time I had (or back at my home office if I didn't have any spare time during the presentation of the seminar), I would call all those people and have conversations with them, given there was already an area of common interest.

Once I started a conversation like this, it became a chain of conversations with each conversation leading to another conversation ie with each conversation referring to another conversation. Many if not all of these conversations bore fruit, leading to more connections, more contracts, more experience, more exposure, more acumen, and more requests for my services. Doggedly, I never gave up on ie I never let go of any conversation like this until its fruit died on the vine or matured - so to speak (I called this approach "kill or clear"). However, the truth is that when it came to what LP&A was speaking about ie when it came to what LP&A offered, almost all this fruit matured.

I never set out to look for more work to expand LP&A. The additional work which expanded LP&A and me to the point where I became one of the most sought after IBM mainframe computer software trainers in these United States, being requested to deliver five different three to five day seminars every week, wasn't sought out by me. Rather, there it was, waiting for me, in the very training rooms in which I delivered my seminars. In other words, it came to me - all by itself.

What I Got Out Of It

The duration of LP&A technical seminars on average was three days. Sometimes they went longer: five days. Sometimes they went even longer: ten days. This means I stood in front of a room full of very intelligent technical people, some of them double PhDs, delivering material, coaching, and answering intricate technical questions seven hours a day for up to five or ten days straight. I think it's fair to say this is a kind of training most people will never get.

No one taught me how to do this. I kind of learned it myself on the job. When you're at the leading edge of a conversation - any conversation, actually, but in this case the leading edge of a very conceptual intricate technical conversation - and you're speaking it for seven hours a day for up to five or ten days straight, creating objects and systems neither in nuts and bolts nor in bricks and mortar but rather in words and concepts, it's a training in and of itself for the speaker. I learned to think on my feet. I learned to think fast on my feet. I learned to think deeply on my feet ... AND ... I learned to share my thoughts as works in progress out loud in front of an auditorium full of people.

Not only that, but the conversations themselves and the kinds of questions they elicited weren't in the order of "Which plug goes in which socket?". They were much more abstract and much more complex than that. I learned to use language very precisely. I also learned it was OK to not have all the right answers! ... at least, not immediately. But if ie when I couldn't answer a question, I wrote it down, did the research, then got the answer which I brought back to the group later. I learned it was OK to think through and to speak through abstract and complex issues with the group until we came up with if not the right conclusions then at least with good, useful conclusions.

It's nearly six years since I retired LP&A. None of these skills have left me. If anything, they're more honed now and they imbue me more now than they ever did. And if they're no longer applied to mainframe computer technology as they once exclusively were, they're now applied to Life itself and in particular to these Conversations For Transformation in which they're arguably much more useful to a vastly wider audience.

Stepping Down

A lot's been said ie a lot's been speculated about why I stepped down from LP&A and all but retired a successful business. But there's really no mystery to this: I wanted to be closer to my children. That's it. There was a certain value, a certain financial reward to be gained by continuing to do what I was doing, and continuing to travel as long and as extensively as I did to do it. This financial reward translated directly into my childrens' future: to their college education funds, to be quite specific. But it also came with a cost: to serve my children and to secure their future college education, I had to be away from them. At some point, especially as they were growing older, that didn't serve any of us any more. The place for me to be was with them at home. That's why I stepped down from LP&A. Any other conjecture is simply off base.

Now, of course, the internet has come of age. PCs, laptops, and tablets are de rigueur. Mainframe computers and mainframe software training simply aren't the markets they once were. No, it's more than that. Mainframe computers and mainframe software training simply aren't even the shadows of the markets they once were. There's no going back, even if I wanted to, now that my children are grown - and in college.

There's an interesting statistic which exists in the folk lore surrounding information technology - which means it may be true or it may not be. It's this: these days ninety nine percent of the computers on the planet are PCs, laptops, and tablets, and only one percent are mainframes (down from their near one hundred percent total dominance in the late '60s and early '70s). But of all the data on the planet today, ninety nine percent of it is still stored on mainframes.

Client List

Laurence Platt and Associates aka LP&A has written software and / or provided computer support and / or delivered technical training seminars for these fine business institutions:

Abbott Laboratories
Advanced Micro Devices
AegonUSA
Air Force Security Assistance Center
Alberta Government Telephone
Alberta Treasury Branch
Albertsons
Allen Bradley
Alliance Data Systems
Allstate
American Family Insurance
Amdahl
America West Airlines
American Century Services
American Express
American Management Systems
American President Lines
American Telephone and Telegraph
Amerisure Insurance
Ameritech Applied Technology
AMP Incorporated
AmTrust Bank
Amoco Corporation
Anglo American Corporation
Anthem Blue Cross Blue Sheild
Apex Computer Services
Asian Computer Services
Atlantic Richfield Corporation
Arizona State University
Arthur Anderson
Automated Concepts Incorporated
Automatic Data Processing
Automobile Association of Michigan
Avery Dennison
Axiom Training and Software Development
Banc One Services Corporation
Bank of California
Bank of America
Bank of New York
Bank of Hong Kong
Bay Area Rapid Transit
Belk Stores
Bell Atlantic
Bell Canada
Bell Laboratories
Bell of Pennsylvania
Birmingham Large Users Group
Blue Cross Blue Shield of Illinois
Blue Cross Blue Shield of Kansas
Blue Cross Blue Shield of Minnesota
Boeing Computer Services
Bon Appetit Catering
Boscov's Department Stores
Brown Shoe Company
Bristol-Myers Squibb
Buckeye Pipe Line Company
Business Information Technology
California Energy Commission
California Federal Bank
California Highway Patrol
California Public Employees Retirement System
California State Automobile Association
California State Lottery Commission
Caltrans
Campbell Soup Company
Canadian Imperial Bank of Commerce
Canadian Pacific
CapitalOne Bank
Carnation
Carter Mining Company
Caterpillar Incorporated
CENTEC
Charles Schwab and Company
Chase Manhattan Bank
Chemical Abstract Services
Chemical Bank
Chevron
Children's Hospital of Columbus Ohio
Ciber Training Services
CIGNA Insurance Company
Cincinnati Bell
Citibank
Citicorp
City of Calgary
City of Mesa
City of Sacramento
City of Toronto
Clorox Corporation
Coca Cola
Colonial Life and Accident Insurance Company
Comdisco Continuity Services
Compass Bank
Computer Generated Solutions
Computer Horizons
Computer Knowledge
Computer Resources Group
Computer Sciences Corporation
Computer Systems Development
CompuTimes Inc
ConAgra
Consumers Energy
Consumers Power Company
Continental Insurance
Corporate Instruction Solutions
Contra Costa County (California)
Copia: The American Center for Food, Wine, and The Arts
Cray Research
Crowley Maritime
Cynergys
Davis Thomas and Associates
DDM Incorporated
Dean Witter Company
Defense Finance and Accounting Service
Defense Information Technology Service Organization
Defense Intelligence Agency
Delta Airlines
Deluxe Corporation
Denning Consulting and Training
Department of Consumer Affairs (California)
Department of Finance (California)
Department of Fish and Game (California)
Department of Health and Human Services (North Carolina)
Department of Health Services (California)
Department of Information Technology (Nevada)
Department of Mental Health (California)
Department of Motor Vehicles (California)
Department of Motor Vehicles (Nevada)
Department of Public Safety (Arizona)
Department of Supply and Services (Canada)
Department of Transportation (California)
Department of the Army Criminal Investigation Command
Department of Water and Power (Los Angeles)
Depository Trust and Clearing Corporation
Dialog Information Systems
Digital Equipment
Discover Card Services
Diversified Investment Advisors
Drexel Burnham Lambert
Dun and Bradstreet Software
Eaton Corporation
EBSCO International
Ecolab
Electronic Data Systems
EMC Corporation
Employment Development Department (California)
Energy Information Administration
Environmental Protection Agency
EpicEvent Productions
Equitable Life Assurance
ExecuTrain
Farm Bureau
Federal National Mortgage Association
Federal Reserve Bank
Fidelity Investments
Fireman's Fund Insurance Company
First Bank Services
First Commercial Bank
First Data Card Services
First Interstate Bank
First National Bank
First Nationwide Bank
Fiserv
Fleet Industrial Supply Center
Fleet Technology Systems
Ford Aerospace
Ford Motor Company
Foster and Gallagher
Franchise Tax Board (California)
Fred Meyer Incorporated
Fujitsu America
General Foods
General Motors
Geodynamics Corporation
General Electric
General Reinsurance Corporation
General Telephone and Electronics
Golden Gate University
Government of Alberta
Grand Valley State University
Great Lakes Higher Education
Great Lakes Technical Group
Group Health Insurance
Hallmark
Health and Human Services Data Center (California)
Health and Welfare Agency Data Center (California)
Hewitt Associates
Hewlett Packard
Home Federal Savings and Loan
Homestead Savings
Honda
Household International
Husky Oil
Illinois Power
Imperial Oil
Indiana Bell
Information Builders Incorporated
Information Management Resources
Informatix
Ingram Micro
Insurance Services Office
Integral Systems
Intel Corporation
Interact Information Services
Internal Revenue Service
International Business Machines
International Consulting and Education
International Netherlands Group
IP Sharp Associates
Isuzu Motors of America
Jackson National Life Insurance
JAT Computer Consultants
Johnson and Johnson
Joseph E Seagram and Sons
Kay-Bee Toy Stores
Keane Incorporated
Kirtland Air Force Base
Kmart
Knauer Consulting
Know How
Kohl's Department Stores
Kraft General Foods
Legent Corporation
Lender Processing Services
Levi Strauss
Lido Cabaret de Paris
Limited Brands
Litton Computer Services
Lockheed Martin
Lockheed Missiles and Space Corporation
Los Angeles County, California
Lucky Stores
Macro 4
Martin Marietta Energy Systems
MasTech Corporation
Master Trainers Consortium
Mayo Clinic
McDonnell Douglas Corporation
MCI
McKesson Corporation
McClellan Air Force Base
Meijer Stores
Memphis Light Gas and Water
Merrill Lynch
Mervyn's Department Stores
Metropolitan Life Insurance
Metro-North Commuter Railroad
Mobil Oil
Moen Computer Services
Montgomery County, Maryland
Motorola
Mutual Benefit Life Insurance
Mutual of Omaha Insurance
Napa Winery Shuttle
National Aeronautics and Space Administration
National Life Insurance
National Semiconductor
Nations Bank
Nationwide Insurance
Naval Air Weapons Station at Point Mugu
Naval Computer and Telecommunications Station
Naval Undersea Warfare Engineering Station
Network Systems Corporation
Nevada Bell
New Technology Foundation
New Technology High School
New England Power Service Company
New York State Crime Victims Board
New York State Office of General Services
New York State Teachers Retirement System
New York State Department of Environmental Conservation
New York State Department of Transportation
New York State Department of Motor Vehicles
New York State Office of Mental Health
New York State Teachers Retirement System
Nims Associates
Nissan Motor Corporation
North American Philips
North Carolina Farm Bereau
Northern States Power Company
Northrop Corporation
Norwest Services
Ohio Bureau of Workers' Compensation
Ohio Department of Job and Family Services
Ohio Edison
Old Mutual Life Assurance
Open Software Technologies
Oracle Corporation
Pacific Bell
Pacific Gas and Electric Company
Pacific Training
Paine Webber
Palm Beach County, Florida
Pepperidge Farm
Performing Arts Technology
Peter R Johnson and Associates
Petro Canada
Philadelphia Electric Company
Philip Morris USA
Philips Semiconductor
Pragmatics Incorporated
Procter and Gamble
Professional Technical Services
Progressive Insurance
Prudential Insurance
Public Service Electricity and Gas
Puget Sound Power and Light
Quaker Oats
Racine Unified School District
Ralston Purina
Regions Bank
Revenue Canada Taxation
Robins Air Force Base
Rockwell Automation
Rohm and Haas Company
Rolm Systems
Rose Garden Guest Home
Royal and Sun Alliance
Royal Insurance
Rutgers University
Sacramento County, California
Sacramento Municipal Utility District
Safeway Stores
Saks Fifth Avenue
Salt River Project
San Diego Gas and Electric Company
Sanford Health
Sandia National Laboratories
Santa Clara County, California
Sara Lee Knit Products
Saturn
Saudi Arabia Ministry of the Interior
Schulman and Associates
Scientific Time Sharing Corporation
Scott Air Force Base
Searle Pharmaceuticals
Security Pacific Bank
Sedgwick County, Kansas
SERENA Software International
Shaklee Corporation
Sharp Health Care
Shell Canada
Shell Oil Company
Social Security Administration
Southern California Edison
Southern Pacific Transport Company
South Western Bell Corporation
SouthTrust Bank
SPR
Stanford University
Star Bank
Statistics Canada
State Board of Equalization (California)
State Compensation Insurance Fund
State Employee Education Program (California)
State Farm Insurance Company
State of California
State of New Mexico
State of Nevada
State of New York
State of North Carolina
State of Oklahoma Department of Human Services
State of Texas Department of Transportation
Storage Technology Corporation
Sun Life Assurance of Canada
Supply and Services Canada
System Development Life Cycle Technologies
Sys-Ed
Tampa Electric
Tandem Computers
Teale Data Center (California)
Technalysis Corporation
Telecommunications Technology
Tesseract
Texaco
Texas Technical University
The Gap
The Hess Collection
The Home Depot
The Shepard Group
The Vanguard Group
Themis Incorporated
Total Systems Services
Training Partners Limited
Train-Right
Trans Union Corporation
Trans World Airlines
Trubody Ranch
TRW Business Credit Services
Tymnet
Underwriters Laboratories
United Air Lines
United Data Services
United Parcel Service
United Health Group
United States Air Force
United States Army Information Systems Command
United States Army Intelligence Center at Fort Huachuca
United States Army Western States Systems Command
United States Army Aviation Systems Command
United States Department of Defense
United States Department of Energy
United States Department of Justice
United States Marine Corps
United States Navy
United States Postal Service
United States Treasury
University of British Columbia
University of California
University of California at Davis Medical Center
University of Illinois
University of North Carolina Health Care
Unocal76 Corporation
US Air
US Bank
US Sprint
US Tobacco
US West Communications
Utilicorp
Vector Research
Verhoef Information Packages
Verizon Wireless
Visa
Virginia Power
Virginia Employment Commission
Visiting Nurse Service Health Care
VM Assist
Volvo
Wachovia Bank
Walmart
Warner Lambert
Washington State Patrol
Washington University
Watermark Learning
Watermark Technical Services
Wells Fargo Bank
Westfield Group
Westinghouse
West Virginia Department of Health and Human Resources
Westinghouse Savannah River Site
Whirlpool Corporation
Wine Valley Experience Limousine
Wisconsin Power and Light
... and more

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