Impact
"Erhard’s influence extends far beyond the couple of million people who have done his courses: there is hardly a self-help book or a management training programme that does not borrow some of his principles." Erhard and his programs have been cited as having a significant cultural impact on America in the 1970s. Erhard’s teachings have influenced the field of professional “Life Coaching,” although Erhard was not considered to be a coach. The late Thomas Leonard, who was the founder of Coach U, the International Coach Federation, Coachville and the International Association of Coaches was an est employee in the 1980‘s. Paul Fireman (former CEO of Reebok), Peter Block, leadership expert Warren Bennis, and economist Michael Jensen, spoke positively of Erhard. Tiger Woods' father cited est as helping him become a better parent. Over the years, Werner Erhard’s philosophy has been cited in helping to promote a multi-billion-dollar personal growth industry based on Erhard's original concepts.
The validity of Erhard's work and his motivations have been met with mixed reviews. Psychiatrist Marc Galanter described Erhard as "a man with no formal experience in mental health, self help, or religious revivalism, but a background in retail sales." Michael Zimmerman, Philosophy Professor at Tulane University, described Erhard as "a kind of artist, a thinker, an inventor, who has big debts to others, borrowed from others, but then put the whole thing together in a way that no one else had ever done." Philosophy professor Robert Todd Carroll referred to est as a "hodge-podge of philosophical bits and pieces culled from the carcasses of existential philosophy, motivational psychology." Social critic John Bassett MacCleary called Erhard "a former used-car salesman" and est "just another moneymaking scam." NYU psychology professor Paul Vitz noted that est "was primarily a business" and that its "style of operation has been labeled as fascist."
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