kNOWHERE® HAS SUCCESSFULLY ENGAGED with a wide variety of customers all over the world. Following are customer experiences within knOwhere environments.

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NAVIGATION CENTER™: DETROIT EDISON.

A Navigation Center is a knOwhere designed environment built onsite at one of our ValueWeb™ client's locations. It is essentially an internal knOwhere with all the elements of environment, process and tools found in a knOwhere Store, but is used for the sole benefit of the organization.

"After spending two weeks "in the zone", I am fresh with feeling of wonderment at what this wonderful space and the wonderful people who staff it do to bring out the creative best in groups. I've had a number of experiences using the Learning Zone, doing major events as well as bringing in small work teams, and I'm am always amazed at how people respond to the physical and emotional experience of being "in the zone". In every case, groups were more productive, creative, and energetic in doing their work than I have experienced in other locations I've used for group events. The design of the space, the audio-visual support, the music, the staff support, the overall excellent service all work together to produce what seems to me at times a magical experience. What I especially like is how easy it is to create a "level playing field"--i.e., titles are truly left at the door when people enter the zone. Using the work walls in the "take a panel" process is a wonderful way to assure that everyone gets their "moment of glory". I use this technique frequently now when I'm working with mixed management-employee groups to assure that employees get "equal floor time". I really appreciate having this wonderful resource available to me in doing my work."

Colleen M. Brown Director-Organizational Learning, DTE Energy.

BHP - THE BROKEN HILL PROPRIETARY COMPANY, LTD, OF AUSTRALIA

BHP is one of the world's largest natural resource and manufacturing companies. The company has operations world wide in steel making, petroleum and minerals. The company employs over 60,000 people, and is headquartered in Melbourne, Australia. In the summer of 1999, BHP Minerals Development of San Francisco, (the development arm of BHP Minerals) was struggling with a decision as to exercise or drop an option to develop one of the richest copper deposits in the world. The struggle was compounded by the fact that while the deposit itself presented no technical hurdles, the country itself (the Democratic Republic of Congo, ex-Zaire), was considered one of the two or three highest risk countries in the world for business. In the words of the BHP sponsor,

"The knOwhere Store was selected for its ability to create a time compressed collaborative work environment, which let the BHP team "live" in each scenario, trying each strategic option in each scenario "world". There is no doubt that this process, if done inside BHP, would have taken at least 6 months. By using the knOwhere environment, the work was completed in three days. In addition, the richness of the resulting documentation allowed the senior management present to create a very tight and compelling presentation for the Managing Director". Since the decision to extend the option, as of November 1999, a cease-fire is in effect in the Congo, and the United Nations is preparing to send a peacekeeping force. Rebel groups and the current Congo paring the country for a new wave of growth and development."

Richard Marrs VP Business Development, The Broken Hill Proprietary Company, Ltd., of Australia

ELECTRONIC ARTS, EA.COM:

"Frankly, I've had a lot of offsite meetings. I think we all have. This is one of the more productive, if not the most productive I've been involved with, and it is because of all the things you guys did, I am incredibly impressed with this team and my level of confidence has gone up quite a bit."

John Riccitello CEO, EA.COM

"We came to knOwhere for a couple of reasons. We knew the high-tech, interesting infrastructure would get a lot of peoples' attention, but we also thought that a more creative, collaborative environment and set of processes would be exactly what we needed to help us. It would get us out of the old ways of working and shape us into a new way of working together to get the launch. We came out of our first design shop with clear strategy and confidence for launch, and realized we needed to involve our partners to build a new EA. In our second DesignShop® process, we had an integrated approach to thinking about our launch and branding EA."

Andy Billings VP Human Resources, EA.com

VALUE WEB MEMBERS

"It was a great experience and I look forward to working together in September. I've sent folks to your website and have raved about the 'holistic' approach you folks take....you really get to know what your clients need and put 110% into delivering...a rare occurrence. I have enjoyed reading Leaping the Abyss since last we were together...good insight into what you all do. I'm looking forward to gaining even more insight in round 2. Just know, when I find the right client, I will be referring them to you for a DesignShop."

Betty Henderson Wingfield Independent Consultant, Knight Ridder Executive Leadership Program

"There are many places and ways to work at the knOwhere store. I bring my startup to knOwhere because the high-performance environment helps us accelerate months of strategic development. Having a collaborative space--the work walls, tools and processes--really allows us to address complex problems that require "group genius" and experiential learning. On a personal level, knOwhere feeds my intellect and soul-a strong connection for doing meaningful work."

Ann Badillo President, Badillo Consulting

HOPELINK CORPORATION

"The knOwhere store Zoomtrax™ Process accelerated HopeLink by at least 3 months. We brought our ecosystem together and took away our market entry strategy. We saved thousands of dollars in travel expenses, sales calls and market research. knOwhere helped jump start our organization, setting new standards on how our customers, partners and vendors work together in the new economy."

Jim Messemer CEO , HopeLink

AGILENT TECHNOLOGIES

"If you're looking for a place to open the hearts, minds, and souls of the people in your organization, then the Knowhere Store is the place to go.

Our Division was interested in bringing together the Sr. Management Team and all the managers and supervisors for a day of sharing, questioning, creating, and learning ways to change a culture of people.

From the first moment we entered the Knowhere Store, we knew we had found a "treasure." The physical environment is perfect for stimulating creativity, teamwork and excitement among the participants. Then, when you add the expertise and philosophies of the founder, Gail Taylor, and her talented krew of facilitators and knowledge workers, you have the combination it takes to make your event a huge success.

When choosing the Knowhere Store for your group, you will have the opportunity to have as much, or as little, involvement in the design process as you want. They also have the ability to take your ideas and objectives and find stimulating ways to get your participants dialoguing and working together to get the results you need.

After weeks of planning and working together to design the program, you finally get to experience what the true essence of the Knowhere Store is all about. The day of your event, their team of people put on a production that will "knock your socks off." For the first time in my career of designing and facilitating team interventions, I had the opportunity to actually experience the event, rather than running around like a crazy person trying to get everything up and runing. The Knowhere Store handles everything. They bring in a music man, a cartoonist/artist, information recorders, videographers, and a lead facilitator. Watching the crew at work is like observing a theatrical performance. It was perfection at its finest!

I remember at the end of our 12-hour day, I felt a tremendous sense of accomplishment. I looked around at all the participants and could feel their energy for what they had accomplished that day. I looked around the room and saw the volumes of work they had created together. Quite a few participants came up to me and said, "this was the best Off-Site they'd ever attended!"

There are really no words to describe what the Knowhere Store is all about. Until you walk into the environment and "feel" its uniqueness and listen to the philosophies of Gail and lead facilitator, Jeff Shults, it will be difficult for you to understand the possibilities the Knowhere Store can bring to your organization. But hopefully my words have enticed you enough to go check it out. I doubt that you will find any place quite like it!"

Debbi Hamill
Agilent Technologies