High Quality Content by WIKIPEDIA articles! Werner Erhard: The Transformation of a Man, The Founding of est is a biography of Werner Erhard by William Warren Bartley, III. The book was published in 1978 by Clarkson Potter. Prior to writing the book, Bartley was a friend of Erhard`s and was involved in his company Erhard Seminars Training (est). While writing the book, Bartley was paid US$30,000 in the role of philosophical consultant for est. Erhard wrote a foreword to the book. The book`s structure describes Erhard`s education, transformation, reconnection with his family, and the theories of the est training.