In 1975 I left the employ of consulting firms and set out on my own. Over the next eight years I ran a series of one-man union-busting enterprises I called by such disingenuous names as Employee Synthesis Program and Human Resources Institute, and I struck it rich. But by 1983 I had become hopelessly alcoholic; the addiction had badly complicated my life, and solo work was taking its toll on me. I landed a counter-organizing job at an Ohio coal company five hundred workers strong, and I decided I needed backup. I called on some former colleagues from a Sheridan spin off called Modern Management Methods and invited them to join me as I feasted off the carcass of the United Mine Workers. They did, gleefully, and my reaffiliation with MMM continued until the death of my shameful career.