Dear Reader,
Last month in Raleigh, just a stone's throw from SAS World Headquarters here in Cary, the world's best hockey players gathered for the 2011 NHL All-Star game. It was a special treat for hockey fans living in the Southern part of the United States, where the weather mostly belies a sport played on ice, unless regulated by a well-appointed indoor rink. (With our average winter temperature of 51° F, pond hockey is something we might play in a video game, not in our backyards.)

It was also a resounding success. Yes, it was great to see the kind of skills that were on display from the pro players, but what often makes or breaks such fan-centric events is the commitment and interest of the area in which it is held – the venue, the fans and the host team. And according to the media, in all three of those categories, the Carolina Hurricanes put the All-Star game in the proverbial back-of-the-net.

"The clear winner was Raleigh," Michael Farber wrote in Sports Illustrated. "The success of the weekend and the host team are reminders to all sunny American markets that there is a blueprint for success."

Perhaps it's just something in the water in this area. Last month, SAS also captained an all-star team when it earned the No. 1 ranking in Fortune magazine's 100 Best Places to Work in the United States list for the second consecutive year. Our blueprint for success? The venue (our well-appointed SAS campus), the host team (our employees) and the fans (our customers). In the reviews compiled by the magazine, SAS workers frequented words like "family," "care," and "people" to describe what drives SAS' culture, a place that believes in delivering phenomenal products and services to both its customers and its employees.

Those are also attributes that keep our world-class instructors at SAS year-after-year to help you become a better SAS pro. SAS' low turnover rate not only means that we draft the best talent to teach our courses, but that our instructors also develop their expertise over many years, passing that knowledge on to you, the student. And really, who in analytics wouldn't like to have a roster full of Wayne Gretzkys and Gordie Howes to train them?
They're always on your team, and so are we.

Thanks for reading,

Larry LaRusso
Editor, SAS Training Report