April 19, 1999

TWO EXPERTS WHO SOUNDED THE ALARM

BY WARREN CARAGATA

Y2K may be the first-ever computer bug capable of infecting humans. That is exactly what has happened to Peter de Jager and Joe Boivin. Y2K has come to define who they are -- though both take very different stands on its impact. "It has taken over my life," says de Jager, whose Brampton, Ont., home features a Ford Explorer in the driveway with a "Y2K" licence plate. "I am counting the days," he says, "for this to be over."

De Jager, a former systems manager for clothing-store operator Dylex, has become one of the world's most quoted experts on the Millennium Bug and was one of the first heralds of its impending consequences. Y2K has been good to him, although he has had to face down criticism from a few colleagues that his crusade was motivated by a desire for fame and fortune. Last year, with a heavy calendar of speaking engagements -- at $15,000 a speech -- and other activities, he earned more than $1.5 million. "I've done well," de Jager allows, though he hopes that once the new century is old news he can put Y2K behind him and concentrate on the issue of managing technological change.

Many in the computer industry used to consider de Jager -- who was born in South Africa and raised in Canada and Ireland -- something of a doomsday nut. Now he believes the Y2K problem is well enough in hand that there will not be major problems. Today, computer colleagues credit him as the man who raised awareness of the bug. "I compliment Peter for starting us all on this road," says Al Aubry, the general manager of Year 2000 services for IBM Canada Ltd. and another Canadian with a worldwide Y2K reputation.

For every penny de Jager has made from Y2K, Joe Boivin may have lost a near-equal amount. The former Y2K program director for the CIBC has taken his savings and invested it in his Global Millennium Foundation, which he started last January and runs from the same high-rise apartment block where he lives. (In this, Boivin and de Jager are alike -- de Jager bought a house across the street from his home to use as an office.) Boivin left CIBC, he says, because "I felt concerned that the global notion of the Y2K problem wasn't appreciated." A public relations campaign launched by his foundation in the first month "blew through $15,000 to $20,000." He accepts that his message of a torrent of failures in Canada and around the world has marginalized him. But, he says, "my conscience was telling me to raise the alarm."

De Jager and Boivin have become synonymous with an issue that everyone hopes will disappear within months. Their next challenge: to refashion themselves for a post-Y2K world.