Yes, those people, the ones who have had a substantial impact on my career, and on life in general. Andy, Dani, Peter and other have shared their thoughts, and now it's time I do the same.
The folks:
Of course the majority of working persons will claim that their parents had a substantial effect on their careers, but the important thing is to state exactly what influence I had received from them. While my mom never had a career outside of the home and didn't weigh in on these sort of matters, my father was a 30+ year welding teacher at the local vocational-technical high school and he was always guiding kids toward professional careers and helping them with all things employment related. When I was starting out my software development career Dad pointed out IT every job in the newspaper, and constantly gave advice on everything from how to apply to jobs to the best interview strategies and how to navigate office politics, which aren't nearly as cutthroat as school system politics. Both parents have always supported us, and the odds I would be where I am today would probably be much lower without that support.
Margaret Price:
Margaret was my high school data processing[*] teacher who never for a moment thought there was anything I couldn't do, and made sure I knew it. "Don't worry about it, just do it - you'll get it done.", she would always say. From the very beginning, Margaret has been a pillar of support, and was that one person who wouldn't allow me to whine or grumble myself into any sort of self pity when things didn't go as I thought they should. Margaret has also been a technical mentor, who has encouraged me to feed my hunger for learning new languages, technologies and the like. It is because of Margaret that I have a drive to help others, to teach, and to mentor.
Henry Marchetti:
Henry was my first boss in a real, formalized IT department. Henry was a tough but fair boss, and he drilled into each employee the importance of quality, integrity and customer service above everything else. Our team actually had to read customer service magazine articles (which we would groan about at the time) but in hindsight I'm glad we had to do so. Henry made sure I was well aware that people who use my software are my customers and I need to treat them as such with the respect that customers deserve. I may often joke about users during talks and classes, but in all reality it's no joke as you're paid because they use your product.
My Students:
Believe it or not, over the years, many, many students have greatly influenced my career. I see all kinds of people representing every sort of company, and every situation out there. I'm thrilled to be behind the podium, as every class contains valuable learning experiences for me (and hopefully, my students too). Students have been demonstrating such vastly different concepts, thoughts and implementations of technologies than the vendors would have in their courseware. I could have nothing less than widened horizons because of them. Thanks, students!
[*]yes, they did call it data processing, and that S36 was darn great technology at the time!