Science
How do you measure the performance of people whose achievements are hard to measure? Building on the work of Harold Fethe, Jeff Lyons founded MindSolve, a company that developed a technology which made employee evaluations more accurate and more reliable. The company did well and was sold, and Jeff made the challenging transition from founder to employee. A self-described “nerd,” Jeff as a kid used to secretly reprogram Tandy computers at the Radio Shack in the Jacksonville mall. He said “not a lot of planning was involved” in his career, “it was more “just being open to stuff and people who say, ‘come solve this problem for me." *This episode was originally released on August 14, 2019.* TRANSCRIPT: Intro (00:01): Inventors and their inventions. Welcome to Radio Cade the podcast from the Cade Museum for Creativity and Invention in Gainesville, Florida, the museum is named after James Robert Cade, who invented Gatorade in 1965. My name is Richard Miles. We'll introduce you to inventors and the things that motivate them, we'll learn about their personal stories, how their inventions work and how their ideas get from the laboratory to the marketplace. Richard Miles (00:38): I'm going to call HR if you work for any size company, that sentence has the appeal of I'm going to tell your mom, but it turns out HR has a fun, sexy side. I'm your host, Richard Miles and today we will be talking about how much fun it is with Jeff Lyons, founder of a company called MindSolve and currently the Senior Vice President of Global Professional Services at Sum Total, welcome to the show, Jeff. Jeff Lyons (01:00): Thanks, Richard. Excited to be here. Richard Miles (01:02): So Jeff, when I look up fun and sexy in the dictionary, there's a picture of you, right? Jeff Lyons (01:05): Definitely. And HR as well. Richard Miles (01:08): I also forgot to mention actually the pinnacle of your professional career has been serving as a board member on the Cade Museum, right? It's pretty much downhill from here. Jeff Lyons (01:16): Yes, thank you. Richard Miles (01:17): And normally we're talking about topics that are unfamiliar to a lot of people, advanced medical technologies, engineering marvels, that sort of stuff. Toda