ISI Welcomes New Director to Staff (September 2005)

Overcoming Adversity (March 2005)

ISI Featured at INC 500 conference (March 2004)

ISI Makes Inc. Magazine's List of the 500 Fastest-Growing Private Companies for the Second Year (October 2003)

Firm Convictions (November 2003)

Mission Accomplished: Hard Work Makes Forecast Come True (December 2003)

Scout Uses Videoconference to Finish Eagle Board of Review (May 2002)

ISI Brings NBA Draft Closer to Memphis Fans (June 2002)

Straight to Video: University of Memphis Honors Alumni-Founded Company in Magazine
(June 2002)

New Television Studio and Art Therapy Room Brighten Hospital Stay for Kids at Le Bonheur
(March 2002)


More About ISI:
Recent News
Accolades



ISI Welcomes New Director to Staff

ISI is proud to announce that Clay Vaughn has been named Director of Data, Products and Services, a new position at ISI. Vaughn is a graduate of Mississippi State University and has a Masters in Science of Instructional Technology. His territory includes Mississippi, Alabama, and Louisiana.

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Overcoming Adversity
ISI hangs tough in tough times, prospers

By Mark Watson, The Commercial Appeal
March 21, 2005

Interactive Solutions Inc. proves Friedrich Nietzsche's aphorism: "What does not destroy me, makes me stronger." In April 2003, the technology company discovered that an employee had defrauded the company of $255,000. Linda Merritt was indicted Aug. 7, 2003.

But the company's staff of 15 persevered, and the company—ISI, which sells and supports videoconferencing, distance learning, telemedicine and audio-visual products throughout the Southeast—was named that fall to Inc. magazine's list of 500 fastest-growing, privately held companies in the U.S. for the second year in a row.

In December 2003, the Memphis Regional Chamber presented Jay Myers, company president and CEO, the Kemmons Wilson Emerging Business Award.

During 2004, Myers worked with Asst. U.S. Atty. Tina Berry, the Secret Service and the FBI to build the case against Merritt.

After a number of delays, Merritt pled guilty to one count of bank fraud on March 16, 2004. Sentencing was scheduled for later.

But it kept getting put off, which was emotionally trying for Myers, who planned to attend the sentencing hearing. He even canceled a business trip to Philadelphia to attend one of the hearings, which ultimately was postponed.

"You needed to have closure," Myers said.

Finally, on Nov. 22, 2004, U.S. District Judge Bernice B. Donald sentenced Merritt to 100 months, or eight years and four months.

"It's a very emotional experience," Myers said. "My wife and I were sitting there, and we heard a bang at the back door, and she comes in in a wheelchair. She had a bum leg. They were getting ready to do a sentence of a little over five years, and they called me up there.

"I told them how scared our people were, how it had almost put us out of business."

After the sentencing, Myers said he felt that he had done the community a service in helping "to put a bad person away."

"There wasn't anything that could have made me feel better at that moment," he said. "White-collar crime isn't viewed like violent crime, so we were very skeptical of what might happen. Afterward, I called (the Secret Service investigator's) office and said, 'I'm proud to be an American today, and I'm proud to say the system works.' "

But while all this was happening, the staff kept selling, and the business kept growing. The company's sales about doubled in 2004 to nearly $11 million and Myers plans to apply for inclusion in the Inc. 500 again.

"That growth would be impressive, even without the embezzlement," said Marc Jordan, Memphis Regional Chamber president.

The company added about 3,000 square feet to its office space on Forest Hill Irene. The company opened another office in Nashville and grew the staff to 30.

"You figure the statistics for emerging businesses to succeed, vs. fail, are pretty dismal to begin with in all of just the normal things that can happen to a business," Jordan said. "To overcome all of those things plus what they had to overcome internally is pretty impressive. ... The team he has developed deserves a lot of credit."

Companies that have been stung by employee fraud often keep them secret, fearing bad publicity, but Myers was candid about his company's circumstance in a Commercial Appeal article that appeared almost exactly one year before the sentencing date.

He has spoken to entrepreneur classes at the University of Memphis and to the Association of Certified Fraud Examiners.

That candor may have contributed to sales in 2004, because customers seemed to rally around the company, Myers said.

"When we all kind of got together at the start of 2004 for a planning meeting at the University of Memphis, I just said, 'I don't know, let's double sales and go all the way,' kind of as a joke," Myers said. "When we walked out of that meeting, everybody had in their head, '$10 million.'

"From the sales staff and service people and support, these people were committed to getting it done."

Copyright, The Commercial Appeal, Memphis, TN. Used with permission. http://www.commercialappeal.com

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ISI Featured at INC 500 conference

Interactive Solutions, Inc. (ISI), was selected as one of only 5 companies recently spotlighted at the 2004 INC 500 conference awards ceremony held at the Doral Country Club in Miami, Fla. ISI founder and CEO, Jay B. Myers was part of a video interview that INC magazine’s Mike Hofman did with select entrepreneurs who discussed a wide range of topics such as the value of entrepreneurship and the risk in starting a business.

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ISI Makes Inc. Magazine's List of the 500 Fastest-Growing Private Companies for Second Year

MEMPHIS, TN—October 2, 2003—Interactive Solutions Inc. (ISI), a leading integrator of enterprise collaboration solutions, including video conferencing, audio/visual, streaming, Web conferencing and network support services, is proud to announce that the company has been named one of America's fastest growing privately held companies for the second time by Inc. magazine. (2001 and 2003)

In this 23rd installment from Inc. magazine, ISI ranks #410 for 2003 with a five-year sales growth from 1998 to 2002 of 435%. A large portion of this growth can be attributed to ISI's unique ability to provide its customers with a truly integrated solution and its successful efforts in addressing the educational and tele-medicine markets. The Inc. 500 Special Issue will appear on newsstands October 14 and will be on display until January 2004.

"We are proud to be recognized once again, and for the second time, by Inc. magazine as one of the fastest growing private companies in the U.S.," reports Jay Myers, President & Chief Executive Officer of ISI. "This award is a tribute to the continued loyalty of our customers, the strong support of our partners and the tireless dedication of our employees. It is with that combined effort that ISI in its almost eight-year existence has achieved our goal of becoming the southeast U.S. leader in the audio/visual and video conferencing industries."

"The entrepreneurs you'll find on the Inc. 500 have the type of attitude we need to get this economy moving again," said Inc. editor-in-chief John Koten. "For them, a tough market is not an excuse for poor performance, but an opportunity to innovate and rise above the competition."

The Inc. 500 ranks privately held companies according to sales growth over the past five years. With 75% of all new job creation in the U.S. coming from small businesses, the Inc. 500 is a prescient indicator of the companies and industries that are driving the economy forward. Over the years, the Inc. 500 has identified the next generation of world-class companies, with Microsoft, Stonyfield Farms, Timberland, Oracle, Princeton Review, Morningstar, E* Trade, Intuit and Domino's Pizza all appearing on the list before they became industry powerhouses.

To be eligible for this year's Inc. 500, companies had to be independent and privately held through their fiscal year 2002, have had at least $200,000 in sales in the base year of 1998, and their 2002 sales had to exceed 2001 sales. Inc. verifies all information using tax forms and financial statements from certified public accountants and by conducting interviews with company officials.

About ISI:
Interactive Solutions, Inc. (ISI) is a leading integrator of managed enterprise collaboration solutions, including video conferencing, audio/visual, streaming, Web conferencing and network services. From our headquarters in Memphis, Tennessee, and branch offices in Nashville, Louisville, Huntsville, Birmingham and Montgomery, Alabama ISI makes video conferencing and audio/visual solutions easy to access and cost justify.

ISI proudly represents products and services from leading industry manufacturers including Polycom (NASDAQ: PLCM), TANDBERG (OSLO: TAA.OL), RADVISION (NASDAQ: RVSN), Forgent Networks (NASDAQ: FORG), Crestron Electronics, Canon, Extron Electronics, Clear One, and AMX.
ISI's numerous awards include ranking in the Inc. 500 Fastest Growing Private Company list for 2001 and 2003, the 2001 Memphis Business Journal Small Business of the Year and recognition by Tandberg as the 2002 winner of the Southeast Region Award for Excellence.

For additional information on ISI's suite of products and services, please call (888) 290-8264 or visit us on the Web at www.isitn.com.

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Firm Convictions
Ethics start in-house at resilient Interactive Solutions

By Mark Watson
Watson@commercialappeal.com

For a technology company that markets the latest in communications systems, Memphis-based Interactive Solutions sure likes ink.

This fall, Inc., the magazine devoted to entrepreneurs, named Interactive Solutions to its list of 500 fastest-growing, privately-held companies in the United States for the second time in three years.

With 15 employees, Interactive Solutions sells, installs, maintains and consults regarding video teleconferencing systems and audiovisual systems. The company ranked 410th on the 2003 Inc. 500 for growing 435 percent between 1998 and 2002. Sales totaled $5.2 million in 2002.

Interactive Solutions also derived some benefit from Inc. last spring, when owner Jay Myers read an article about embezzlement at a family-owned business.

Myers started looking into his own books and discovered evidence that an accounting manager and another employee had embezzled $255,000. On Aug 7, Linda Merritt and Angela T. Bell were indicted for bank fraud. Merritt’s attorney, Pamela Heurin declined comment, as the case approaches resolution.
Typically, when embezzlement occurs, the company fires the culprit and tries to recoup the money as a civil matter.

“Most small businesses don’t prosecute,” said Myers, whose brother headed the Better Business Bureau of the Mid-South until his death in June 2002. “I looked in the mirror and thought, my brother and my father ran the Better Business Bureau in this town for many years. I have been raised my whole life with honesty and integrity and ethics, I decided we were going to prosecute to the fullest extent of the law.”

And today Myers is unusually open about this incident, in hopes that his bad experience can help others.

Working with the Secret Service and Wilson & Turner, a fraud examination firm, Interactive Solutions recovered about half the money, Myers said.

“I think it’s a valuable business lesson,” said Myers, an Eagle Scout. “If (my business) were any smaller than I am today, this kind of hit could have put me out of business.

I’ll never get half of that money back, but if I tell you the story, we may just save a few other businesses along the way. And if I just help one other small business guy save that amount of money or more, you can’t put a price on that.”

Dennis Gross, director of operations and telecommunications at Methodist Le Bonheur Healthcare, said this integrity and candor is “key to my doing business with him.

“The style of the company, the integrity that is there, the leadership of that group just permeates the entire company.”

Interactive Solutions supplied systems used in Methodist Le Bonheur’s pediatric telemedicine system. The company also installed audiovisual systems for two major meeting rooms.

Interactive Solutions installed telemedicine systems at 60 sites in the Mid-South, 25 sites in northern Mississippi and 30 sites in Louisiana.

“To our knowledge, we’re the largest provider of telemedicine sites in the Southeast and one of the largest in the country,” Myers said.

His company’s success depends upon extraordinary toughness and resilience of his staff, he said. The death of Myers’s brother John in 2002 prevented the business owner from attending the Inc. 500 conference for winning in 2001. It also reduced his sales effectiveness.

“They took care of me,” Myers said. “They knew a job had to be done, so they took care of it. I wanted us to get that Inc. award again. It’s a tribute to my brother. … They rallied, circled the wagons and got it done. We literally had purchase orders coming in on New Year’s Eve.”

But last April19, they discovered the embezzlement.

“Twice in one year, my staff stepped up, and while I was out playing cops and robbers, they kept selling, just like they when my brother passed away. I am proud to tell you they are going to increase revenue this year. We’re going to be profitable.”

“This is a very resilient firm.”

Copyright, The Commercial Appeal, Memphis, TN. Used with permission. (http://www.commercialappeal.com)

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Mission Accomplished: Hard Work Makes Forecast Come True
Entrepreneur humbled by regional chamber’s inaugural Wilson award

By David Flaum
flaum@commercialappeal.com

Not long after Jay Myers opened his video teleconference business in 1996, Kemmons Wilson appeared at his door for a demonstration.

The founder of Interactive Solutions didn’t know whether to bow or just shake hands with the legendary entrepreneur and the founder of Holiday Inns. Myers opted for the latter.

His part-time secretary, the only other company employee at the time, took photos that sit in the bookcase over Myers’s desk.

As Wilson left without buying anything, he said, “You hang in there. You’re going to make some money at this business.”

On Friday, as Myers accepted the Memphis Regional Chamber’s first annual Kemmons Wilson Emerging Business Award, he said, “Mission accomplished. We did our job.”

At the ceremonies during the chamber’s third annual chairman’s inaugural luncheon, he gave his usual praise to his employees and, belatedly, to his wife.

He had one other unusual thank you.

“Eight years ago today, I got fired from my job,” Myers said.

He then thanked his former employer, without naming him.

Before the ceremony, Myers said his firm had grown to 17 employees and should produce about $6 million in revenues this year.

He said he was more excited to receive the chamber recognition than having his company named to Inc. magazine’s list of the 500 fastest-growing private companies in the United States for the second time in three years.

“Inc. is neat nationwide, but I’m one of 500 people,” Myers said. “I’m the only one getting this (award).

“The community thing is very important to me and he is the biggest name in the entrepreneurial world,” he said. “I’m really thrilled.”

Chamber officials decided to start the award as a way to recognize the contributions to the community from Wilson, who died in February, said Marc Jordan, chamber president and chief executive officer.

“Talk about an icon for entrepreneurs, this was the man,” he said at the ceremony.

Earlier, Jordan said the chamber had never given an award for any type of business.

Wilson was “forever helping businesses get started,” he said. “He really gave a lot of himself to people who had ideas, who had dreams like he had dreams.”

Dreams and goals that turn into a vision are essential, said Jerry West, president of basketball operations for the Memphis Grizzlies and the event’s keynote speaker.

West said he set high goals for himself growing up in a small town in West Virginia.

“My dream was to be a basketball player, the best basketball player in the world,” said the NBA hall-of-famer. “People who have lofty goals are the ones who accomplish the most in life.”
His goal now: For the Grizzlies to beat the team, he used to play for and run, the Los Angeles Lakers, to make it into the NBA championship series.

Copyright, The Commercial Appeal, Memphis, TN. Used with permission. (http://www.commercialappeal.com)

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Scout Uses Videoconference to Finish Eagle Board of Review

Brandon Black's mind was miles away. Actually, it was precisely 1,114 miles away.

Brandon is the first Boy Scout to have his Eagle Board of Review conducted by videoconference. While leaders from the Chickasaw Council gathered in Memphis, Tenn., Brandon and his father met them from a videoconferencing center in Boulder, Co.

"It makes you realize you're in the 21st century," said Assistant Scoutmaster Bruce Farmer. "It was as if they were right there in the room with us."

Brandon had spent seven years working with Farmer and the other members of Troop 270. He was committed to becoming an Eagle Scout.

"My dad kept motivating me," he said. "Not many people make it. If you can make it, it's a life accomplishment you can cherish forever."

Brandon's father, Ken Black, strongly supported the Scouts and encouraged Brandon and his other son, Kyle, to get involved.

"I was never a Scout, said Ken.”I never had the opportunity, but this was something I definitely wanted for my boys."

While Brandon was planning his Eagle project, Ken received a job opportunity in Boulder. The family moved in June, but Brandon and his father flew back to Memphis for a week in July to complete the project, a meditation garden for the troop's sponsor, Grace Church of the Nazarene. He and friends from his troop worked for three days in the hot Memphis sun to complete the project.

"Brandon helped improve the area, and he allowed us to give back to the church that had given so much to the Scouts," explained Farmer.

Brandon returned to Boulder and started his junior year of high school a few weeks later. Although his Eagle project had been completed, he still needed to face the Eagle Board of Review. He had tried to schedule the review in Memphis, but scheduling conflicts and airfare costs made it prohibitive.

ISI's Jay Myers and John Delockery learned of Brandon's situation from other Scout leaders. The men, who are both active Scout volunteers, offered ISI's assistance to help Brandon finish.

"He worked so hard to get everything done," said Myers. "I wanted to help him in any way I could."
Ken Black was grateful for ISI's help. "We had two choices, pay for additional airfare or use videoconference," he said. It took a few calls to coordinate, but everything soon fell into place.

The Eagle Board of Review was held earlier this fall. Charlie Bartlow, Eagle Board Chairman for the Eastern District, has conducted hundreds of reviews on Eagle candidates. Brandon's was the first one he did with a camera.

"It felt strange not having him sitting there," he said. "But he looked much more at ease (with the technology) than we were."

When the review was over, the Blacks celebrated with a family dinner in Boulder. The Blacks plan to be involved with Scouting in the Boulder area, as soon as they find a troop. Brandon also plans to keep Scouting as a part of his life for many years to come. He hopes to achieve an Eagle Palm and eventually become an adult leader.

Brandon returned to Memphis in December to visit relatives and take part in his Eagle Court of Honor. This time, he did it in person.

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ISI Brings NBA Draft Closer to Memphis Fans

Fans of the Memphis Grizzlies had a front row seat for this year's NBA draft and all the behind-the-scenes excitement.

Interactive Solutions, Inc. provided videoconferencing services that linked activities from the Grizzlies' headquarters at Toyota Plaza to the official Draft Party at the Pyramid. The event was held June 26. Fans were able to receive up-to-the-minute information on the draft from Grizzlies' leadership and NBA officials.

The Grizzlies had the fourth selection in the first round of the 2002 NBA Draft.

"This is sports history," said Jay Myers, chief executive officer of ISI. "And we are so glad to be able to have a role in bringing part of it to the fans."

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Straight to Video: University of Memphis Honors Alumni-Founded Company in Magazine

The University of Memphis featured ISI's journey from inception to success with a Spring 2002 feature article in its quarterly alumni publication, The University of Memphis Alumni Magazine. Read the article below as featured, or visit the publication Web site.

One U of M alumnus is profiting by diminishing distances as he makes the words “near” and “far” obsolete with his Memphis-based business.

Straight to Video
by Benjamin Potter

The world is getting smaller.

Telephones, television, the Internet — these inventions and countless others bring the world into our living rooms. And new technologies such as videoconferencing put employers closer to employees, teachers closer to students and doctors closer to patients.

As U of M alumnus Jay Myers (BBA ’78) can attest, videoconferencing can be big business. Myers is president and CEO of Interactive Solutions Inc. (ISI). In October, the business magazine Inc. ranked ISI 182nd on its annual list of America’s 500 fastest-growing private companies after ISI harvested a mammoth 1,535 percent sales growth in its first five years.

Myers’ travels have taken him across the country and to foreign lands, but his longest trek to date was the one to establish ISI. It was a journey decades in the making.

Jay Myers built ISI from the ground up. The fledgling company does the bulk of its business in the South but has clients all over the U.S. and even a few overseas.

Rewind

Myers carries himself with perfect posture, and he normally dons glasses and a conservative shirt and tie. But there are hints in his Germantown, Tenn., office that belie his outward appearance and CEO title.

By his desk sits a sign that says “Reserved for Jay Myers. UT fans will be towed at owner’s expense.”

“I have to turn that sign around sometimes,” he says. “A lot of our clients come from East
Tennessee.” A loyal Tiger fan, he adds, “I don’t whistle ‘Rocky Top’ around here very much.”

While he was at then-Memphis State University, Myers admits he wasn’t a “star student,” but hard work paid off. “I worked my way through school,” he says. “I take a lot of pride in that.”

John Pepin (BBA ’62, MBA ’64), dean of Fogelman College of Business and Economics, says Myers was a “slightly above-average student,” but grades weren’t what made him unique.

“What made Jay stand out,” Pepin says, “was his outgoing and very competitive personality, numerous questions, entrepreneurial thoughts and great perseverance.”

Or maybe business was in the blood. Role models ran rampant in the Myers household. His father once helmed the Memphis Better Business Bureau, and several siblings work for various corporations throughout the South. Myers considers his father a tough act to follow.

“I was very close to my late father,” Myers says, who shares both a first name and birthday with his dad. “He was always a strong supporter of me and was always in my corner.”

After graduation, Myers struggled to come into his own. Fresh out of college in 1978, he went to work as a salesman for AM International.

In 1982, he went to Eastman Kodak Co. looking for a change of pace. By 1987, life’s pace was as frantic as ever — peaking at a time when he had 48 hours to find and purchase a new home in Raleigh, N.C., while his wife, Maureen (BA ’76) was expecting their first child. “That’s what you call eating stress for breakfast,” as Myers puts it.

Then, a bombshell. Just months after Myers moved his family to Raleigh, Kodak dissolved the division at which he was working.

A job offer from Hewlett-Packard and his mother’s fight with breast cancer brought Myers back to Memphis. But wanting a return to a smaller company, he hit the books at the library to research emerging technologies. “My way of trying to deal with crises is to get educated,” he says. “You can’t sit back and expect changes — you’ve got to do something.”

Pause

In 1990, Myers made his fourth career move, this time to ATS Telephone and Data Systems, Inc. (now Expanets Mid-South Region), a company founded by another U of M alumnus, David Perdue (BBA ’63). At ATS, Myers got an initial glimpse into his future.
“One day I was talking to my boss and saw a tape on his desk about videoconferencing,” Myers says. He borrowed the tape and was immediately enamored with the technology. After a month of persuasion, he convinced ATS to sell the equipment.

Meanwhile, Myers had ideas for a new company — one that would deal solely with videoconferencing equipment.

“ISI was basically formed off the dining room table in my house,” Myers says. “I held my ‘CEO meetings’ and hammered out ideas during my morning run with Shadow, our dog. The good thing about the dog was that she never talked back or shot down any of my ideas!”

But at the same time, Myers says starting a new company was a serious matter that required great focus, as well as his family’s full-fledged support.

“My role in the beginning, as the old com-mercial says, was not to let him see me sweat,” Maureen says. “It sounds corny, but I knew that we would be OK. If this business did not work out, then something else would.”

Myers says that period in his life was a “humbling experience.” He and a secretary spent 1996 plugging away, looking for clients and forming a business partnership with a friend in Kentucky. Despite the small triumph of ISI’s first sale (“It was for $28,000, but it felt like $28 million for us,” Myers says), times were trying for the fledgling company.

Private investors began to lose faith and pulled the financial rug from underneath ISI’s feet. The clamps tightened when ISI was swindled out of $14,000 from a fraudulent New Hampshire-based company. At the end of its first year, the company was nearly a quarter of a million dollars in the red.

Myers remained diligent, however, and the hard work soon paid off. Large Tennessee-based clients, such as AutoZone, FedEx and Oak Ridge National Laboratory, helped turn the tide and put ISI back in the black.

Play

The U of M played an important role in ISI’s recovery. In 1998, Myers enrolled in an entrepreneur class headed by Dr. Barry Gilmore through the University’s Fast Track program.

“I’m not sure there was any magic formula,” Myers says, “but we learned to put together the components of a strong business plan.” Developing that business plan, along with meeting other local business owners, strengthened the backbone of know-how and contacts.

ISI found great success in the next few years. Revenues increased, as did the number of employees. By the end of 2000, the company had a new home in Germantown, Tenn., more than $4 million in total sales and a Small Business of the Year Award from the Memphis Business Journal.

His older brother, John Myers (BBA ’73), describes his sibling’s abilities this way: “He is constantly wanting to network and be associated with others who have the skills and experience to help him. While it’s not a unique characteristic, I suspect it’s one that is shared by many entrepreneurs. And that’s the bottom line — Jay’s an entrepreneur. He had a vision for a business, he created it and he made it successful.”

Two other ISI employees are U of M graduates — Don Cottam (BBA ’97) and Andrew Ruhland (BBA ’00) — a decision Myers says was “by design.”

“I’m proud of going to school at Memphis State,” Myers says. “They’ve got one of the best business schools in the South. The U of M taught us to think outside the box.”

Record

Some equate the term “videoconferencing” with hostile company takeovers or impersonal business meetings. Myers, however, paints a more benign, personal picture of the trade.

Many of ISI’s clients include several area hospitals and educational facilities. Distance learning is a big part of what ISI does, and so is telemedicine.

One endeavor in telemedicine has linked the North Mississippi Medical Center in Tupelo, Miss., to Le Bonheur Children’s Medical Center in Memphis. Now, a pediatrician in Memphis can diagnose a patient in rural Mississippi via the video link in a matter of minutes. The old process cost more time, money and stress, Myers says.

“The mental anguish created by this system for both the babies and the parents was enormous, not to mention very inefficient,” he says. “We feel very good about being able to provide technology that improves people’s lives.

“Using this technology might mean avoiding a plane trip and being able to attend a child’s school play or ballgame,” Myers says. “It makes us feel like we have a role in people’s business life.”

Sharon Newsom, a registered nurse, and other medical personnel at Le Bonheur, use this videoconferencing equpment, which is connected to a facility in Tupelo, Miss. Medical devices can be plugged in for added practicality.

Fast Forward

For Myers, being a businessman is only half of the picture. He considers community service “an obligation” and has been active in shaping the Memphis community in a positive way.

Myers, an Eagle Scout, still helps Boy Scouts of America through fund raising and assisting scouts who seek personal management or communications merit badges. He also teaches a business basics course to elementary school students for Junior Achievement. And he’s a member of Leadership Collierville, Tenn., where participants go through team-building exercises, diversity training and visits to the state legislature.

Myers essentially is a potent blend of aggressive salesman and neighborhood nice guy. He has four pillars upon which he wants to set ISI. “One, highest ethical standards,” he says. “Two, impeccable integrity and honesty. Three, give back to the community. Four, honor my father’s name and reputation. I want to run the business in a manner that would make my father proud.”

Perhaps most importantly, he remains true to himself.

“You can fool a lot of people, but you can’t fool yourself,” he says. “You are who you are.”

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New Television Studio and Art Therapy Room Brighten Hospital Stay for Kids at Le Bonheur
ISI's equipment helps make hospital stays easier for kids at Le Bonheur Children's Medical Center

Le Bonheur Children's Medical Center has a staff of child life specialists who work with children and their families to normalize the hospital environment. Child life specialists teach children about hospital experiences using developmentally appropriate terms and techniques in a play setting. The newest tools at their disposal are Le Bonheur's new television studio and art therapy room.

Studio 8, Le Bonheur's new television studio is a much improved and high tech version of Le Bonheur's current in-house television channel. Equipment in the studio was provided by Interactive Solutions, Inc. (ISI). Studio 8 will feature three channels: a movie channel that will play continuous movies appropriate for children, an activity channel that will include game show and interactive activities for children, and an information channel to communicate about special events in the hospital. The child life staff will utilize Studio 8's remote capabilities to film activities in the hospital for children who aren't able to get out of bed.

"Even under the very best circumstances, a hospital stay can be tough on kids," said ISI's president and CEO Jay Myers. "We are so glad that we could design this new system for Le Bonheur's kids. We know that it will help make a tough situation much easier for these children and their families."

The art therapy room is designed to encourage creativity and will be used during create arts sessions. It features a kiln, arts and crafts supplies and many other creativity-encouraging tools. Le Bonheur Club and Wal-Mart raised the funds for the rooms.

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