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Taking a Break Due to Increased Workload! (or How Wonderfully Hectic Was Your Week?) |
Posted By Guy Timberlake, The American Small Business Coalition, LLC,
Sunday, July 25, 2010
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Taking a Break Due to Increased Workload!
(or How Wonderfully Hectic Was Your Week?)
 Okay,
in all seriousness I guess I DO have an entry for this week, it just
wasn't planned. But the workload has increased and in ways beyond our
membership programs.
For starters, we've been pinged by a few
agencies requesting assistance in identifying some industry partners.
You'll see one of them (from the FBI)
on the front page of our site and in this newsletter. Look for others
will shortly. What I love about this most is having the opportunity to
give our members a leg up and giving them the information first. It's
not that we don't value all of the contractors out there, but c'mon! I
mean, membership does have its privileges, right?
Then for all of you folks with interpretation and translation experience, you may be DLITE'd to know this Thursday and next Wednesday, we will be hosting two teaming events for the upcoming INSCOM DLITE requirement with our friends from Mission Essential Personnel
(MEP). Don't know who they are? Well, we've known MEP (formerly Aegis
Mission Essential Personnel) since they were knee-high to a June Bug,
which means they are a founding member of The ASBC and we knew the
company when the employee count was around fifteen. Want to know where
they are today?
MISSION ESSENTIAL
PERSONNEL (MEP) IS THE U.S. DEPARTMENT OF DEFENSE'S LEADING PROVIDER OF
TRANSLATORS, INTERPRETERS AND CULTURAL ADVISORS IN AFGHANISTAN, WITH
MORE THAN 5,000 PERSONNEL IN THEATER AND HUNDREDS MORE IN AFRICA, ASIA,
EUROPE AND THE MIDDLE EAST.
Pretty cool, huh?!? We think they know what they are doing and might make a good teaming partner. But, that's for you to decide.
Members will also see references to multiple teams engaged to pursue the DIA-IES opportunity. We're in pure matchmaker mode for this one and have already helped two sets of teams get formed. Good luck folks!
There is plenty more of this in store as all signs seem to indicate fiscal year end may be a busy one!
Once again, this is how we roll.
Peace!
Guy
Timberlake
Chief Visionary and CEO
"The
person who says it cannot be
done
should not interrupt the person doing it."
Identify, Qualify, Pursue and Capture B2G Business
Opportunities.
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A Case of Mistaken Identity. Helping Our Members Identify, Qualify, Pursue and Win B2G Biz is Why We're Here! |
Posted By Guy Timberlake, The American Small Business Coalition, LLC,
Saturday, July 17, 2010
Updated: Sunday, July 25, 2010
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A Case of Mistaken Identity.
Helping
Our Members Identify, Qualify, Pursue and Win B2G Biz is Why We're
Here!
The other day I
received a call from a reporter who wanted to interview me about how The
American Small Business Coalition advocates on behalf of small and
minority businesses to change policy that impacts government contracting
rules.
Huh?
Now the gentleman was not from one of our
usual industry pub's, so after explaining we are a membership
organization helping Industry better understand how business is done in
the government sector and that we host a community of resources to help
small, medium and large companies leverage information and relationships
to identify and capture direct and subcontract business opportunities,
I declined the interview and referred him to another organization that
does take on legislative and policy issues.
Seriously, can you
imagine me in the hallowed halls doing serious testimony? I would have
to invoke the spirit of my grandfather Rev. Dr. George Murray Thompson,
Sr. (the Southern Baptist Minister from Richmond, VA) just to get
myself through a session with the House or Senate or that of my
great-great uncle, George Washington Murray, a U.S. Congressman from
South Carolina who represented their 7th district in the late 1800's.
Nahh!
Maggie
and I (and now my new boss, Pem!) are very content working with our
staff and volunteers to create situations like the one that occurred at
last week's Washington Breakfast Club where a
business opportunity was announced by our guests from the Defense Intelligence Agency.
Guests introduce
themselves at last week's Washington
Breakfast Club at the Tower Club which was themed as the "DIA
Small Business Roundtable" and featured Sherry
Baldwin (Dir. Office of Small Business Programs) and Don Camden (DIA SITE Contracting
Officer).  | Or the
other opportunity that popped up last week (courtesy of a referral from a
Member) that has resulted in six other Members (five small business and
one mid-tier) now being engaged by another mid-tier company to pursue a
limited competition opportunity with a federal agency.
It
doesn't stop there.
One of our CORE Small Business Members who is part of a team
currently taking down Navy work, just opened the door for a few other
CORE Small Business Members to get a piece of the action. In fact, if you
are a CORE Small Business Member reading this and the terms TFMS and
TMMCA resonate with you, click here to view and respond to the
opportunity right now!
That's how we roll.
Peace!
Guy
Timberlake
Chief
Visionary and CEO
"The
person who says it cannot be
done
should
not interrupt the person doing it."
 Identify,
Qualify, Pursue and Capture B2G Business
Opportunities.
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The U.S. Mid-Sized Business Administration? (also known as "We Must Protect This House!") |
Posted By Guy Timberlake, The American Small Business Coalition, LLC,
Wednesday, July 07, 2010
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"We Must
Protect This House!"
 In a
recent Washington Technology article by Matthew Weigelt entitled "Small-biz definitions put
hurt
on midsize contractors" business leaders from mid-tier
companies talk about the squeeze they feel once they graduate from the
current SBA size standards that define what a small business is for
federal contracting. They talk about the "procurement cliff" companies
face, specifically in the area of IT and the investment by the
Government which is being lost when these companies who benefited from
SBA Small Business Assistance are essentially forgotten about.
While
I can empathize with the sentiment, the answer is not in expanding the
size standards drastically to accommodate companies with upwards of
$100M in annual revenues as is the case with the companies in the WT
article. With a straight face, I say, lobby to create a new agency or at
least a new set of rules which apply to this group of companies. If the
Government sees fit to create assistance programs for mid-tier
companies it should not be to the detriment of current and future small
businesses.
Increasing the size standards creates a backlash on
the entry-tier of the size standards, basically making it near
impossible for newer, smaller companies to even get started. Since the
size standard applies to direct contracting and subcontracting, it
creates the same effect for small businesses as the rule which makes
Alaskan Native Corporations small businesses for
contracting/subcontracting, regardless of their size. Actions like these further cripple the ability of America's Innovation and Economic Engine to create jobs and bring their ideas and solutions to the Public and Private Sectors.
Without
question, mid-tier companies need help at some level and I would
participate in helping find a resolution to the proverbial "No Man's
Land" that exists for companies who graduate from the small business
program. But not at the expense of putting additional hurdles in front
of our small businesses.
Like the folks at Under Armour have so
eloquently stated in their marketing, "We Must Protect This House!"
Peace!
Best
regards,
Guy
Timberlake
Chief Visionary and CEO
"The person who says it cannot be
done
should not interrupt the person doing it."
Identify, Qualify, Pursue and Capture B2G Business Opportunities.
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"Attack ON the Small Business issues!" (Hey! Haven't we seen this movie before?) |
Posted By Guy Timberlake, The American Small Business Coalition, LLC,
Sunday, June 20, 2010
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In early May I blogged about the Administration's Small Business Task Force (Dear Mr. President: About that Interagency Task Force on Federal Contracting Opportunities for Small Business...) which has recently scheduled a public hearing for Monday, June 28th at Department of Commerce. They plan to hear feedback from those interested in offering it, on a series of topical questions to help the Task Force begin to size up what to accomplish and how to accomplish it. I think.My original comments (which I stand by) pointed out the tremendous potential for lack of truly good and useful ideas from the Task Force since the members are the agency heads who will then appoint other senior leaders from their agencies to tend to the "business" of the Task Force as opposed to having a group of Industry Small Business Leaders sitting at the table with  career feds who will continue to manage the solutions developed by the Task Force long after this Administration has departed. Additionally, those career feds are the "boots on the ground" who know what works and why it works and can speak poignantly about the approaches discussed and developed by the Task Force and ensure the solutions can be integrated successfully to complement if not enhance achievement of their agency mission goals. This is not to imply or say the leaders appointed by this Administration are not creative and do not have the ability to generate good ideas, but in the scheme of their overall responsibilities, I do not have confidence this activity nor this issue will cause a ripple in the "pools" of their respective concerns.Nonetheless, I have registered to attend the public hearing and offer my two cents related to:
- How can prime contractors be more effectively
held responsible for their subcontracting plans?
- What aspects, if any, of the rules governing
set-asides should be changed?
In a follow-on to the Task Force blog entry, I submitted "Ahem! Change B2G Small Businesses Could Believe In! (and live with, literally!)" where I offered a few suggestions on helping the cause of continued small business participation in federal contracting.These suggestions are referred to
as "Federal
Contracting Change Small Businesses Can Believe In" and if implemented would create a tremendous impact on the U.S. Economy not to mention
the morale of the men and women leading the true small businesses that
strive to make a difference every day by supporting the diplomatic,
humanitarian, intelligence and defense missions of our Government, here
and abroad.Here are those suggestions again: - Small Business Subcontracting Deliverables versus Goals -
Institute a change which makes small business participation a
deliverable for companies considered "other than small business" where a
dollar value is attributed to the subcontracting plan. The incentive is
clear.
- Parity in the
Small Business Program - Level the playing field to create fair
opportunity for small businesses and remove some of the complexity in
order to make it easier for companies to engage less on the
certifications and more on their capabilities. This will also help
simplify it for the government acquisition professional, too.
- Expand and Set-Aside Simplified Acquisitions
- Increase the range of the Simplified Acquisition Threshold to
$500,000 and change the "reservation" to a total set-aside for companies eligible to receive
SBA Assistance for Federal Contracting.
When I attend the public meeting, and hopefully have the opportunity to leverage my allotted two minutes, this is what I plan to comment on.
Peace!
Guy Timberlake
Chief Visionary and Chief Executive Officer
"The
person who says it cannot be done
should not interrupt the person doing it."
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To Be or Not To Be (a Small Business)? That IS the question! |
Posted By Guy Timberlake, The American Small Business Coalition, LLC,
Thursday, June 10, 2010
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Honestly. Can you give me a break?
A friend tells me to take another gander at the Washington Technology Top 100 list, specifically the group of 'small businesses' that made the list, and to let them know what I see. Not only do I see the usual round-up of Alaskan Native Corporations on the list (no comments from the peanut gallery!), but I see several companies on the list that to my knowledge don't meet ANY definition for being a small business.
I mean seriously folks, two of the companies on the list are clearly 'other than small business' which is the technical definition for companies that have the word "No" on their CCR profile under the heading of "Small Business" and "Emerging Small Business" in the section titled "Small Business Types."
Pretty simple.
Other companies on the WT Top 100 list of small businesses have added lots and lots of manufacturer NAICS Codes (which are measured in number of
employees over a three-year average) to their profiles so there are
affirmative responses co-mingled with the "NO's" in that same "Small
Business Types" section.
Essentially, they find a few NAICS Codes that will identify them as a small
business (even if the definitions don't pertain to their actual
business) and assume that means they are a small business across the
board. It's their own rendition of Code-Shopping with an industry twist.
Then there are those who simply did not update their revenues in CCR so that a company that advertises government sales in excess of $100M on the WT Top 100 list shows up in CCR as a company that meets the $25M size standard.
What about the one's who are not including the totals of their affiliates?
So let's say the companies who embellished their "capabilities" in CCR actually are manufacturers of... well whatever. Is that their primary industry?
In these cases, methinks not.
In the Code of Federal Regulations (CFR's) there is a section that talks about "How does SBA determine a concern's "primary industry”?" (CFR § 121.107) that states: "In determining the primary industry in which a concern or a concern
combined with its affiliates is engaged, SBA considers the distribution
of receipts, employees and costs of doing business among the different
industries in which business operations occurred for the most recently
completed fiscal year. SBA may also consider other factors, such as the
distribution of patents, contract awards, and assets."
I find it appalling that a company with more than $150M in sales to the government feels they are still in need of Government Contracting Assistance from the U.S Small Business Administration. That is what it means when you claim to be a small business, right? Keep in mind the totals listed on the WT Top 100 List only represent government sector sales and NOT total company sales.
So, what IS the question Washington Technology asks on the submission forms for the Top 100 that so confuses folks in mid-tier and large companies that they keep checking "Yes" to being a small business?
It has to be an honest mistake. Right?
Peace!
Guy Timberlake
Chief Visionary and CEO
The person who says it cannot be done
should not interrupt the
person doing it.
Tags:
bogus
business
CCR
honor
large
mid-tier
SBA
small
Washington Technology Top 100
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