Will Holmes, Founder of WHC was asked to facilitate the Procuring Opportunity event on February15th 2019 at the Earl Graves School of Business at Morgan State University. Here are his opening remarks:
On behalf of the Baltimore City Chamber of Commerce, I’d like to thank Morgan State University and the Earl Graves School of Business for hosting us today. Special Thanks to Tatiana Nelson Joseph, Joseph Wells and the entire Goldman Sachs 10,000 Small Businesses team for your help in hosting and coordinating this event. Thank you to Kurt Sommer of the Baltimore Integration Partnership and BLocal for collaborating with the Chamber. It’s amazing to align the institutions, large businesses and the small business community in a way that we can all benefit. I’d like than our participating organizations:
- City of Baltimore – Mayor’s Office of Small, Minority & Women Business
- Baltimore City Procurement Bureau
- Coppin State University
- Johns Hopkins University
- Kaiser Permanente
- Loyola University
- Lifebridge Health
- Maryland Institute College of Art
- Port Covington Development Team
- Towson University
- University of Maryland Baltimore
- University of Maryland Medical System
- University of Baltimore
- Clark Construction Group LLC
- T. Rowe Price
- Southway Builders
- Cordish Companies Whiting-Turner
- Baltimore Development Corporation
- Small Business Resource Center
- Made in Baltimore
- Goldman Sachs 10,000 Small Businesses
- Baltimore Gas & Electric
- Cureate / City Seeds
- William Holmes Consulting and CHV Media
- Hotel Indigo
- Baltimore Community Lending/ Baltimore Business Lending
- CMD Outsourcing
- American Design Associates
- Orange Element
- DPW Business Development Program
- Brown Advisory
These organizations are committed to working with the small business community, so please join me in thanking them for their participation, dedication and support.
All of these organizations have tables in the auditorium. Please make sure to visit them. Also, we are recording portions of today’s event. Special thanks to CHV Media for videography and Rob Morton for photography. If you visit the WHC table, you can share your thoughts about today’s event and be in our event recap video.
So, WHY ARE WE HERE?
Government agencies, large companies, universities all have needs. They all have pain points that need to be addressed. For Some needs, they will handle internally with existing staff. For other pain points, they will decide to bring in someone from outside the organization to fix these issues.
For some issues, a larger business with 20 years of experience and hundreds of employees is the best organization to handle the problem.
BUT
For other issues, a small business can probably do the job.
So, the government agencies, large companies and institutions decide to take the risk and set goals or create mandates to set aside a certain percentage to small businesses. Why take the risk? Because by giving small businesses a chance, we provide the opportunity for more jobs and stronger more stable communities.
BUT
Small businesses often don’t have the capital they need to buy the resources and hire the people to handle big jobs. They often don’t know where to go to get the contracts. And they often don’t know how to build the capacity needed to support these larger contracts.
So over here you have government agencies, large companies and institutions have needs and available contracts.
And over here you have small businesses who want the contracts but may not quite be ready yet, but with a little info, or a little capital or a little assistance they can be ready.
Today’s event Procuring Opportunity is for small companies to learn how to be more ready AND have a chance to meet the government agencies, large companies and institutions that are looking for small businesses to award contracts.
CONNECTIING THE LARGE INSTITITONS WITH THE SMALL BUSINESSES
THIS IS WHY WE ARE HERE TODAY!
For more information on minority business contracting and procurement opportunities, contact us using the form below: