The Large Influence of Small Business

• By: Arpan Patel, PMP
• On: 08/10/2021 23:47:53
• In: Committee Chair Comments
• Comments: 0

We're excited to launch ACEC/MW's new Small Business Committee (SBC) during our kickoff/welcome meeting this Thursday, August 12th at 11:30am via Zoom. Along with my Vice-Chair, Tandrumn Reid of T3 Design, we welcome you all to attend!
 
The SBC's mission consists of three key pillars: Advocacy, Education, and Engagement.
 
All firms in our industry started out as small businesses at some point. While “small business” is most easily defined by revenue size or headcount, we must understand and work within the patchwork of specific socioeconomic definitions and priorities of each Metropolitan Washington area agency/owner. These vary greatly in our region: SBE, DBE, MBE, WBE, VOB, SBR, and Local.  Additionally, there are important issues relating to the CBE and SWaM programs.
 
Such goals and requirements can be influenced through our advocacy and education to best meet the mutual needs of our membership and government owners, but we must start with a clear understanding of these requirements among our small business and large/Prime members.
 
We also want to make sure our small business members are prepared to successfully do business with government owners and large/Prime firms. This involves helping small businesses understand how to better meet their needs in terms of certifications, staffing, financial capacity, and administrative systems and processes, including FAR and overhead compliance.
 
If these issues matter to you, we welcome small and large business members to join the SBC: existing and NEW. In addition to advocacy and education, we envision ample engagement and networking opportunities between small business members and Primes/owners.
 
If you would like to receive the invitation to join our kickoff meeting, please contact ACEC/MW.  I look forward to seeing you there via Zoom.


Committee Chair Bio: Arpan has over 25 years of business, financial, and technical management experience in fields including infrastructure engineering, finance, land development, and information technology. This includes the management of multi-million dollar projects as a member of leading Wall Street investment banks, as a partner in a real estate development and construction firm, and as the founder and Area Manager of Somat Engineering's Capital Region practice. Learn more here: https://www.linkedin.com/in/arpanpatel/.