Month: December 2018

Find Local Opportunities Near You!

Posted on by Eric Coffie

Leverage these local opportunities to provide products and services to the government! Here’s a guide to tell you how.

LOOK FOR LOCAL OPPORTUNITIES

While looking for potential projects for my potential client, one of the agencies that I was looking at is the National Park Service.

Good thing, I  had the privilege of speaking with someone from the Denver Service Center and this person gave me some ideas on how we could potentially land a contract with the National Park Service.

1. Look for DOI’s forecast list.

The first thing that you should do is visit the Department of Interior’s website to see their forecast list. 

With this, type the term “Department of the Interior Forecast list” on your search bar. The first results should be about the procurement opportunities on their website, so click on that. 

Afterwards, you will then be transported to their Office of Small and Disadvantaged Business Utilization’s procurement opportunities page. Scroll down past that and you will see the document of their procurement opportunities within that year. 

2. Download the forecast document. 

Once you click that document, it will then be downloaded to your computer. 

Then, when you pull up that spreadsheet, it will provide you a list of different opportunities organized by contract types. It also gives you the name of the opportunity, the value range of the job, where the place performance is, and the point of contact and their numbers. 

TAKE ADVANTAGE OF THIS OPPORTUNITY!

For a lot of people out there who are looking for simplified acquisition or micro-purchases, this is a great opportunity for you to solicit directly to a national park in your local area and to also find a potential opportunity to work with local government agencies near you.

In fact, I want to compare this opportunity to more of like a state or a local contract because it’s close in terms of proximity to your actual physical location.

However, the good thing is, you’re getting federal past performance and federal jobs although these are just smaller projects. 

You could easily sort this forecast list by state and you could pick or choose the ones that are closest to you. There might be 10 or 15 local contracts within your area that you can easily reach out to. 

And even if you’re not successful in landing something right now, you still have the opportunity to make connections and build relationships with agencies and clients near you. 

“From my understanding, if the person at the local level is, right, they like you and they want to do business with you,they can then refer that back up to the Denver Service Center for larger contracts, for larger opportunities, for set aside jobs, for negotiating type proposals.”

So, this is your tip for today. Take advantage of using a forecast list with over a thousand of opportunities in order to identify potential future clients, future jobs, and future opportunities coming up!

RESOURCES

With this in mind, if you want to learn more about doing business with the government, then join us here at GovCon Giants.

Just visit our website and other social media platforms or check the new GovCon Edu where you learn everything about government contracting!

You can also check these resources below:

Find local opportunities with National Park Service (NPS) Department of Interior

https://youtu.be/8kWibjZ5wjo

https://govcongiants1.wpengine.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/12/Find-local-opportunities-with-National-Park-Service-DOI.pdf

 

Holiday Reflection and Goal Setting towards Success!

Posted on by Eric Coffie

Achieve your vision in life with this holiday reflection and goal setting towards success!

HOLIDAY REFLECTION

We always hear this saying, “Whatever gets measured gets done,” and it only means that if you’re not measuring your activities on a weekly, monthly, or quarterly basis, then, it’s very difficult to know if you’re moving or making progress or not.

With this in mind, I always look back to see if I was productive, did I accomplish the things I set out to accomplish, and if not, what happened.

To give you an idea, I first started doing this activity in 2016. I listed my goals which were to do 50 videos and 100 podcasts, gain 50,000 views and 5,000 person email list, and create a free course.

Currently, I exceeded the 50 videos, I never did a podcast, I’ve done well over the 50,000 views, I didn’t get to the 5,000 person email list, but I did create my free course.

Apart from that, there are some other things that happened that were not part of my initial goals. I’ve got national organizations talking to me and I’ve developed relationships with companies that are going to take me into contract with arenas that I’ve not been familiar with. 

“By just writing down the goals and having them at the top of your mind and going through that exercise, you know you’re going to hit some of those goals. You may not hit others, but there’s some things that are going to happen that you may not be able to see that may take you in some directions that are even beyond what you thought you’d be at and where you’d be or go.”

GOAL SETTING

In setting my goals, I have these 100 life goals and this 21-goal category. 

For my 100 life goals, I just put everything that I want to do. These are a wide range of things, like visiting India, visiting China, going to the ESPYs, and other things to kind of start checking off the boxes.

Then, for my 21-goal category, I wrote down three goals per section and the areas that I focused on were relationship, business and career, health and fitness goals, personal goals, contribution and legacy, and then financial goals. 

To give an example, under my contribution and legacy, I wrote down things like to help 100,000 of small businesses achieve dramatic growth results, impact the lives of millions of people so they can pay it forward for the next generation, and ensure financial freedom for the next five generations.

VISION STATEMENT

Then, to keep me on track with my goal, I have this 12-month vision statement.

Through this tracker, I ask these questions below:

What’s important to me? What are my core values? What are the things that are not easy for me? What are some of those core values that help me push through some of those hard tasks? What are my five big goals for the year? What are the five most compelling reasons to hit these goals and elevate my life? What are the key behaviors I must develop?

Apart from that, you also need to take note of the things you need to sacrifice in order to achieve those goals. For me, I’m willing to give up nights and weekends, all vacation plans, every Saturday and Sunday, and return for the money that I desire.

SUCCESS REASONS

Now that you have your goals and your vision statement, you also need to list down all of your reasons why you want to achieve those goals. 

“You can write down your goals. You can write down your vision statement, all that stuff…. You can have plenty of intelligence, talent, and good work ethic, but if you don’t have enough reasons, then you won’t do the activity.” 

Consider that these reasons, your reasons, these are like magnets that will pull you closer towards your goals. 

“For me, I knew I wanted to help my son. I knew I wanted to help my niece. I have a goal to pay off my parents’ house. And so those kinds of things are what pulled me through those tough times when people were yelling at me, screaming at me, when people treated me poorly, or I didn’t feel like I was being treated fairly.”

So, what are the reasons behind some of those goals? Write those down and don’t forget to look at it from time to time. 

RESOURCES

With this in mind, if you want to be part of a community who wants to succeed in life in terms of doing business with the government, then join us here at GovCon Giants.

Just visit our website and other social media platforms or check the new GovCon Edu where you learn everything about government contracting!

To learn more about the topic above, you can also check these resources below:

How to Set Goals in Life

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mLqx9IjOXTs&t=154s

Holiday reflection and Goal Setting – Govcon Training Day 10

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iu2q-cBvTTw&feature=youtu.be

https://govcongiants1.wpengine.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/12/Holiday-reflection-and-Goal-Setting-Govcon-Training-Day-10.pdf

Protect Yourselves, Know the Miller Act!

Posted on by Eric Coffie

In this blog, we’ll talk about the Miller Act and how all federal contractors need to know about this in order to protect ourselves in dealing with government contracts.

THE MILLER ACT

The Miller Act is a provision under U.S.C. Chapter 31 which helps protect contractors from non-payment of supplies and/or labor when working on federal contracts. 

This Act requires prime contractors who get federal contractors put bonds on the job. A bond is a form of insurance policy that provides protection for all federal contractors because as you may or may not know, you cannot sue the federal government for non-payment.

So, if you’re working on a federal job, you do not have the right or ability to put a lien on a federal facility, the Department of Justice, or the White House. 

The good thing is the Miller Act helps you out of this problem because it requires prime contractors to give a bond to ensure protection for the little guys out there.

Still, keep in mind that you must comply and meet the requirements. This means that if 90 days after the job and you were not paid yet, then you should file a claim. Consider that you only have up to one year to file that claim.

If you meet all those provisions, then you are due your money.

KEEP MIND OF WHAT TIER YOU FALL INTO

However, the bad side of the Miller Act provision is that it only provides protection to the first-tier and second-tier subcontractors. It does not provide protection if you fall outside of that window.

To give you a visual idea, when the federal government gives a contract to a company, this company is considered a prime. 

However, most primes can’t do all of the job alone, so they hire a subcontractor to do some parts of the contract. These subcontractors are considered first-tier. 

Now, if this subcontractor hires another company to work under them, this company will then be considered a second-tier subcontractor. 

And if that second-tier subcontractor hires you for a portion of their contract, then you’re considered a third-tier subcontractor. 

However, no matter how huge that contract is, you’re still a third-tier subcontractor. You have no remedies for ensuring that that person who hired you will pay you.

Naturally, you could sue them, if you’ve got the money and the resources. However, there’s no protection and there’s no provisions in the law that govern that. So now, you would have to sue them at your own expense.

Now, let’s assume that you try to complain to someone at the top, they’re going to read this law to you. They’re going to reference this particular section in the law that talks about bonds, what’s formally known as the Miller Act.

“If you’re out there and you’re operating in the auspice of the government. When you’re out there and you’re operating and you’re excited, know what position you are in on a contract. Know how close you are to the actual contract holder, so that way you can ensure you’re protected.”

MY PERSONAL STORY

To tell you the truth, I also have a story of how this Act affected me. This job was actually in Texas where we’re building a border patrol station and the first-tier subcontractor hired me and then I became a second-tier subcontractor.

Well, I got my equipment from H&E, which provided equipment for the job, because I don’t own all the machines and equipment for the job. So, H&E then became a third-tier to me.

Guess what happens? Well, the second guy who had the contract decided not to pay me because he failed to do something on his part. It then left me in a position where I could not pay H&E and H&E had no recourse to pursue the actual prime contractor or the government or the other guy for that matter. 

Now, the good thing about that, for me at least, was because H&E was a much larger entity than myself and they had the power and money to hire an attorney to sue the first-tier subcontractor. 

I just gave them all of the information. They read my contract and they also read the contract of the person who hired me. And they were able to sue the first-tier subcontractor and get the money that was due to them in that case.

So, in my particular situation, it worked out great, but it doesn’t always end up like that. That’s why I’m giving you this information. 

“The more information that you know, the more you’re aware, then you can take precautionary efforts in place when you’re working with some of these companies. Maybe you could do things like ask for some money up front, maybe you can ask for a smaller window in terms of being paid. Whatever steps that you need to take to protect yourselves, I want to inform and educate everyone out there, so that you can take those necessary steps.”

RESOURCES

With this in mind, if you want to learn more about doing business with the government, then join us here at GovCon Giants.

Just visit our website and other social media platforms or check the new GovCon Edu where you learn everything about government contracting!

You can also check these resources below:

All contractors of government jobs MUST watch this video. Miller Act.

https://youtu.be/6O4qOCCwujo

https://govcongiants1.wpengine.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/12/All-contractors-of-government-jobs-MUST-watch-this-video.-Miller-Act.pdf