With government contracting, organizations first register in the System for Award Management (SAM) after getting a Unique Entity Identifier (UEI). Then a bid is submitted in response to a request for proposal (RFP) from a government agency. The agency then selects the winning bid(s) through a competitive process, sometimes with special programs and “set-asides” to help small, disadvantaged, and veteran-owned businesses.
For owners of disadvantaged businesses, they must have a net worth under amounts specified by the agencies, such specified by the US Department of Transportation and the SBA on 8(a) set aside programs. Even if people meet the net worth criteria, they still might not qualify, if there’s evidence of substantial wealth from other sources.
And that’s just to qualify to bid! It’s a full time job. So, an organization needs to designate someone, paid a salary not based on a percentage of the successful bids, to do the following (Notice how this does not have BOSS making money off the contracting, which we could, but rather outlining the tried and proven approach.):
- publish and distribute a budget of revenue and costs from government contracting and update quarterly
- determine which programs an organization qualifies for
- check websites for RFP’s and the due dates for bids
- prepare detailed financial plans to see if the organization has the manpower and resources to fulfill a bid
- write up and submit the bid
- follow up with agency personnel on what to improve on for bids not won
Such follow-up just might be the most important of the job. It builds relationships with agency personnel in anticipation of future bids. As for sources of information, there are SAM.gov for RFP’s, the Public Contracting Institute, Federal Publications Seminars, Acquisition.gov, the General Services Administration at Sell to government, and the SBA at Federal Contracting.