 Hey, GovCon Giants family, your host Eric Coffey. And today we're bringing you another exciting episode of the GovCon Giants podcast. Today's guest, Molly Mayhew, found her company MTS in 2017 after spending so many years as a subject matter expert, supporting other private sector companies from business development to government sales, government senior sales manager, and she decided it was now time to go off and start her own business. And so she found MTS in 2017, a systems integrator supporting federal, local and state contracts. Today's episode, you're going to hear all of the wonderful things that Molly's working on. She's a mother for grandmother for and she is an avid Buckeye fan. So stay tuned for this upcoming exciting episode because we so many of us, we know and we want to get into the IT space or with the IT sector. Or we're always thinking that it's too competitive and there's not enough opportunities out there because of the competent competition nature of IT. That is not the case. And so I want to share with you another story, bring another example of a woman who's a veteran who's coming in to this particular space and she's making a headway. Stay tuned for this upcoming exciting episode with Molly Mayhew. I'm so excited to join. I'm Molly Mayhew, the founder of Mayhew Technology Solutions. We're based out of Edmond, Oklahoma. We are a small business systems integrator that specializes in low voltage professionals, professional services and products and material about a value added reseller. We're also SBA 8A. I'm a service disabled veteran. We are in a hub zone. I'm an economic disadvantage woman on small business and then I'm also a DOT disadvantage business enterprise. So MTS checks all six federal tags for set-asides. But while I say that, I lead with what we can do, what our capabilities are, how we execute. And then the set-aside tags, of course, are the complement that allow customers and prime contractors to leverage those set-asides in order to meet small business utilization goals. Nice, nice. Now, your background, but actually you said a lot there. I did. I was like, I'm like, every time you said I had a question, I had another question, I had another question, another question. Thirty years wrapped up in that one statement. It was very well said. I love it. I, you know, but the first part of it that you stated was when I asked the question originally about where do we learn these things? And you said how we were raised and are there, you know, what our family, our parents taught us and our family and things like that. Did you come from an entrepreneurial family? No, I did not. I grew up in a small town in Ohio. My dad was an insurance man and my mom was a registered nurse in a family of seven kids. So, but I am a competitor and my father was very competitive when it came to sports and whatnot and in sales. So he was in sales. And, you know, as I grew older, I'd met an individual that said, if your father can sell insurance, the level he does, insurance is the hardest thing to sell. So obviously my father was successful as an insurance man, and I believe that's where I got most of my talent, skills and a gift for gab. No, no, I believe that I think we have to get comfortable selling ourselves and at least, like you said, selling your business and what you do and how you can add value to the government, right? And all your customers, not just the government, whoever your customer may be, whether it's a partner, right? You know, and I tell people, even as you grow your organizations, we have to sell to our internal teams, right? We got to get them to buy in. Right? That's important. That buy-in is very important. Internal and external. You're absolutely correct. Almost everybody's a customer or someone you're selling to, right? To achieve that buy-in. Right. Right. Absolutely. So tell us about, okay, you know, it's a little Molly, dad's insurance person, right? I have a son and he never knew what I did like for a living, right? And so did you really, did you, what do you think? Okay. I know his sales acumen, right? Fell upon you, but like, do you have any specific memories or stories that you can remember that identified? It was like, Hey, I think I'm like my dad. I say it every day. I mean, past several years ago, and as I age, I see it, I kind of giggle both some personal, you know, little tics and, and what not some mannerisms and sayings. My dad was known for saying, you got to go with what you got. I say that a lot. Okay. I think that's how he lived his whole life, to be honest, raising seven kids in middle class family and sending us all to Catholic school, which was, you know, quite expensive, still is quite expensive. So I was blessed to grow up in a small town. Like I said, in Ohio, Lime, Ohio, go to Catholic school, be part of a Catholic community, be in the sports. I was very sports oriented. And so out of the six girls, one boy, I was the most athletic or at least towards in my dad's eyes, the most the most athletic and he taught me, I think at an early age, which set me up again foundational is I could do anything as well as a boy. My neighbor next door used to sit outside on the driveway with this pipe and my dad would be firing the baseball at me, not a softball, a baseball at me and my youngest sister would be running in between because she was fast and he just say stand, you're going to take her head off one of these days. And my dad just fired back and said, Nope, she'll catch it every time. And I mean, he threw it, no mercy. He he ruffled that ball at me and expected me to catch it. Same thing with basketball. I excelled at basketball throughout my life and just a multi sport player, right? But he had me encouraged me to be out there to be able to shoot from anywhere on the court with my eyes closed at any given time. So hundred hundred shots a day, I'd be out there a hundred shots a day and I'd challenge myself to get a better percentage each time. You know, when when can I achieve to make a hundred out of a hundred? So I spent a lot of time trying to live up to my dad's expectations, taking that framework that he gave me as far as competition and and and success and and self achievement, not just necessarily everybody's else's achievement, but what it meant to me to achieve certain goals and I've used that throughout my life. I mean, it's just presented itself multiple times in life and that foundation is so core to who I am and the direction I'm going. That's that's I could see that, right? I mean, I could see it because again, when you talk about a hundred shots a day, right, that's dedication, right? That's, you know, doing the things that you don't like repetitively. It's, you know, good at it, right? Building a habit out of the things that you don't like. There are a lot of people talk about that, right? If you don't like something, make it a habit. And so, you know, even I can tell you about myself even like right now, one of the things I've been trying to drink more water. Yeah. And it is so hard and we all know we need to do it, right? And it's like, oh my gosh, how do you, how do people just drink only water? I can't have Gatorade, like nope, just water. It's like how do you start weeding yourself off of sugary drinks to only water, right? And we both have the same challenge. I'm trying to do the same thing. Are you really? Yeah, it's tough. It's tough. It's tough. I mean, I started off with watering down my drinks and then watering them down, watering down a little bit each week. So progressively cold turkey. You got to go. No, no, no, no, I can't. I can't. So, all right. Well, that's great. I, you know, a lot of small businesses do have those, hey, when I was a kid, you know, these those types of habits. Now you, it was five years ago that you started your company. Is that correct? In late 2017, I transitioned from a large wireless customer and our business and started the framework of MTS. Yes, we went operational in in 2018. Okay. Now why at that time, like what out of all the years would made it like, all right, 2017 is the year I've, you know, I'm going to do it. I think it's I've spent the last after the military, you know, 14 years, mid thirties. I'd spent the next 20 years or so doing it for everybody else, helping other companies, both large and small, be successful, grow their government business. I didn't want to get to an age where I looked back and I had regrets that what if regret one day and I had experience in building an a day when I first got out of the military here in Oklahoma. Yes. So I helped with that. So when it's successful and it's still successful today, and then I, you know, entered different industries and different verticals because folks saw me here in in the Oklahoma area as somebody that understood how to sell to government and somewhat of an expertise in the fact that I'm passionate about it. And I love talking about it. And more importantly, I love to help other people figure it out, especially small businesses. Right. So it just kind of grew from there across multiple verticals and industries, helping folks grow that to a point where it was time. I knew it was time. I put the right building blocks in place to be able to take that step from a very successful career with the wire, like I said, with the wireless company and step out and start my own business and have it look back. So, wow, that's great. I love it. That's awesome. You said you mentioned that you love helping small businesses grow. Tell us, you know, I know that as we become busy with our own lives, our own companies, right? It becomes harder to do that to help all the small businesses. And I just want to make sure I kind of want to put this out there because people will reach out to you. So let's set some ground. Let's set up some framework for like what that is, right? What does that look like? Hey, I can send an email. Hey, I get, you know, what kind of people are companies? Is it IT companies? Is it all small businesses? Is I mean, is there a specialty that you like, that you like working with? Is there any, are you an expert in a certain field? Right? Of expertise or just general small businesses? I think it's general small business. You know, at least to have that first conversation, when you meet folks and they, they're either frustrated or they don't understand the language and I've had to learn to de-acronize and de-acronism myself sometimes because we understand government business. The acronyms can flow and folks say, Hey, you're talking a different language. And that language is scary, right? Some of the companies that I've helped, even large companies, didn't understand that how to government. How do you get on a base? How do we get our salespeople onto an installation to talk to the customer? So I've learned that. I sat on that other side of the desk at the end of my military career, managing a large program out of Andrew's Air Force Base and I learned the process. So it, it, I was intrigued by it. And just like in my military career, I was a SME for my career field. I wanted to be a SME for how to sell to government. And I don't, I get, I think my biggest pleasure of course is contract wins, especially at the end of fiscal year. But it's really when you can sit down and help another small business. I'm, I'm passionate about helping women on small business. I'm passionate about helping veterans and veterans in business, but veterans also that may not have gone after their service disabled status, right? That service connected. I'll take the time to help them or at least be that facilitator that gets them to the right resource. I love connecting folks to the right resource. So I learned early on, maybe because I was blessed by mentors that came out of contracting at Tinker Air Force Base and some other folks that had years of experience with government contracting and that hands-on experience myself that, hey, I want to give back to other people. It's just who I am fundamentally to give back, pay it forward, do something nice for somebody today just because. So I think it kind of just incorporates itself as who you are fundamentally as a person. And I think it's important to always give back to other folks. No, I agree totally. That's probably one of my biggest joys of my YouTube channel is reading the comments that people post every single day. I mean, almost every hour, a couple hours, you know, thank you for this video. This helped me in this way. There's, you know, this sets in light on this topic, things like that. You know, I have not going back to you said, Smee, can you tell people the acronym? Smee, subject matter expert. So I did, you know, I did spend 14 years in the in the military and like Air Force Lawson Air Force came from Andrews Air Force Base as my last as my last assignment. He and I just recently connected about six months ago. Fantastic guy. I think we've got some good things that we're going to announce here soon together. But you know, I did the Air Force. I became a subject matter expert and that started 14 years prior. I was put into the career field did high frequency communications command and control wanted to be the best grew up as a I say I'm a sack baby of the strategic air command before it went away and the Air Force evolved into other things. Right? Right. So that command was very strict and again, the word foundation, you had to have the foundation to be six successful in my first two years of the Air Force as an airman before the commands went away, the structure went away and changed itself. But I became the system expert. I became the operational expert for a system that went through a thirty five million dollar BOD consolidation program. So we took 14 high frequency sites around the world, both Air Force and Navy and centralized them into Andrews Air Force Base. I got thrown into the mix of the of the program by raising my hand and telling a bunch of engineers and and contractors that the system didn't work the way they just said it did on the whiteboard and from raising that hand, I went into the world of program management system configuration, first article test schoolhouse training to train the schoolhouse kids on a new system and the new new policies, new procedures. So it just opened up this whole of the world that again, you know, had I not raised my hand, I probably maybe wouldn't be here today, but it's that foundational step that just continues to build on itself and bring me to where I am today. Well, that's great. So lesson learned. Raise your hand in the military. You're told not to raise your hand. You know, okay. Well, to do volunteer, you know, don't take additional duties is what some supervisors told me through the years, but I didn't listen to him because each one of those additional duties, whether I like doing it at the time or not set me up somewhere down the line that it came back full circle and it helped me in the next stage or another stage of my career. So I'm not a big believer in not raising my hand. I've done it since I was little and I'll continue to do it, you know, until I'm not here anymore. So I'm an action kind of person. I'm going to take action kind of person and raising my hand again is just fundamental to who I am. When small businesses are talking to you and they're frustrated. One first thing is do you have and I have not been able to find a resource for the acronyms to you. I have somebody even asked me for my I don't know. And I'm like, I don't want to make it. I'm like, hope this looking tell me where to go get it from so I could just buy it and like here. Here's the resource for the acronyms. People ask me out there. There is one out there. Let me try to find it. I used to have one. I created one for folks. Okay. I can see if I and then I'll share it with you if I can find it. But share with me and I will put it publicly everywhere all over because people are the scariest thing. People ask me all the time and I don't I just don't have the time to make one. But I would love if someone had it when I I assumed someone had to have made this somewhere. Even as for sale, at least, you know, make it available to us so then we could share it with folks out there. I'm taking a note because I've seen one. I've created one. So that's it. See, you can help. You're helping us already. That's amazing. Now. All right. So you decide. All right. I'm going to step out. I'm going to start my business. What's the first thing that you do? Well, incorporating obviously incorporate to get registered. Right. Yeah, I've done this before and there were a couple lessons learned. So, you know, part of it is you learn. Hey, I've done this for everybody else and then you go do it for yourself and you make a couple of mistakes or decisions that you thought you knew better until it's your company and you make them anyways. So I was going to say that. I was getting to that because you know, my friends that work I had a friend of mine because I saw to your your site tech data, but I had a friend of mine and he left. He started his own business. He said, you know, Eric. The sales guys that I used to call me all the time when I was working for the company, they stopped calling me when I was my company and then I'm trying to call them and they don't pick up my phone calls. They don't return. So tell us, Molly, how different is that now that you're okay? You're out there. You start MTS now. What do you do? Well, I had a plan. It took me several months to create that plan. So again, I knew what set aside tags I could capture fairly quickly to set off and go go after that set aside business, both as a prime and a potential subcontractor. So my first order of businesses, I am 100% service disabled veteran. So I have that income coming in every month and had the ability to live on that income while I took this step. But I also believed to supplement my income. I did some small business consulting so help some folks understand the government space to bring in some of that additional income in order to grow the company as well as reinvest a little bit of the money to grow the company. It's almost the same model from 1998 when I helped another small business start here. We both got out of the Air Force and started a successful 8A company and almost took that same model. Pay yourself enough to get buy in life and then take the extra money and reinvest it into the company to build it. Yes. So I was able to do that for the first year. Capsule captured two contracts. I knew I was going to go into low voltage because I came from the wireless industry. So my first contract was actually guest Wi-Fi down at the Central Texas VA. So we were able to do that and then do some audio visual out at the Air Force base here locally. So those two contracts set the foundation for the first year. They were at the end of the fiscal year rolled into my second year of business and the contracts just continued to grow. I developed a relationship with the customers. We got some modified contract work but we also began winning additional type of work for various customers. And some of that too was hey, I'm back in the industry. I'd been kind of away from the federal space for several years trying to get back out there, re-engage my network, take advantage of who I know. And honestly, that first contract was a lesson learned that I thought I'd be able to avoid the lesson. But again, a challenge was presented and it had to be overcome in order to be successful on that first contract and be profitable by the time it was over with. So. Yeah, I think that's so so many of us. We would get about profits. Right? Because in order to stay in business, you have to make a profit, right? You can't just win contracts. That doesn't keep you in business. You have to. I always tell people you have to actually deliver, perform and make a profit all at same time. Yes. And I just responded to a survey a couple weeks ago from I think one of our mutual friends and she had said, what was your first contract? Did you make a profit? Or is it acceptable to lose money on your first contract? And I absolutely unequivocally said none. No, and so she reached out to me. We had a dialogue and while I understand other folks have experienced that have lost money on their first contract. I'm requirements driven, you know, process driven. So I love to pick a part of contract and that's how I can help small businesses as well is pick a part of contract. Find all the shouts, right? Talk back in the day. Find all the shouts in the day, right? Back in the day. And if it says shout, you've got to do it. Molly, can you explain that in depth for people? So it just doesn't I don't want to miss that point because that's such a critical thing that I don't I don't think I've said it in the last six months. So it's great that you've brought that up. So let's talk about it. Yes, you know, and some people call it shredding the statement of work, shredding the contract. I know there's computerized versions, but I get a lot of joy doing it old school by hand and taking my highlighter and my first draft of the contract. I always go find the word shall and today's technology you can convert it to word if it's not in word and go do a find and find the word shall and highlight them because those are firm requirements of the government when the word says shall. It's not a maybe it's not an if it's not a oops I forgot you're going to be evaluated on each one of those shall requirements. And then the rest is all just, you know, additional info to help explain the scope of work, the requirements and what the customer's expectation is. And that's before you even get to the FAR requirements and all the compliance requirements. So those are just as important to understand if the contract is going to be taxed. The small business participation. If it's a set aside the 50 percent rule right on a set aside contract if it goes over the simplified acquisition threshold and I could go on and on. But I get a lot of joy out of doing that. I find a lot of pleasure out of doing that and as a business owner, especially being so small still and we're just starting our fifth year is is I will continue to read those contracts for those requirements because ultimately it stops with me. If we miss a requirement ultimately it's my responsibility. Right, right, right. No, I agree. I agree. Thank you for that. That was I hope that was more that was helpful. No, it was absolutely. Like I said, I mean, this is something that I think someone said to me that the best thing about church is that they reiterate the same things over and over again. And so I think that this needs to be reiterated because, you know, not, you know, you may not know, but throughout my time of interviewing people, these things are not always said. And so when it's repeated, it's like, OK, great, I'm glad someone brought that up again because I forget and I and a lot of things I take things for granted. And so it's great when someone like like herself can bring up these. I forgot the way you said it, but like this old, the old rules, the old truths. Yeah, yeah, right. The old school of doing things. There you go. The old school of doing things back in the day. So I love that in the day. Back in the day. So that's great. Thank you for that. Now you came in, became an expert in low voltage. You start pivoting some of the things. When did the eight eight come along or come about? So I was able to get all the other tags in 2018, primarily twenty eighteen and then twenty nineteen the day after Thanksgiving I was approved by the SBA for my eight eight. OK, so we've we're just going into finishing our second year as an eight eight and looking forward to some direct awards here at the end of the year that I'm finalizing around this podcast. You know, by Thursday and then seeing what else we can do utilizing that eight eight status as well as my other set of side status is a lot of work with the VA as a SDV OSB. So it's the key is how can you take those set aside categories and leverage them? But at the same time, make sure you have successful past performance. You're executing on the requirements. You're delivering a solution that the customer needs and is meaningful and then pulling that all together. But the set of sides and the past performance in order to continue to grow the company and earn the right to win customers business. What time do you wake up today? 1 a.m. What woke you up? What woke you up? The military girl and me still there. So when my phone bangs at 1 a.m. I'm a military and mother, right? I'm a mother of four. So and even though they're all grown, I still worry about them. So at 1 a.m. When I heard the bing, I read the email and there's an opportunity to close a last minute deal. Direct award. So I was up and I was moving and reading the requirements and you still made it to the podcast. Thank you. It's going to be a great Monday. That's right. You know, I mean, I think it's very easy for people to make excuses. So but I know we know Molly Mayhew is not one for excuses. Not today. Not practicing the hundred shots a day of basketball. Do you still play sports? Unfortunately, I can't with some of my service connection and you know, age related things, but I played basketball in high school and played in the military. I was put in the hall of fame a couple of years ago before my dad passed. Thankfully, so he was able to share in that. I think it was just as much his award as it was mine. So love sports. I've played everything. I bowled on the Air Force Teams bases. I played softball. I played basketball. So always always competing and always working. Wow, that's that's incredible. Tell us some other things that is to share. You know, I mean, I could ask more about yourself, but I'm curious about the small businesses, some other things that small businesses that you've run across, things that you that you recommend or that you've recommended in the past or maybe a book or something to watch or something to share. What are some other things that you that you regularly share with small businesses? You know, I've heard on several of your other podcasts and I think it's a commonality amongst the small business folks is the line of credit and how to fund your business. No matter where you start from, eventually, if you win a contract or two, you're going to have to fund it somehow. And it was one of my first lessons learned again, having done this for so many other folks and you know, being able to generate some income for myself was how could I fund a at this particular time my first contract of $70,000 worth of equipment and the subcontractor partner mentor partner had suddenly said, Hey, we can't we can't do that for you. So you're going to have to figure out how to buy that equipment for this first contract. After initial shock, I took the letter or I took the opportunity to again, continue to re-engage my my network and I reached out to some folks in the distribution community, honestly, Annexed or federal out of the DC area and somebody who I'd worked with before Bright Riley who I'd worked with at a wire and cable manufacturing company years before 10 years before. So here I am and I'm saying, Hey, I have this challenge. You know, I started my small business. Is there a way you can help and he immediately took our long-term relationship, you know, my reputation in the industry presented my challenge to his boss and they met the challenge for me. They went ahead and gave me a line of credit. We were able to get the equipment able to get the contract executed and still be profitable. So sometimes it's not what you know, but who you know and then those relationships, those long-term relationships that you've established through the years, reach out to them. Most people are willing to help and I just happened to be lucky enough to have that button to push when I needed it. That's that's that's that's great. So line of credit and funding for the business. That's super important. It I like you said, I think that some of the people who have not done this yet believe that that's an initial challenge, but I've seen that that challenge continues at every single level because even when we're doing, you know, you think, Hey, I did whatever five million in sales. You know, well, you wanted to seven million next year, right? Or eight million. Well, that's going to take funding to support that. Yes. Yes, that growth. And the requirements to be funded for 70,000 are different requirements to be funded for 700,000. Right. Never goes away. It doesn't go away. Right. So the challenges never go away. You have to learn how to navigate that element of the business. On that same topic, what are some things that when you started the business were hard, but now they've become much easier than when you first started. Well, the line of credit, the relationships just as important today as I've grown to establish a relationship with the right bank and a bank that's used to dealing with small businesses, the SBA understands what it takes to do government. I'm blessed to do that. I've partnered with Arvis Bank here locally. They get the government. I think they're the number one or two lender SBA lender in the state. What is the name of it? Arvis. Arvis. Arvis Bank. A R V E S B. Yes, sir. Okay. They've helped me pivot in the last year and a half since I've moved to them in multiple directions. There's a team of five or six and it's just any time I may ask a question. I have a new resource and they're responsive and they're willing to to take what they know not just in banking but also in the government space and see where they can help MTS in terms of growth. Lines of credits. SBA loans. I'm going through that process now. You know, and then the SBA it's important to keep in contact with the SBA and have a good relationship with your local SBA office. Part of the emergence leaders program right now. I have my final presentation and in a week. But that program in and of itself the emerging leaders program has helped me understand some things that I needed to understand better as a business owner not necessarily how to sell to government. But as a business owner lines of credit how people look at my financials. I may look at them one way but how does the outside world look at my financials when they ask for your profit and loss statements in your balance sheets. What do they see in terms of hey we'd like to partner with MTS or or we'd like to extend you a line of credit or any other reason to do business with you. So I've learned how to read those statements and what they mean to other folks and I think that opened up a whole different world to me in the last three or four months during this program to make me take a look harder look at my balance sheet a harder look at my profit profit and loss statement and how I can improve some things to help MTS be seen as a strong small business partner. It's great. A lot of my previous guests went to that emerging leaders program. That seems to be a another common denominator. It is a wonderful program. Yeah, when they first qualify whenever they become eligible to go that's something that we highly recommend for people to do. I agree. I make that same recommendation. I'm almost done with it and I wouldn't trade it for the world. Yeah, that's great. That's great. Now you you said you won your first contracts but what did you have the past performance to get that contract? Was it not required? My subcontractor had the past performance in low voltage. So we creatively were able to roll that in and you utilize it in the response to meet the response in the requirements. That's excellent. That's that's that's another great just so that you know those are things that people ask a lot. Okay, great. So when you're out and you're sharing the word that's a great point to help set their small businesses out there because so many people like you said they don't have the previous past performance and like, okay, how do I get started on past performance? It's like, you know, what comes first the chicken or the egg? And I'll also share something that I recently learned this past week and I don't have it yet but there was some new clarifications that the SBA put out on rules back in November of 2020. I encourage everyone to go look those up. I have a couple of them from I interviewed Polaro Marza the attorney represents small businesses and they and one of the rules and is exactly what you just said that now and it's important for not just for you and I to know it and for small businesses but other for contracting folks to know because these things are changing all the time and what the representative the attorney from Polaro Marza said is that contracting officers if they don't know the rules they could potentially get in trouble because the contracts are violating the new rules that the SBA created. Right. One of those rules happens to be that they cannot prevent you from using your subcontractors experience as credible experience. Yes. And that's actually a rule that was put in place that's been that was like it was already I think it already existed but they clarified it that rule and that those new regulations that went out so those those new regulations really they made it easier for small businesses to break into this marketplace and to kind of get their foot off the ground. I think so too. And you know there's always ways to be creative to address the mail and in a solicitation or a statement of work. It's created creativity while staying legal and compliant is key to winning and while I started as a prime and most folks start as a subcontractor I've started as a prime 99% of my businesses as a prime contractor and I'm helping some local women owned and veterans who are subbing to me get their first subcontract right so and talking them through that processes hey now you'll have verified past performance and on some of the larger bids I do believe one of the new rules is the prime contractor the C-Pars right is subcontractors can have C-Pars so I think that's that helps as well establish newer business or a small business that might not have a lot of past performance enter into it start to build that past performance roadblock in order to be more credible more viable to move towards that prime contractor role. Right I agree I think and like I said I haven't read all the rules but those that stuck out to me there one other thing that I know is that you did you set up a couple of joint ventures have you worked through those or that's just something that's new that you're doing I've got a couple one is specifically for stars three the joint venture waiting to hear if we're in the next cohort I think that'll come out by the end of the year looking for some good news there the others are based on business and how to do business and sometimes you set up a joint venture in hopes that the business will come to that joint venture and sometimes it doesn't so I've got some new ones in play I also well versed in the SBA mentor protege program and recommend that to folks if it's the right fit right is to find that right mentor and again one of those one of those things you learn is I've done this a long time and I'm entering into my second mentor protege my first one didn't it wasn't quite the right fit and we didn't realize that until we dance together and it just didn't fit and we weren't on the same path and going down the same direction so I'm excited to soon announce my second mentor protege agreement and a new joint venture and I think it's exciting and you'll recognize some of the folks when that gets announced and some good things moving forward for MTS the mentor our new joint venture as well as the one for stars three in 2022 so I'm excited can't wait for it to get here but we've got some work to get through the next couple days before some of that can come to fruition so congratulations I'm wishing much thank you yes and again I did my research but we'll wait for you to make your official announcement I'm sure you probably know I do but I just I hey I don't want to spoil surprise I wait for your official announcements I couldn't pick a better mentor this second time around my first mentors they were great and you know they got me through that first critical year right of establishing a company having some processes put in place being a subcontractor to me taking their past performance and building up on that I wouldn't be where I am today without my first manner it just sometimes maintain that friendship but it's just not the right that for and either of us in terms of a business relationship do you I'm staying on topic with that mentor they say that the 8 a program has a very like okay let's let's let's go 30,000 level okay um 75,000 small businesses quality or qualify for any the social economic categories 230 then will never get business what do you think how do you think we can help that two-thirds of the people who would never get business to not maybe not all of them but how do we help you know how do we help 10% of them 15% 20% of them what is the mentoring thing is that one is that a key element to it right what do you think that would help them I think mentoring as a whole whether it's the formal mentor today program are mentoring as a whole I've had in my entire life especially mentors who have been there done it walk the walk talk the talk have not just been successful but they've also had they've learned from mistakes or decisions you know and lessons learned that experience I think they can help you from being a sounding board on some of the things you want to do in my case I was lucky enough to have the assistance from a contractual standpoint aligned with the contractual and then the operational standpoint so I think the mentor protege if you can find the right mentor but there's also if you hear from the community some folks that say hey this mentor protege it's not a mutual give and take so again I'm blessed with the second one I think it's gonna found a phenomenal mentor Air Force veteran yep successful business owner and not only just a successful business person but just another person that aligns with who I am there they call to see how it's going they ask the questions they're compassionate they give back veteran focused and proven employees lies focused and he's very family a family focused and all of those things line up with Molly Mayhew so I think in tandem we're going to do some phenomenal things and again I'm excited for the time we get an outset here in about 30 days all right what else other things for another for small businesses that are hey they're have a low likely a chance of success how what other things can we do to help them succeed to be worked or things that work for you that you could would recommend to them I think p-tax can help if you get the right p-tax and and pick their brains I think some of the trainings there go a long way the SBA has their trainings the p-tax have their trainings finding another small business that has some time to mentor you whether they're your former mentor or not being part of communities on LinkedIn and like them following your podcast I mean I'm so thankful that I've seen it because again I've watched several of them and I have more scheduled to watch because there's nothing to me that is more valuable than listening to somebody who's experienced something similar walk down that path and sometimes humble enough to share their lessons learned their successes hey I should have done this better hey this is where I came from this is where I am now it takes a lot of humility for a successful business person to open the book and say hey let's not make the same mistakes or share it in your podcast so other people starting out have that resource and have that information that could help them or prevent them from making that same mistake right right yeah no I agree I you know I learn a lot that and that's what I was telling the beginning I mean I've learned so much that put it this when I first start this podcast I didn't know what capture manager was seriously I mean that's one of those words that it's you don't find capture manager widely used in English language outside of government outside of government and I didn't know what a capture manager was and that's just one of the very beginning of initial examples of things so all right now it's great I think that that those are all really good good points to make I love you're telling us where you're going what you're working on that's that's that's awesome let's you know you mentioned the sometimes people say things about the formal mentor program I've heard chaos war and small businesses about joint ventures with large entities do you have any other precautionary things that small business should look for I've heard the same things I think you've got to go into a matter protege with eyes wide open and realistic expectations it's not going to be the end all fix all and large businesses in you know been successful based on the fact that they understand the government world they have those capture managers they have those BD professionals they have that strategic plan to incorporate small businesses why because they have to right once you win a certain value of a contract there's a small business plan that has to come into play and I really like to go off a little topic here is I'm seeing more and more of an accountability for those small business plans not just hey we have them we won the award really you know are we going to go use them I'm seeing some accountability coming into play and some of it's being incentivized in order to meet certain small business categories on very large contracts so I've been pleasantly surprised to see that started that curve starting to happen right and I'm hoping that the government and the contracting world the officers contracting officers continue that trend to enforce the small business utilization not just on paper but in actuality in an implementation nice that's great I mean that's huge for a small business because like you said having historically there has not been a lot of enforcement right and accountability so that's a that's a and you spend the time and you spend the resources the small business you get a little excited and while you might be on the winning team you may never get any work you're just on the winning team so you know it's it's picking your partners wisely it's understanding the requirements again it's all a process and I think of a small business can identify what that process is who's your customer what are the requirements I was trained in the science of solution selling and through that what are their pain point you know the cliche statement what keeps you up at night but there's some truth to that question and those are pain point so become that person become that small business and answer your customers pain points with a viable solution that's meaningful it's meaningful it's future-proofed and it meets their budget right so and then go execute on it once you build trust with that customer that you're trying to understand what they do every day and what some of the challenges they have are then you become a viable resource to them and in turn as the relationship grows you become like to go to people who we trust right it's just human nature so when you understand that understand your customer understand the requirements address your capabilities towards those requirements then and then be patient a lot of small businesses don't realize it can take up to 18 months to win your first contract yes and I've had so many people through the years go oh my goodness you were right it took just about that you know 12 to 18 months it doesn't happen overnight so be patient stand in keep making it happen and give it time because once you win your force your first contract the rest will come yes yes yes I I am I love that and I second that you said something science solution selling yes so the wireless company I worked for had a program sales program based on the science of solution selling axiom and it's a process oriented sales approach and I am a process oriented person so it it spoke to me the minute that I was presented with it and actually was successful enough that I was there icon winner for two years in a row they kept putting me up for the competition to go utilize that sales process in order to do mock sales ups right in front of 500 people and then be claimed the winner the competitor and means like let's go it's just a process let's go tackle let's knock it out but in the course of that learning that process so well it helps you walk through customer needs identifying what they do identifying their pain points and their challenges and then mapping your solutions your services your products to that customer like a building block and be able to deliver a meaningful solution to them. Like that like you actually just gave me some great ideas you give me some great ideas I like that that's good let's up let's switch topics since we're wrapping up here happiest purchase that you've made recently for Amazon happiest purchase my recent purchase from Amazon my U.S. flag that's now installed in my front yard in the flight pole from Amazon from Amazon okay all right how big is the flag it stands about 20 foot up in the air I've got to let the roof line protect it with the winds out here in Oklahoma Amazon so do a 20 foot high flag yes got a box here to cover it was quite the big box but I'm happy it's installed I'm happy it's installed I'm proud to have a flag in my in my front yard I mean I am a veteran I am a patriot so there's nothing better than to drive up and see my flag that's great that's great early riser or burning the midnight oil and I'm both and I won't say unfortunately both I can 24 hours I'm better in the mornings because you know there's something just special about getting up before most people do and knocking out two or three hours before the world gets crazy it allows you to set your day identify your day and some of those important things to do on my to do list I still use an old school to do list before the world wakes up now when you say your to do list is that a journal style to do list it is I have a book a notebook notebook yeah my little my little squares that have my to do list yep and I check out taking notes the whole time there's not to me there's there's just a satisfaction of taking your pen and checking off the item my my little square all right done and moving on and then it's there always as a reference back to something whether it's a conversation tasks that I needed to get done and the various notes that I may have it allows for continuity right continuity and flow at the end of the year I know that Bill Gates takes a couple weeks that reflect how his year went do you do that quarterly or at annually where you reflect on how the year went and things that you accomplish and you do anything like that I've told myself I'm going to start and of course COVID kind of put in that I did make myself go on vacation it was four days to the beach and it was wonderful and I pretty much shut down and and just checked emails once a day which is odd for me I'm a 24 7 person right I think most military folks are and most business people are if needed so it was nice to take those four days had some family join me at the beach and my plan is here in the last quarter after the into the fiscal year is to take two weeks I'm going to go home see my sisters and then I'm going to Maryland for a mission 22 event and veteran veteran suicide so MTS sponsored that I'm going to join the colossal family at a great event and while I can't do the 22 pushups I'll be there supporting everybody that is that is doing the 22 pushups an hour in recognition and support of you know veterans and suicide awareness I like it I love it I love it I place a job that you've worked at and no one would ever guess you laugh you had something you had something come good because you had you laugh you chuckle I mean I did ice cream I little local ice cream store when I was younger people probably wouldn't have expected I mowed yards from the time I was seven years old and to push a mower papers my brother gave me a quarter to carry the bag for the paper route when I was younger and just because I wanted to hang out with my brother I carried this huge paper bag while he made the five dollars or whatever he made a route. I got a quarter for it. So your brother was the entrepreneur huh? He was the capitalist. He really was when I was younger and you know I just wanted to follow him around and I mean down to quarters for you know we have weed eaters now those scissors she used to edge your lawn with I'd be out there while he was mowing and I'd get a quarter to do the hard edging part but a quarter was a quarter back then you go down to the candy store and by 25 pieces of penny candy right now a quarter yeah quarters you know it meant a lot was a lot of money. That's right. Something that you have to do in business that you don't like like a job accounting H. Accounting I don't like the accounting part it's numbers it's numbers crunching now I love the number results but accounting is is a challenge for me every day right so you I'm sorry you have a third party vendor to handle that or bookkeeper you know how yeah I do and and it's growing and going to be outsourced to support that growth with what's coming in 2022 right you're going to need I could I can anticipate especially if you if you're on stars three you're going to that's going to be massive I hope so yeah that's that's the first of many ID IQ G WACs that I want to be on we're entering through our fifth year it's time to start though capturing those ID IQs and those G WACs yeah not great that's can you for the people that don't know ID IQ G WAC can you just two minutes on it so ID IQ acronym I know what you mean I I I caught you say the acronyms that's that's what I would do G WAC government wide acquisition right contract so agency level national level contract vehicles usually multi-vendor right and they're competed so when you go present it to your customer if you're awarded onto an ID IQ or a G WAC vets to stars soup there's so many out there right I as C IOS P4s coming out Polaris is supposed to be coming out if they can get past somebody the hurdles on the government side but you have to earn the right to to get on that contract right the right pricing the right past performance the right partners and then it's to me it's a tool and that's what I tell small businesses once you get those tools in your pocket let you go shop that to your customer and becomes an avenue for your customer to get to you the pricing is already competed they already know what your pricing is you utilize the contract in a way to say hey here's how I can help you let me help let me help you with what you need and here's how you can do it with an already competed contract vehicle if that makes sense make sense make sense books that you recommend I do a lot of fiction just because it takes my way my life my mind away from from the world for a day but again I like the new holds book again a coach I like new holds read new holds well I grew up a Buckeye fan I still am a Buckeye fan in the middle sooner nation and then because I'm Catholic Notre Dame was second so when they played each other if they ever played each other it was a Buckeye's first then Notre Dame for everything else and I despise that team up north that's interesting little holds I didn't guess that one always such a great motivational speaker and I didn't know yeah I mean I know from the football field but I didn't know about the book itself I can't think of the title but it's sitting over there on my desk and then I like process-oriented books how to learn from folks and I think we're for the emerging leaders we read duct tape mark duct tape marketing I know that and that's another thing where I've got to get better at at marketing for the company so that books gonna help me try to build that marketing plan and get some exposure for the company especially as we continue to excel and succeed and execute and time I know it's the end of fiscal year some parting words for the audience first of all utilize this podcast resource again I've watched them I'm so thankful to be invited to one I hope I've imparted some information reach out to folks like us that are willing to take the time willing to help willing to learn and then go on LinkedIn and find out who we're connected to because those people probably are going to be able to be a resource and help as well know your know who you want to be in the in the contracting world is in the product plan identify who your customer base is and what their needs are and then marry it all up and go execute I love it I actually a continuation of what she said about the LinkedIn and doing my research today on you I actually found a lot of people that I did not know going through your LinkedIn and people that you like and so you'll see I'm not stalking but just see I like start liking a lot of stuff that you like cause I mean it's very I mean we're in the same space and yes and a lot of and there were people that are doing things that are service third party service providers that I really liked what they were sharing and I like and you liked it and it made sense to me even there's a post by Kimberly Yates which I know Kimberly Yates very well that I had not read that post and I got so few likes but I mean it was a fantastic post I'm going to reshare that with my audience there's so much information on LinkedIn as people begin to use it I'm one of the earlier followers of LinkedIn I had to avoid companies telling me what my LinkedIn had to look like completely because I grew to you know the 500 followers pretty quickly and and I could say in the beginning that I've physically had met those first 500 followers or had spoken to them or had done business with them so they they were mutual they just weren't hey let me connect with with somebody because I like what their their that if you search for it or you just happen to read the feed I find it a very beneficial part of my day and if I don't get to it every day I get to it at least once a week and can spend times on the weekend and what not if there's downtime I will scroll LinkedIn to see what I can garner from LinkedIn from not just business but even the personal stuff and then all the veterans up in the female business ownership stuff there's so much inspiration there's so much valuable right and connect and I think connecting with other people is what makes us all successful without the connection you're just out there in the world alone trying to figure it out yeah mostly I've especially during COVID and everybody sitting home and not working in offices anymore and definitely makes really difficult and I could say there's a lot of positive news stories on LinkedIn yes there's a lot of positive stories on LinkedIn not like the alternative or the other social media the other social media stuff that's really that they're saying is a danger you know children and other people like that I read that this past weekend some of the studies and the analysis which is a little worried because I grew up we weren't connected right I'm old enough we weren't connected and there's moments now just like going to the beach disconnect I need to disconnect a little bit and realize that I'm not going to miss much if I'm keeping on top of my life my business my family I can take a couple days and it'll all still be there when I get back I agree I agree so well said so well said Molly thank you so much for coming on I really enjoyed it I have a whole page of notes as you see I appreciate it and keep doing what you're doing because I think this is valuable I'm going to go promote so when you see me sharing some of your stuff please understand that I'm a big share when I believe that there's a viable solution what you're doing is viable and I thank you for helping small and what you do I truly appreciate and I've loved chatting with you and I'm I'm going to try to make a point to chat with you some more we'll connect all right all right you have a good week thanks you do the same enjoy fiscal year best enjoy and the fiscal year I'm planning on it plan thank you thank you so much bye bye bye bye