 Good morning, everyone. I think I heard our moderators say that we are ready to get started. I'm so thrilled to see so many participants on this really power packed event that the city of Columbia is putting on for us this morning. We are delighted to have Mayor Rickman, also council member Herbert with us and some other city officials. We have a jam packed agenda. So we are going to get right to it. My name is Judy Gatson. I am really honored to be here and invited to host this event for the city of Columbia, our virtual, to keep everyone safe, Minority Business Opportunity Conference. The theme for this event this year is opportunities out of crisis. It is so incredibly important, especially considering the last couple of years that we've been through. Our focus today will be on connections, on communication and capacity. During the conference, we're going to discuss the importance of strategically, strategically positioning your business to seize incredible contracting opportunities. Again, I'm honored to be here with you. I'm hoping to learn a lot as well. I'm looking forward to hearing from our dynamic speakers and really gleaning a lot from the information that they are here to share today from all of our presenters. If you have questions and comments along the way, feel free to add them in the chat. I'm going to have updates on some changes that the city is going to make to try and streamline its services. But we want to jump right into our agenda and hear from some of the folks who have been really instrumental in pulling this event together today, starting with our director for OBO for the city of Columbia, the incredible Melissa Lindler. Melissa, I'll turn it over to you. Thank you so much, Judy. And we certainly appreciate you taking the time out of your busy schedule to moderate our event today. We're so excited about today's conference hosted by the city of Columbia's Office of Business Opportunities. For those joining us for the first time, the purpose of the city of Columbia's Office of Business Opportunity is to support and administer programs and initiatives designed to build the capacity of our small minority and women-owned businesses and work internally to connect those businesses to opportunities that exist within the city of Columbia. As a public entity, we understand that we exist to meet the needs of a very diverse small business community, city programs housed in OBO, such as our Columbia Disadvantaged Business Enterprise Program, our Metro Protege Program, and the Citywide 15% Minority Participation Initiative started by our city manager, have been established to meet those needs and connect our small business community to procurement opportunities within the city. We're so excited to have our city manager, Teresa Wilson, Mayor Rickamon, and Councilwoman Tina Herbert join us today. For those of you that don't know, Tina, Councilwoman Herbert was my credit sister in this office. So she was the previous director for the Office of Business Opportunities and certainly understands, as well as our other members of leadership, the importance of this conference, but the important role that minority and women-owned businesses play in meeting the needs of the city and making us successful. Understand our city leaders are some of the strongest advocates for our small business community and being intentional about creating an inclusive environment that provides opportunities for everyone is certainly a priority here at the City of Columbia. Last year, even during the pandemic, the city awarded $45 million to minority and women-owned business enterprises here in the City of Columbia. This was only possible by actively connecting our minority and women-owned businesses through events like this one and making sure that local small businesses are aware and have access to security, I'm sorry, to city procurement opportunities at all levels across the city. I would also just like to say in closing that many of the efforts to provide a diverse and inclusive vendor and supplier pool would not be possible without our community partnerships that have formed throughout the years that with the U.S. Small Business Administration, South Carolina Department of Transportation, the South Carolina Division of Small and Minority Business Contracting and Certification, Carolina's Virginia Minority Supplier Council, South Carolina Department of Commerce, Benedict College Women's Business Center, South Carolina Commission on Minority Affairs and the Richland County Office of Business Opportunity. Again, thank you so much for joining us today and we hope that you enjoy the 2022 Minority Business Opportunity Conference, Opportunities Out of Crisis, Connections, Communications and Capacity. Thank you. Fantastic, Melissa. Thank you so much for laying the foundation for our great event here today and thank you on a personal note for the incredible work that you've done over the years to increase access to opportunities in many ways throughout the city. We appreciate your efforts and then looking forward to the dynamic panel that you've pulled together for us to learn from this afternoon and this morning and this afternoon. It is also our honor and delight to have our city manager here with us today. Theresa Wilson has really, under her leadership, made it a priority to advance the needle for minority and women-owned businesses in our community. She has also made time on her very busy schedule to join us this morning and city manager Wilson, we know so many people have great ideas, right? But if they aren't connected to the right resources, they don't have the power to really leverage those ideas into the incredible opportunities that they are. I know that has been a passion of yours. We thank you for joining us for the conference today. Hey, Judy, thank you for being our wonderful MC and always on point with keeping us on task. And I know you will help do that today. I'm, you're exactly right, Judy. It is a passion of mine, but there are no individuals more passionate in the city than Melissa and the OVO team about the work that they do. They really treat it as a mission. And you're right that we can have these goals. We can champion ideas of others, but you need a staff like Melissa's and an office that's dedicated to it every day because with all the myriad of things going on in the city, you know, you really have to have folks who are focused and like laser to focus on making sure that our small minority and women on business enterprises get the resources that they need. So I'm very thankful for them. I'm very proud of them. They put on a good program. That's for sure. And they built, they bring in individuals like you, Judy and a lot of the people that I'm so anxious to see in person, hopefully soon we're still trying to be safe and do these conferences virtually, but I see Nica and I think I saw Anton Gunn side and end, but these are, you know, great friends personally and friends of the city. So it's neat to see everyone. As Judy said, helping small businesses grow has been and continues to be one of the top priorities at the city of Columbia, our small businesses obviously are the backbone. We know that of the local economy and reflect the diversity of our great city. According to the US Small Business Administration, and you know, my experts on the call Melissa and her team gave me these facts. So let me share them. Small businesses make up 99.4% of all of the businesses in South Carolina and employ 43.8% of our entire labor force. So that's very significant. And Columbia is a unique place because we have anchors such as institutions of higher education, government and key private entities, all great economic engines, but in order to thrive we must connect our small business community and make sure that they have access to these opportunities which we have here in our capital city, even in the midst of a pandemic. The city of Columbia's Minority Business Opportunity Conference, we feel provides that chance for our small business community to connect to these public and private entities like Ms. Christy P. Jordan with AT&T Services is participating as well as here from local entrepreneurs like Mr. Lance Brown who's the president and CEO of Rhino Medical Supply about ways that his company found opportunities out of prices that led to substantial growth of his business. As a city, we understand for sure that the diversity of our small business community and value, the innovation that comes from that diversity. This requires that we're also intentional as Melissa mentioned about our efforts to be both diverse and inclusive in the procurement of goods and services. So we have a lot of our procurement officials participating today because we want to make sure that people understand how to do business with the city. This intentionality is reflected in our city-wide minority women-owned business enterprise goal of 15%. And what this goal means is that our city departments have been directed to spend at least 15% of their department's budget annually with minority and women-owned businesses. When we first went down this path, that goal was implemented in fiscal year 1516. And at that point, we were at about 7.2%. And since then, we're really excited that to date and that the FY21-22 annual year, we're currently at a little over 17%. So we move the needle. And I think, again, being intentional and setting those goals is very important. We're also undergoing our second disparity study, I'm sorry, to ensure that we are working collectively across the city and with our community partners to address barriers that might prevent our small minority and women-owned business community from fully participating in our procurement process. So that's the outside entity coming in to really help us evaluate ourselves and how we're doing with moving that needle. And those are just a few examples of the city's commitment to supporting all of our small businesses. So I encourage everyone to take advantage today of the resources and information that will be shared and introduce your business to us and our community partners. You will hear shortly that Mayor Rickamon, I'm sorry, Mayor Rickamon is going to talk about, we are open and we want to do business with you. He's laughing because that, you know, we're still transitioning, Judy, and sometimes everyone makes that slip of tongue, but it is not because he is the most excited person in the building. He's over there across the hall for me. He's sitting out most day all day and it's been fun. And we're doing the job of transitioning and I know Mayor Rickamon is just particularly interested in this topic and the mission of the Office of Business Opportunity. So we really thank him and Council Wong for joining us today. Thank you, Judy. It's our pleasure. I want to thank you and the entire OBO team for being such strong advocates for the small business community. And listen, I have all people understand the slip of a tongue. The muscle memory is very strong. At least you weren't on live TV across the Midlands of South Carolina as I have been on some occasions. Thank you so much, City Manager Wilton. We appreciate your dedication, your passion and your service to our great city. It is now my honor to introduce the city's new mayor, Mayor Daniel Rickamon. As you see, they're sitting in his office. His presence really speaks volumes to the commitment that city leadership has in encouraging those to get involved and especially to support our small businesses. And Mayor Rickamon, I know from every tweet and social media post and event that I've seen you hold so far, you have made a point of saying, we are open for business. So I'm going to suggest that everybody, as they listen to this information today that we use the hashtag COLA open for business to share the pearls of wisdom, the questions, the knowledge that we're learning from this great event today. Glad to have you with us, Mayor Rickamon. Well, thank you. First of all, I want to take a minute just to thank our city manager, Theresa Wilson for everything she's doing and especially the transitions. We're moving forward and keeping the ball moving as we're trying to escalate our goals. Ms. Gadson, thank you very much for taking the time out of your busy schedule to be part of this because it does really enhance the program. And then I have to give the kudos to the OVO office, Melissa Lindler and her staff. Everything that we've talked about and tried to move forward, they take it to another level and I'm excited about where we're headed and the opportunities before us. So many people talk about small business in the city and opportunities and how we get more involved. And as we continue to move forward, we are open. We are open for collaboration. We're open for business. We're open for investments. We want to grow every part of it. The only way we can do that is do it together. And so we continue to find ways to be more open and inviting to include the small businesses here in our community. I'm just overwhelmed at how many people, we're over, I think, almost 600 small businesses have signed up for this conference, which is incredible, which means that we're making those connections and that all the hard work that the OVO office has done city manager and the city as a whole is doing is making a difference. People are wanting to get involved and that's how we're gonna grow and be competitive everywhere else. I believe this interest to this commitment is because of the commitment of the city and our community partners and all the small businesses that want to help each other. We have an opportunity to grow and take advantage of historic opportunities that I'm not sure that we've ever seen before. And if we work collectively together, we collaborate and we drive forth, we will have an opportunity for everybody to grow and take part of this. Look, I understand probably more than most folks what a small business owner goes through. I've been through the permitting process, I've seen the hurdles, I've been there from the start and that's one of the reasons why I stayed in Columbia, South Carolina. Columbia at the time when I graduated from college was an opportunity where there were lots of jobs and lots of people starting small businesses. So we're committed to support the entrepreneurial ecosystem that embodies diversity that thrives on innovation and fosters public and private collaboration. And I use the word collaboration a lot because it's one of the things that we've heard that we haven't done a good job about. I hope we can do that more that we continue to introduce people and put people together in partnerships so that we all can grow. This conference is just one example of the city's efforts through the OVO office and to address those challenges as Judy mentioned earlier from the connecting those small businesses to the public and private procurement processes and representatives, communicating all of these opportunities that exist in the city of Columbia with our community partners, assisting you and your capacity by sharing the information, reminding you of the value that you bring to our small minority and women owned businesses to any industry. And I have to say, South Carolina is usually last in a lot of things but we're in the top five for women owned businesses. And I think that's something that we haven't celebrated and should celebrate. Columbia, we have over 5,000 minority owned businesses and I think we have close to 7,000 women owned businesses in this community. And there's an opportunity there for us to celebrate, enhance, help grow. And I think that's what you're gonna hear from this conference, but from the city as a whole. I know it's a goal of city council. I know Ms. Herbert is a big proponent, obviously from her past experience, but she's a woman owned business and she understands some of the trials and tribulations that small businesses go through and is really a champion for us to change the way we operate and how we move forward. And I'm thankful to have her support and for her to be on council with us as we move forward because we're gonna continue to work hand in hand with local partners to provide these opportunities for our entrepreneurs and our community to grow while addressing the many needs of our city. And if you heard, some people say, hey, you're putting your laundry out in the public, but to be honest, these are opportunities. These are hurdles that the city has come with our 4,000, excuse me, our 4,000 work orders behind. I see this as opportunity to grow small businesses, really enhance our performance and customer service by taking advantage of services that could be provided. We're close to 600 employees short across the city and I see this as an opportunity to reach all these businesses that are out here and bring them in and help us provide the service to provide the best customer service, but at the same time, we have an opportunity to invest in small business by helping them grow. And the more they grow means the more they hire and then they become hopefully a national or international business that's headquartered in Columbia, South Carolina. And we wanna be part of that journey. And so exactly where are we at work and how do you participate? Look, we, as y'all all know, we're not gonna hide the fact that we have aging infrastructure. We're faced with numerous water and sewer repairs. As we talked about, we have a backlog of work orders and some of them range from landscaping to meter setting to repairs, but they're also opportunities as we continue to enhance our customer service, how we involve private sector and call services and other services to make sure that we provide the most effective efficient business for the citizens. As you know, many small minority women and firms have the capacity to partner with us and the more efficient again, those jobs done quicker. I think that is a huge asset that we have not explored, but we are open in trying to make it easy for you to do business with us and help us. The administration has fixed and allowed us to immediately start addressing the backlog with different opportunities. And I think because everybody's joining here, they wanna hear the different opportunities that we have. We're gonna continue to go through every department and figure out where the opportunities and continue growth. So this is just the beginning of many opportunities. And I can't stress that enough is we have to make it easy for our community partners, our small businesses to do business with the city because if we're gonna spend dollars, we'd like to spend them here in our community first and foremost because it benefits the entire community. You're gonna hear here a little bit from our department of procurement and contracts who will join and kind of talk about the opportunities and how we get started. So I hope everybody who joins today is enjoying this. I hope they'll be able to get a lot of information. I hope they ask lots of questions and get out so that, and look, if you have ideas that we can do something different or better, we say open, we're open. It's not just about open for business and the innovation but it's very open for listening and collaborating, taking out new ideas. I know that I heard from somebody earlier today that's on this conference that said, you know, one of the things the city could do is help pay the local vendors quicker. How can we do that? Can we make it electronic versus a paper check? These are the ideas and probably hurdles for some small businesses that are very critical for them to participate. So please don't be shy, share. We would really, really love to hear your feedback, your ideas, any questions you have. And once again, I have to reiterate, this city is open. We can't do it without working together. This is a collaborative effort and once again, I just want to take one more minute to thank the OVO office for everything that they've been doing. Melissa and I have been working on trying to get lists together and other things that we make sure that we reach out to every business that possibly could do something. And in her office, it has been moving forward. I think we may slow her down just because of our processes but we're trying to get that red tape out of the way. Thanks again to the city manager for all she does, all she supports. And she literally spends probably way too many hours working but we really appreciate her effort. And Ms. Gadson, with that, I'm gonna put it back to you. Well, Mayor Rickman, again, thank you for your time and making the time to be here today. And I just want to reiterate what you said about inviting everyone to submit their questions, ideas and comments. Typically at events like this, we get a flood of it at the very end when our time is up. So don't miss this opportunity with these experts on hand. Drop your information in the Q&A, in the chat. The OBO team is gonna take all of it. They'll work on following up with any questions that we aren't able to cover in our time allotted today but we're gonna cover as much ground as we can. So get the pin out, take the notes, make sure you have the contact information so that you can follow up with the OBO team and they can follow up with you. Mayor Rickman, thank you once again. It is now my pleasure to introduce the Honorable Tina S. Herbert. She's always been doing the work. She's just adding yet one more cap to her tapestry there in terms of how she contributes to the city. She's been a dedicated public servant. We are excited to have her with us today as well. Councilwoman Herbert. Thank you, Judy. I guess I've died and gone to heaven because I've just been introduced by Ms. Judy Gas. So this fit really my honor and an all-star lineup I really feel like. But I'm so excited for this day and so excited for the opportunities that you all are about to have. As the previous director of the Office of Distance Opportunities, I really remember what we were thinking when we started this up. We just wanted to make it easier. We understand the barriers. We understand the problems. We understand folks don't have easy access and that is the point of this conference, to give you access that you probably didn't have before. Introduce you to people, give you information because entrepreneurship is not easy. We all know that. But it's really not easy a lot of times for minority businesses or women-owned businesses. And so we want to help address those barriers. The city, the city manager, Mayor Rickamann, Melissa, they're really, really, truly focused on diversity and inclusion. And I think about OBO, OBO was my baby and I gave my baby because I only wanted one. So I had to give OBO away and I gave my baby to Melissa and it has been such a pleasure to watch it grow and watch her take on her persona and put her new ideas to it. So Melissa, I also wanna say that you've done a great job and I'm super, super, super, super proud of you. And I'm gonna continue to support you in the endeavors of OBO over the years as long as all the other statutes, all my other babies. But we also wanna think about too the pandemic and how it's really, really hit minority businesses. And I'm a read, made sure I read my statistics. According to a recent report by the National Bureau of Economic Research, 41% of black-owned businesses, which represents about 440,000 entrepreneurs have been shuttered by the pandemic compared to just 17% of majority-owned businesses. So when we know that, we know that we have to particularly look at our minority-owned businesses and our women-owned businesses and look even beyond equity, look beyond equality and start looking at equity and looking at those historic factors as well as the current factors. And I'm just super proud of OBO and the city for taking that on. And we're gonna continue to take it on with all of the partners. So I hope that you all enjoy all of the information that you're gonna get today. Super, super proud again of OBO, super, super proud of Melissa. And if there, I'm planning on listening because the very recommend is right. We eat what we kill and so you always are looking for new information. And I will also commend everyone who's here and who's watching because it's hard. It's hard to step away from the business to take some time to get some information. But I promise you that the information you get here today will be well worth your time. Thank you so much, y'all. All right, Councilwoman Herbert, thank you so much. And it reminds me of one of my favorite sayings. You miss 100% of the shots you don't take, right? You gotta invest in order to get a return on that investment. You gotta be willing to make the investment. So thank you to all of our city leaders for being here today. We wanna kick it off with our first speaker who has so much to share. We have a very ambitious schedule. We wanna be respectful of your time. So we're gonna keep it moving. Drop those questions and comments in the Q&A. If you have comments in the chat, we'll be checking that as well. I'll turn my camera off once I make the introduction and jump back on when we're ready to move into Q&A, which will be led by the city staff. So we wanna make sure we protect our time for that. Just quickly, let me tell you a little bit about our first speaker today. Dr. Nika White is a national authority and fearless advocate for diversity, equity, and inclusion. As an award-winning management and leadership consultant, also keynote speaker, published author, and executive practitioner for DEI efforts across business, nonprofit, and education, Dr. White has been instrumental in helping organizations break barriers and integrate DEI into their business frameworks. Over her 20-plus years of leadership, Dr. White has worked with more than 150 corporate educational government and nonprofit brands. She's managed over $200 million in business assets for her clients and also written a couple of books on diversity, equity, and inclusion. She has represented more than 150 keynote speeches and presentations across the country on a range of issues, including team engagement, organizational leadership, strategic diversity, race equity, and intentional inclusion. Dr. White's talk brings a mixture of expertise, passion, vision, and an incredibly authentic style to create holistic takeaways for every audience that she meets. Please give a warm welcome to Dr. Nicole White. Thank you so very much, Judy. I am actually getting up my presentation now, and I'm super excited to share with each of you today. I don't take it lightly that you all have invited me to compliment today's event, and I promise to leave you all better off than I found you. But I too want to take an opportunity just to acknowledge the great work of the city of Columbia, the OBO office, city manager, Teresa Wilson, Mayor Rickinman, and all of those who have been a part of bringing this event to fruition. It's incredibly important for us to center ourselves on economic inclusion. So anytime that I have a chance to come and share, it's always an easy decision to be able to say yes. I want to provide a greeting, a greeting that's going to help center us on the topic that I really want to focus on today, which is belonging. From awareness to action and opportunity. I love the fact that the theme of this conference is all about connections and communications and capacity, and I believe that what helps us to actualize all of those things in an effective way is when we can center belonging. So in the spirit of our topic of belonging today, I wish to extend this warm welcome as we settle into today's virtual conference and we center ourselves. I welcome participants of African, Asian, Arabic, Middle Eastern and European descent. Those who identify as Hispanic, Latin X, Black, white, indigenous, native, biracial, and people of multiple races and ethnicities. I welcome participants from different faiths, religion traditions, spiritual beliefs, private practices not belonging to a tradition, agnostic, atheist, and seekers. I also welcome those of you with disabilities, visible or invisible, and other private identities that may shape how in which you show up in this world. I welcome those of you who identify a single, dating, partnered, married, separated, divorced, or widowed. I welcome each of you as participants of all sexual orientations, preferences, and gender identities. I also welcome those of you who identify as parents, step parents, foster parents, Godparents, guardians, caretakers, and colleagues to have adopted or have been adopted. Wherever you are, whoever you are, you belong here and you are valued for every bit of uniqueness that you bring to this space. I hope you feel acknowledged, seen, and heard, and I welcome you. So what I wanna do today is make sure that we are connecting this topic of belongingness to the reason we are gathered. It's all about opportunity, right? Opportunity for those historically excluded populations of people that are so important to our community and really help us to thrive and be at our best. And so let's dig right in. Here are the three topics that I want to center us on during our short time together today. First, I want us to understand belonging and understand it as an outcome of equity and inclusion that leads to opportunity. I want us to begin to leverage belonging as a tool that's gonna help us foster connection, psychological safety, and support. And then thirdly, I also wanna introduce this audience to strategies to achieve impact, again, through belonging. We often talk about diversity, we talk about equity, we talk about inclusion, but really the outcome of combining all of those elements together, it should be centered on belonging. So that's the energy that I'm bringing to today's conversation. So let's jump right in. I wanna lay the foundation. I don't want to assume that everyone that's assembled here today, we are defining these terms as diversity, equity, and inclusion and belonging the same way. So let's begin to just create this common language that we all can coalesce around as we talk about this topic. So here's what I'd say about diversity, equity, and inclusion and belonging. And I'm going to quote my friend Arthur Chan as I do this. Diversity is a fact. We don't have to do anything to create diversity. It is already here and happening. When people say, Dr. White, I have to embrace diversity, to create diversity. I know that they're well-intended and I understand what they're trying to communicate, but the bottom line is that diversity, it's already here and happening, right? So it is a fact. And it's not only just about the optics of age, race, and gender. Certainly those are really important dimensions of diversity, but it's really broad in this reach and this breadth. And as a society, we have to become much more sophisticated in how in which we talk about and define diversity. Now, equity is a choice. It's interconnected to equality, but there is a clear distinction that we cannot deny as we're really trying to center this topic of belonging and opportunity, that everyone has the same starting place in life. And so if we want to really create a society where equality is in reach for all, equity is the means to get there and it is a choice. And then inclusion, inclusion is all about action and not just any action, but useful action, intentional action. It has a certain look and feel about it, right? It's calibrated, it's calculated. It requires forethought and foresight and belief in a process that all of the activity that we're doing to help foster inclusion, there is a value on the other end of that. And then again, if we connect diversity, equity and inclusion and we see it actualize, what we get is belonging as the outcome. So again, we're level setting here because I wanna make sure that we all are aligned. I wanna move now into sharing what I believe are some really philosophical underpinnings that are critically important to the work of actualizing and operationalizing diversity, equity, inclusion and belonging. The first thing is that inclusion is a leadership function. It has a growth capability to it. And when I talk about leadership in the context of DEIB, I am speaking of influence, not positionality. Certainly titles and positions are a part of leadership, but I think that the missed opportunity in that is if we don't also acknowledge that influence is leadership as well, it will cause some people to feel like I don't need to own or be responsible for this work of fostering inclusion. And that's not true. I think that too many of us at our core if we were to engage each other, we can talk about the value of DEI, but most often we're passive about it and that we see it as the responsibility of the person who carries the title of chief diversity officer, leader, manager or HR professionals, right? And that's not the case. We each have a sphere of influence that we can tap and leverage to help foster inclusivity. It does require intentionality and skills training, but guess what? There's a growth capability attached to it, which means that if we don't know how to do it, that's okay, but resources abound to help us get there. So there should be no excuses. Inclusion is a leadership function by way of influence. It also starts at the personal level. I love the stories that have been shared so far today because it helps each of us to understand the connection point to this broad work of equity, economic conclusion and belonging because we have to realize that people are the ones who are running organizations, they're the ones who are running cities and communities and influencing those spaces. And so if we don't get it at the personal level, the value of DEI, we're not going to be positioned to be able to take that mindset and transfer it into the organizations that we're affiliated with, that we're leading, that we're influencing. So it starts at the personal level. What looks like resistance is often a lack of clarity, right? So if we are sensing that someone is hesitant to get on board, then the first question we should ask ourselves is what can I do with the body of knowledge and experience that I have around this important work to help bring them along, right? And another guiding principle is that guilting, shaming, blaming, they're all counterproductive. I think that we need people to engage in this work because of, not in spite of, and that's going to help us all emerge stronger because we all have a part to play in this work of inclusion and equity and belonging. And then lastly, the one principle that I will share on this slide is that diversity equals difference. There's a point of respect in which things differ, which is what I shared before. It's not right or wrong, it's not good or bad, it's not inferior, it's not superior, it's just difference. And the reason that I always like to amplify that is because I believe that the reason so many people become offended by conversations of diversity is because of how they classify it, which oftentimes can be right, wrong, good or bad, right? Instead of just seeing it as simply a point of respect in which things differ. A few more guiding principles. Power and privilege should be acknowledged and used honorably. I say every day that I as a black founder, black female, I am privileged in so many regards. I grew up in a home with both parents and I have the fortune of being able to be supported by them. I grew up in a home where I had more than enough, all of my needs were met. I am a well-abled body individual and if I were to take inventory of my life, so many other examples I could point to were I have had an advantage not because of anything that I've done but because of the cards that I was dealt. And what I realized is that that requires a responsibility and ownership of me to acknowledge that power and that privilege and to use it to help others along the way. L.I. SHIP, L.I. SHIP is that bare minimum about action not just any action but useful action. And it's also not about just having an affinity where you're advocating for people who are like us. It's easy to gravitate to people who are like us but what about those who are different? It's all about those who are historically excluded, marginalized, underrepresented or I like to say underinvested and underestimated. Next guiding principle, activity does not equate to impact. There is a keen difference and I want each of us to make sure we're leaning into the difference between the two. Activity has a start and an end date. Impact is where we look at policies, procedures, systems, culture and that's where we're able to sustain the work where we can realize the DEI transformation and change that we all can be proud of. We have to also realize the importance of choosing courage over comfort. This work is not easy. It's a lot of complexity surrounding diversity, equity and inclusion and belonging but we can't sit on the sidelines and expect for someone else to then care about it enough to help emerge us to a place where we really can realize full potential for all. Rather, we have to make sure that even on those days that we feel a little uncertain, we do it scared. We challenge the status quo where we can even if our voices are shaking because courage over comfort is so needed right now in this work. I also wanna talk a little bit about intent versus impact as it relates to a guiding principle with the work of DEIB. Intent doesn't exonerate us from the consequences of our actions. So if we are navigating through life saying, well, I didn't mean it that way. That wasn't my intent. Then what I would suggest that you really consider is what is the impact however of your actions? We don't have to own the intent but we must own the impact. I often say you can step on my toe and I can know that you're sorry and that you didn't mean to but guess what, my toe still hurts. And so let's also take responsibility of owning the impact. And then the last DEIB guiding principle that I'll share with you before I move on is that DEIB should be viewed as opportunity, not obligation. It is time for us to shift the paradigm, right? So many of us enter this conversation feeling like we are tolerating something and no one wants to be tolerated, right? We tolerate things that are burdensome. So I think that part of us emerging stronger as a society is when we can take a step back and take control over the narrative by seeing diversity, equity and inclusion and belonging as opportunity and not as obligation. So those are the DEIB guiding principles but I want to hone back in on where I started which was the longing. Here's what the longing is all about. When we feel like we belong, we experience meaning, life satisfaction, physical health and psychological safety and that's critically important. I want you to catch this next thought. It is hard for any person regardless of their background and their demographics, any person to show up at their best in any environment if they are always questioning whether or not they belong. I want you to think about that for a second. If people are questioning, do I belong here? Am I valued? Am I seen and heard? Do I have full opportunity for success? Does my opinion count and matter? Am I safe? If people are questioning those things day in and day out then they are not bringing their A game to that environment and we rely on our colleagues, our peers, our business leaders, everyone to bring their A game so that we as a society can operate at our best. So this should give each of us pause. Pause in a way to where we begin to question what can I do within my sphere of influence to help create a sense of belonging for all of those I touched. The longing is also validation. Validation builds a sense of belonging and it is the language of acceptance, right? That's what I mean when I say people want to feel seen, valued and heard. So my intent with my welcome this morning was to make sure that everyone who's gathered as part of this convening felt that you belong here. I want to validate your presence here because we question that oftentimes, especially those of us who find ourselves systems under systems of oppression, but you belong here. Belonging the security and support is a sense of acceptance of a part, it's inclusion. It's also being able to bring our authentic selves to whatever the environment and know that we are enough and that that's welcomed. It's about feeling empowered to take risk. And we know that as we're centered on the audience that's full of business leaders and owners that taking risk is an important entrepreneurship is not easy, right? And then also belonging is about psychological safety. So I want to lean into psychological safety as a key element of belonging as part of today's conversation because I think this is really critical. So Amy Edmondson is the one that actually coined the phrase psychological safety and it has now reached so many different environments where it first started within the healthcare facility. But here is also how another thought leader describes psychological safety. And this is from Timothy R. Clark who was the author of Four Stages of Psychological Safety. But here's how he describes it. Inclusion and safety satisfies the basic human need, basic human need to be included, accepted and belong. It means it's not expensive to be yourself. It's not expensive to be yourself. You are accepted for who you are, including your unique attributes and defining characteristics. So to me, when I read this, it centers on humanity, it centers on belonging and it centers on authenticity, important aspects. So when we feel like our psychological safety is compromised, there are lots of feelings that come up for us. And I want to socialize this because I really want to make sure that we aren't just understanding this at the high theory level, but we begin to think about how can I now actualize a change and maybe my approach and my process as I'm interacting with others. And here are the feelings that often come up. People can feel betrayed and they can feel exhausted and embarrassed and shamed when psychological safety is not there. They can feel unappreciated and they can withdraw and be resentful and vulnerable and overwhelmed and hurt and pain. And the list goes on and on. Feel words are important because it connects us to that feeling in a way to where hopefully we're feeling called to action. So I wanted to take a moment to just hone in on some of those feelings. But what we have to think about next is when psychological safety is compromised and harm has occurred, what are the needs of the individuals in which we want to be in solid relationships with? What do they need in that moment? They need empathy. They need validation. There's that word again. They need an acknowledgement of the harm and acceptance and belonging. They need community and connection, reassurance and support and apology and atonement. Sometimes they even need time and space to process. So if we're one of those individuals that rush towards seeking forgiveness, we have to be willing to respect and honor someone's need for time and space. And they need the harm to stop. So I love these conferences because it can bring forth some of the challenges and the barriers that can lead to harm that causes people to have their psychological safety and belonging compromised. And then once we are aware, we can do something about it. I love this quote by Maya Angelou. I've learned that people will forget what you said, people will even forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel. Everyone wants to feel a sense of belonging. So as I'm getting close to the end of my talk today, I want to introduce three P's that I think are critical to helping to actualize a strong culture and sense of belonging for all. One of which is that we have to be very purposeful. We have to be intentional about wanting to create a sense of safety and belonging. Two, we have to be preventative. It's not enough for us just to react and course correct after the harm has taken place, right? Yes, we certainly can restore the relationship, but what are we doing to be proactive to help prevent the harm from taking place in the first place? And then once we have been aware of the challenge and the harm, and we still see that there are some consequences and implications, how do we problem solve? How do we course correct? How do we bring that relationship back into a place of healthy state? So to illustrate this, I wanna show a quick video and then we're gonna wrap up. There was once a carpenter that lived by a river in the village near you. Every day with his trusty hammer, he built boats out of wood. One day as the carpenter was working, he looked out onto the river and saw a child trying to swim towards the shore. Help, said the child. The current is too strong. So the carpenter grabbed a boat and rescued the child. How did you get into the river? Asked the carpenter. I fell in upstream, said the child. The next day when the carpenter looked out onto the river, he saw two children struggling to swim towards the shore. Help, the children said. The carpenter called out to another villager and together they rescued the children. But the next day there were five children and the next day there were a dozen and soon the whole village was busy rescuing children from the river. The villagers grew weary and some of the boats started to leak and break from overuse. The carpenter worked tirelessly to repair them but as the number of children in the river grew, soon there weren't even enough boats to get the job done. One day the carpenter asked himself a question. Why and how are so many children falling into the river in the first place? So he bravely ran upstream to find out. There he saw a big windy village with many houses and some of the houses were in a state of disrepair. And when the wind blew especially hard, the houses creaked and cracked and things were swept out of them and into the nearby river. Sometimes what was swept up was children. The carpenter saw an old lady walking by. Excuse me, he said to the old lady, tell me, why are these houses so broken down? Why aren't these houses stronger? The people of this village want to fix these houses so that they can resist the wind, the old lady replied. But we do not have the tools to do so and the wind lately has been especially strong. I can help, said the carpenter. And with the help of the old lady, he gathered the villagers, gave them his hammer and taught them how to use it so that they could learn to make their houses strong when the wind blew especially hard and keep their children from falling into the river. Yay! Because you see, if we make the effort to go upstream and help build strong foundations there, we won't need to work so hard to rescue children downstream. Prevention first, remember I said that the second P was all about prevention. And so it's critically important for us to make sure that we're amplifying that. I wanna bring this full circle as I talk about the opportunity that we have today as we're gathering around this really important topic of economic inclusion and opportunity. The first thing is, let's talk about the downstream approach, right? We saw this at the start of the video where there was a quick fix band-aid really just to try to make sure that we were addressing the immediate problem at hand. And so one example, if we take it out of the context of the village and the windy houses that were dilapidated and causing all type of items to flow into the river, including the children, but let's relate that to something that we often see within our organizations. It's a cry for help. Our teammates feel isolated and excluded. They're not feeling a sense of connectivity and belonging. So an approach that often organizations will take is let's offer maybe a one-time team building activity, right? That's gonna help us to bridge that gap. That is the downstream approach. It is a way to address a quick fix, but it's not sustainable. So let's think about the midstream approach. Once the carpenter saw that two kids had fallen into the river, he had to go and get help. And so he wanted to make sure that the kid was safe. If we were to equate this to an organization environment, one thing that they could be thinking of is how do we onboard help and offer in-house resources to address the feelings of people feeling isolated and excluded? And so then they may say, a midstream approach is let's do ongoing DEIB training or learning and development experiences. And don't get me wrong. I think that awareness around deepening people's understanding and knowledge of DEIB is really important, but that is a midstream approach and that is only going to take you but so far. So let's think about the upstream approach. This is where we consider the holistic factors of what's occurring. What is, after we pull back all the layers, the under root cause, the crux of the matter that is preventing us from being able to be successful. And so when we think about that to the world that we live in right now and many of the organizations and conversations that we are a part of, we have to consider that develop unconventional approaches that address the initial cause is really necessary. And those are pre-existing structural barriers and inequity challenges facing minorities rather with socioeconomic, educational, environmental, the list goes on and on, that prevent full participation and opportunity. So we need to stop trying to address these very systemic issues with surface solutions. We have to get to the crux of the matter to understand the root cause so that then everyone can participate and have full opportunity for success. We see examples of structural inequities across so many different aspects that can impact negatively belonging and opportunity. Here are a few listed here, safe housing, transportation and neighborhoods, of course, racism, discrimination and violence, intergenerational trauma, health disparities that lead to additional family stressors and loss, which can impact of course, our ability to have a path forward of reaching a place of success and health. And then if we take it to the context of business development, lack of access to capital, lack of access to professional networks, right? So this is the reality of what we're dealing with. So here's what I want to encourage you all to think about, the formula for change. We need to get proximate to the problem, Brian Stevenson has told us that several times before, which means that we need to make sure we're asking the right questions. I think that we spend way too much time making definitive statements and not enough time asking thoughtful, good questions to help us to fully understand. And then if we were to add the proximity to active empathy, that's how we're going to realize impactful change. So I want to lean in for a quick moment just to make sure we're clear on passive versus active empathy. Passive empathy is benign, benign state of empathizing with the oppressed, whereas active empathy, it leads to take an action to overcome emotional injury and oppression. And it's so needed if we want to have that impactful change. So I'll end with this quote and this is by Emmanuel Olcio. And he says, the first domino never knew it was going to knock over 200. Let me affect the person living next door to me and let that domino knock over the rest. If we believe that our individual efforts do not amount to anything, then I want you to always think back to this domino analogy. If we each were to do our part and not wait for the responsibility to be pushed towards someone else, but we own the responsibility within our sphere of influence to knock down just one domino, we are starting a process that can affect so many people in positive ways. So no, we can't roll the ocean. No, we can't undo hundreds of years of oppression that continues to show forth in many different ways. But we can create some positive impact for one person, maybe through one activity. And then that can serve as a catalyst for continuing to allow others to want to do the same. And through that, we can all emerge stronger. Thank you so much for allowing me to share today. I think that we may have time for a couple of questions. I will leave it up to Aisha. I think who's going to be checking the chat and bringing those questions forth. And so I'm gonna stop sharing my screen now just so that I can be visible to this community. Thank you, Dr. White. That was wonderful. Can you speak on how small businesses, what role they play in the process of diversity and inclusion and equity and making sure that they connect with these thermal opportunities and access to these opportunities? Well, I think the first thing is that, yes, you definitely wanna make sure that you're doing all that you can to position yourself, to be able to compete effectively in the marketplace. And I think that once each of us as business owners are focused on that, our own personal growth, then we can garner greater ability to then bring others along, right? And so I think it's a mentality of how do we protect the full turf? I know of some individuals who they shy away from, I don't want to be known as a minority-owned business. And I can understand the sentiments behind that, but I also think that if we are close-minded to that factor, we are sometimes compromising the opportunities that could come our way. And then lifting us decline. As I think about the stats that were shared earlier today, there is a spectrum of all types of minority businesses. Some are already at the place that others want to be. So how are we reaching back, sharing our knowledge and our experience, being transparent and vulnerable, right? So that others can learn from the journey that we've been on. Thank you, we appreciate that. One of the questions we received are, are you available to have one-on-one meetings or guidance with clients? Do you schedule those one-on-one? Yes, I do. So my firm is a full-service diversity, equity, and inclusion consultancy. And we intersect the work of diversity, equity, and inclusion with leadership and business. And so our categories, you know, exist to help address DEI strategy work, which there are a myriad of things that fall underneath that, as well as developing learning and development experiences to help people to, again, just deepen their understanding of diversity, equity, and inclusion, both in theory, but most importantly in practice. And so happy to have conversations with anyone who's interested. Okay, and how can they contact you like that? So my website is nikawight.com, very simple. And there's reproduced a lot of content. It's our kind of our way, courtesy content. It's our way of showing up to the broader community of folks who really just want to deepen their knowledge and understanding. So you'll find a lot of resources out there as well. But nikawight.com is my website. Excellent. Another question we have is any succession planning assistance for those individuals that want to turn over their company to maybe their children or their grandchildren? So I love this question. I come from, I'm surrounded by successful entrepreneurs in my family. And one of the things that we've been very intentional about is building that structure. So that even if, you know, there's someone in our family that we're thinking we want to be able to turn our business over to, maybe they don't, they have a different direction or path for themselves, but the option is still there. So just the mere fact that the question is surfacing and then the considerations that I think is great. I believe it's about having a plan. You know, just if that is part of what your goals are, don't think that it's going to just happen organically, but you're going to have to start implementing certain practices and action steps to help bring that to fruition. Who are you grooming to be able to be that successor? How are you introducing them to the business model? How are you opening up yourself to even be willing to kind of let go when you need to at the appropriate time, right? I work with a lot of business owners and some of the things that I hear when, you know, individual leaders are trying to then turn it over to someone else's their reluctance to really turn it over to that family member. And so I think there's a lot to be said or just planning and even talking to people that have done it successfully. Okay. I don't know anything. I'll answer a couple more questions. I know some of you had some issues with the video. It was on a smaller screen. As a reminder, we will send out a link to the video after this call today along with some other items. So you will be able to see the presentation in full screen mode. Another question we have is what are some ways to get executive leadership by in both in word and action on diversity, equity, inclusion, along with issues? Clarity, you know, resistance is often a lack of clarity. And so I believe in data. I believe in evidence-based data to help tell the story and not just any data, but how are we interrogating the data? How are we disaggregating the data so that we're looking at it across different populations? Sometimes we will just assume that if we have 83% of people responding one way, that we're good, right? That's a pretty high percentage. But what I find in my line of work is that once I disaggregate the data, another story unfolds and surfaces that we have to then interrogate. And so I think bringing data is hard to argue with facts and data. I think that also we have to help bring people along, understanding that people have different mental models. Their level of entry into this broad topic of diversity, equity, and inclusion could be minimal. So how are we sharing resources in a way that helps them to engage and to lean in to the opportunity to learn more? Thank you. And Dr. Wright, I don't know if you've seen all those comments in the chat, but everyone is saying this was an awesome presentation. And it was, you shared such wonderful insight and perspective. I know that all of our audience still this was beneficial, but thank you so much for participating today. I'm gonna turn it back over to Judy. Thank you for having me. Thank you. And Dr. White, before you go, would you be so kind as to share your social media handles with us? Sure. So I think that the easiest way is that if you go to my website, which is nekawhite.com, it has links to all of my social media, but I am on Instagram, Twitter, LinkedIn, I'm on them all. And mostly it's just nekawhite, or maybe in some cases, neka-see-white. But again, you can't go wrong just by visiting the website. Thank you, Judy. Fantastic. We will visit the website, encourage everyone to connect on social media as well and make sure that you're following her so that you can stay connected to these incredible pearls of wisdom that she shared with us today. Dr. White, thank you again for your time, your engagement and the inspiration. All right, everyone, it is now time to move into the next portion of our program, focusing on diversity program and matchmaking. Christy Jordan currently serves as Senior Supplier Diversity Manager within AT&T Global Supply Chain. So in her role through her advocacy and promotion, she works to increase and improve the quality of the overall participation of diverse businesses, the focus of our conference here today, and specifically in AT&T's purchases of materials and services. So talk about being connected to a decision-maker. She is one of those power makers. As a seasoned leader in her duties, she also offers the opportunity to coach, to mentor and to really develop upcoming leaders. We are delighted to have her here with us today. We are honored to have you with us, Miss Christy P. Jordan. Good morning, everybody. Thank you so much for including AT&T in such an exciting event. We are happy to be here and actually just wanted to review with you and go over our AT&T Supplier Diversity department activities that we are involved in. So as you can see, to start off, we have been leading the way for half a century since 1968 with our Supplier Diversity Program. It started born out of the 1960s when the country was faced with systemic, racial and economic challenges. And here we are in 2022. Still seeing some of that, but happy to be a part of celebrating almost 55 years now of our Supplier Diversity Program. We since 1968 have certified or have done business $200 billion worth of business with diverse businesses within the United States and across the world. So overall for AT&T, we have a supplier diversity goal of 21 and a half percent. So 21 and a half percent of our spend is with diverse suppliers. We have some best practices that we look at for our Supplier Diversity Program. And we have 11 right here that we're going to share with you today. One, we have leadership commitment from the top. So it's a top-down initiative within AT&T and we do have significant goal setting in place with our business units and our Prime Supplier Program for our diverse suppliers spend. We want you to understand the why, why we believe this is important to our company and to the communities and our employees. We want to ensure a meaningful and measurable program. So that means it has to have meat in it. Our employees have to buy in and we have to be able to measure and show the significance of the program. We want to show you how we establish our resources. We do have a very supplier-centric approach to our diverse spend and the program. We have a great supplier advocacy program for those suppliers and diverse suppliers that are interested in doing business with AT&T. We talk a lot about our stakeholder management. Our program does have measurable metrics and return on investment. Our Prime Supplier Program is very, very important to supplier diversity and making sure that we have suppliers that may be non-diverse but understand the importance of working with diverse businesses in their business practices as well. We have a supplier diversity system that is easy to manage and easy for prospective suppliers to register for to look to do business with AT&T. And we also look to incentivize based on the use of diverse businesses within our supply chain. Today's purpose is for us to discuss how you as diverse businesses can help impact AT&T supplier diversity goals. Next slide. As I mentioned earlier, we have leadership commitment. Our CEO, John Stanky, has been quoted as saying that our supplier diversity program seeks to make meaningful and measurable contributions to the economic growth of diverse companies and communities by stimulating job growth, improving opportunities for technical training and being a catalyst to stimulate new diverse businesses, AT&T supplier diversity program will improve the livelihoods for diverse individuals across the country. Next slide. I mentioned us wanting you to understand the why. Why we believe supplier diversity is important in our global supply chain. This is because it reflects the diversity of our customers, employees, and the communities that we serve. So again, we just talked about the mission of the AT&T supplier diversity program as quoted from our CEO, John Stanky. But the value that it has is our brand enhancement, the impact to our communities, customer loyalty and just overall better business solutions. Diverse businesses bring very diverse options and opportunities to our business space. So the metrics that we use, we have a tier one and tier two spend program, supplier utilization by diverse segments. So we have various commodities across our business units that we look at for interjecting diverse suppliers. We create jobs as an impact of this diverse spend. We have several diverse suppliers that are participating in our RFPs, our request for pricing or request for quotes and the number of diverse suppliers that are awarded actual contracts in business within AT&T. Those are the metrics that we are using to evaluate our program. Next slide. So our program, supporting the economic success of diverse suppliers and their communities through corporate purchasing and business development. Again, we have accountability from top down with our internal stakeholders and management of our business units, our brand enhancement and community impact as well as devoting the proper resources with supplier-centric approach. So the best practices in our AT&T supplier diversity, we have focus areas on our diversity segment spend, the different program opportunities. We want to increase our tier two opportunities in business to business mentoring and also set targets for minority spend categories. So we assign preferred supplier designations to prioritize companies with diversity as a core value in their business operations. So a lot of our prime suppliers and those preferred suppliers have also dedicated a percentage of their spend to diverse businesses and that is one of their core operating values. Next slide. We mentioned that we have the supplier-centric approach that means supporting the economic success of diverse suppliers and their communities through corporate purchasing and business development. Our program has a very large supplier outreach. We do sponsorships. We participate in industry boards and groups and executive roundtables. We have a heavy presence in external affairs and advocacy and a front door portal for reviewing prospective suppliers. We work to develop prospective suppliers. We have a business growth acceleration program. We have executive development scholarships where we award different opportunities for diverse businesses to sit down and have conversations with executives in different areas. And we have a prime and subcontractor mentoring program. Our supplier opportunities, we include diverse suppliers in our RFPs and RFQs. We have a supplier diversity team that's a part of acquisition planning, meaning a part of onboarding diverse businesses and our prime supplier program targets. And those are where we work with our prime suppliers to set their diversity percentage and spans in their contracts with AT&T. Again, supplier advocacy, this is something heavy within the supplier department, supplier diversity department. Supplier diversity is a part of our overall global supply chain organization. We have supplier diversity teams assigned to different spend categories throughout our business units. And they are aligned with strategic sourcing managers who are actually the liaison between the supplier and the business units obtaining contracts for those business units. And we have supplier diversity team members that are assigned to different diverse suppliers. Next slide, please. So our internal stakeholder, excuse me, Slepaier Advocacy. Our supplier diversity department is led by one director and we have 12 dedicated professionals and they are broken up and work on different commodity assignments throughout our business. And they work with external outreach. We have various KPIs and metrics to maximize the opportunities for diverse businesses through critical partnerships with our sourcing team. So our sourcing team are actual contract managers that are handling the RFPs and communicating directly with our business unit. Our prime suppliers are those large suppliers that spend over $2 million with AT&T and we ensure that they are complying with our diversity goals in terms of their subcontracting if they are not a diverse vendor. We want to make sure that they do have, as their core values, a diversity span. We monitor those two or two results on a quarterly basis. So we're asking them to subcontract a part of their AT&T business to diverse suppliers. And we also facilitate matchmaking opportunities where we set up opportunities for our prime suppliers to meet diverse businesses that are interested in doing business with AT&T as well. Our business units, our supplier, diversity advocates are integral in working with our business units and sharing information about diverse businesses or prospective diverse businesses that we have come in contact with. So we actually advocate for those smaller businesses to meet the business units and those decision makers. We have external organizations that we work with, our certification agencies, those are the agencies that we work with to make sure that our vendors or our diverse vendors are certified it. So we have WeBank, the minority supplier, diversity councils, et cetera, that we work with on certification and we partner with our external affairs group as well. Next slide. So our internal stakeholder management, that's ensuring that supplier diversity remains relevant and at the forefront of each organization's priorities. This is a demanding challenge, as you heard from our previous speaker, to make sure that there is buy-in on supplier diversity, that it's just not a check mark that you check off when you're going down your task list, but that the organization really believes and is engaged in supplier diversity. So we have performance transparency, making sure that we are communicating with our business units and our sourcing managers. We have supplier diversity training that we provide to our business units as well as our sourcing managers as well. And then influencing, making sure that we have ambassadors throughout the company that work to influence others within the company about the benefits of supplier diversity. Next slide, please. So our diversity systems, and this is where you may be interested mostly because this is how we onboard and intake our diverse suppliers. So our prospective suppliers will go through a supplier intake process where we get information from you about your company and your commodity that you're interested in, the certifications that you're holding, proving that you are a diverse business. Once you input that information into our portal, there is a pre-qualification process where your information is vetted and routed to a supplier diversity manager if you meet all of those criteria. If not, we'll send you an email that says thank you for your interest in being a prospective diverse supplier, but we recommend you follow up on these things if you don't pass the initial pre-qualification stage. But as you see in this flow chart, once you do pass the pre-qualification stage, then you are sent to a supplier diversity manager that manages that respective commodity. We intern, and that's the group that I'm in, we intern route your information to our sourcing managers as well as our business units if there are opportunities. If there are not immediate opportunities, we input you into our database. We will give you a personal call and set up a 15 to 30 minute interview with you just to vet you as a company, make sure you know what is required when working with AT&T, and also encourage you to work with the various boards in your areas for other opportunities across the board. Next slide, please. So one thing I mentioned a couple of times throughout my presentation is our prime supplier in tier two subcontracting program. This is a great opportunity for diverse businesses to get their foot in the door with AT&T. And that is through our prime supplier program where we have our suppliers are required to meet diversity goals. Just as we set a 21 and a half percent diverse spend goal, we ask that our prime suppliers commit to a diverse spend goal as well, preferably at that 21 and a half percent or higher. This program has been instrumental in helping prime suppliers increase their utilization of minority business and women, disabled veterans own businesses or diverse businesses in their supply chain. And that is, again, the opportunity for subcontracting tier two spend. Our diversity team, we collaborate with our prime suppliers throughout the year to set the diversity goals. So initially in the beginning of the year, we get their diversity plan. At this time during the year, we're going through that plan, working with them to see how they are going to execute on that plan and also providing them names and references of diverse vendors or prospective suppliers in the diverse world that they could work with. We help to develop solutions for improvement and make supplier referrals, as I mentioned, and recommendations. And then throughout the year, we track and review their use of diverse suppliers throughout the year. Next slide, please. So everybody wins when we develop a program to recognize and reward the most aligned with our supplier diversity program. There's something in it for everyone. So we do have for our prime suppliers and suppliers that fulfilled their goals every year. We have diverse and non-diverse suppliers receive top corporation recognition. Our suppliers receive diversity excellence awards based on their results each year. We have employee and executive partnership awards. And I know one of these that's very popular within our culture is the advocate of the year award. And these are employees who support diversity supplier initiatives, whether or not they are referring diverse suppliers to diversity managers or sourcing managers or business units, working as supplier diversity advocates for the various outreach activities that we participate in. We also have our employee resource groups. They also support our diversity initiatives as well. And then again, our preferred suppliers. And these are suppliers who demonstrate a commitment to all aspects of corporate social responsibility and diversity and sustainability. They earn a preferred supplier status and they are given higher consideration during the RFP process. Next slide, please. So we do believe that representation matters. Our diverse supplier base is a great asset to AT&T. We are eager for diverse suppliers to find more about our program. We do have a supplier registration. It is located on this last slide. This website will take you directly to our prospective supplier portal intake process. And we ask suppliers to register here at www.attsuppliers.com. And again, once you're registered, you are connected with the appropriate diversity advocate for the further evaluation. That is again, once you submit your certifications, a little bit of information about your company and what commodity that you're interested in, you will then be routed to a diversity advocate and we will vet your company and hopefully get you moved forward in the process of sourcing with AT&T. If you have any questions, please don't hesitate to send those to our inbox at attsd at att.com. And I am not sure if we're going to do questions today. I don't believe so, but you can also just send those questions directly to our inbox. Christy, thank you so very much. I appreciate you making your inbox available. And I see a lot of questions and great comments and feedback back. So tremendous information, a wealth of resources. I've already tweeted out a couple of those bullet points that you shared with us and the presentation will be available later for those who are not able to join us again. So thank you again for sharing your time in your expertise. Absolutely invaluable. Thank you. All right, everyone, that we are gonna up next, spend a little time on making connections and positioning your business for opportunities. Again, that is what the focus of this event is all about, so much great information. If you don't get your question answered today during this chat, know that we're gathering all of that information. I'm seeing your comments in the chat as well. And so the OBO team will work diligently to follow up with you and make sure you get connected to whatever resource it is that you need. It is my pleasure to introduce Lance Brown, who was actually born and raised right here in South Carolina in Spartanburg, attended the University of South Carolina before receiving his MBA from the Duke University Fuqua School of Business. He serves as the CEO and president of Rhino Medical Supply, which is one of the nation's fastest growing minority owned healthcare distribution companies. We are delighted to have him with us today. Please give a warm welcome to Mr. Lance Brown. Thank you for being with us. Thank you for having me. It was really a privilege and a pleasure to be on. Seeing for some familiar faces, Mayor, new mayor, Rickerman, good to see you again. Shortly after being sworn in, he stopped by to see us. So he's a man of the people. So I really appreciate him and Aisha and Kalina, everything that you guys do to put these type of events on the help. So hopefully I can be helpful. My goal, I know we have, I have a 20 minutes spot to give some time back so that we can do some Q and A at the end of it. And then just kind of piggybacking off what Dr. White said and also Mrs. Jordan, you know, Dr. White kind of laid out why diversity and inclusion is important. And then we heard from a corporate institution standpoint that there's actually programs and big businesses that seek that out. So now hopefully what I can do is tell you a little bit about our story and how we've been able to make connections to take advantage of some of these opportunities. So Rhino Medical, my name is Lance Brown. We're in Columbia, South Carolina, Rhino Medical Supply. And I say that with great pride, like being able to build a business right here from our great state and the city of Columbia is really important to us. And as we continue to grow and grow, you know, get larger, we don't have any intentions of leaving our city or our state. So anytime I tell people where we're from, I say that with great pride. But connections is really important and we wouldn't be here without connections. So we were founded May 7th, 2020. So if you're doing the math in your head, what happened in 2020? COVID-19, the coronavirus. And it kind of took everybody from storm. My background is I spent 13 years with Wells Fargo and December 1st, 2017, me and three other partners left and we started a credit card process of business called Swipe Fest. And we still have the business and it's growing as well. But the business of Swipe is working with other small businesses to process electronic forms of payments. And when you think about 2020 and how it happened, a lot of us had to shut our doors and we didn't know what the future looked like. And if you can't have customers in your business to pay you, then how are you gonna stay in business? So it was just a lot of uncertainty. And one of our partners, one of the guys that worked for us for Swipe, who's now a partner at Rhino Trip Robson, he's literally the only one that had any type of medical experience. So you're talking about starting a brand new business during a global pandemic with no industry experience. So it sounds like fun, that's exactly how it was. But what we were able to do is leverage relationships and you just never know how 20 year old relationships can turn into a business opportunity later. So during 2020 and the thick of it, if you watch the news, the larger states, California and New York were consuming most of, if not all of the PPE. And what that does is it creates, if the larger customers, hospital systems or states are consuming one product that literally everybody in the world needs at that time, typically what happens is the underserved communities, rural states, smaller systems are the ones that are gonna be left out in the wind or looking for options. So what happens is that if you normally have a hundred times demand of something or 10 times demanding something and you can't go to your first 10 people, it creates lanes for someone like us to step in and help serve. And we started with like a purpose of really helping smaller states, smaller systems, underserved communities find the PPE that they needed. And we also understand that this is a humbling business, right? We got started because of COVID-19 and there's plenty of people maybe even on this call that have been devastated by the virus. So it's very humbling that we started a business because of it and it's our job to make sure that everything that we do, we have purpose behind it and we're truly trying to help. And that's how it is. So the All-American story started in a room outside of my garage to give you some perspective that room is my PlayStation room now because where I play video games at night. So very small room. And then we grew into a 15,000 square foot warehouse is where we are and we distribute all over the country. Our primary customers are our hospitals, healthcare systems, acute, non-acute. We're in all 50 states. We're weird in the way that we started outside of our state and now we're starting to hone into the state of South Carolina and regionally. So at this point we have customers in all 50 states. So our growth has been organic. Sometimes we didn't know we needed things until we ran into it. And from logistics to warehousing to distribution to the whole nine. And so we've been able to grow that way. So how does connections work? Trips connections with one of the hospital systems allowed us to get our first order of a million mask. And then another connection he had was 100,000 gallons and then from there it just kind of took off. And I think when I think about making connections I put it in four buckets, at least four buckets. One is connecting with your customers and everybody's different. We all have different businesses and different industries. And so I can't really tell you how do you connect with certain industries. But as a whole connecting with customers, I would put it as a bucket, connecting with your team, with your employees, your team members, your partners, connecting professionally and also connecting with your community. So what does that mean? So connecting with customers is extremely important. It's a quote that I like is if you wake up every day and you decide what you want to give versus what you wanna get, it's gonna help you be more successful. And a lot of times when we think about earning business whether it be from the city of Columbia, the state of South Carolina or whomever, it's not about what we do or what we can sell, it's about what the customer needs and what solution, what problem we can solve for them. So if you really approach it that way of like, what type of, can we be a problem solver? Can we help them provide a solution to something that they need help with? And procurement, if we're just like honing in and talking about the city of Columbia and some of the opportunities, getting to know in our world, we deal with a lot of procurement agents. We deal a lot with a lot of buyers and they have a lot of things throwing their plate on a daily basis of what they have to procure. So if you're not easy to do business with, then they're gonna go to their trusted sources. And being a minority on business, a woman on business, a veteran on business is really important. And I think if all things were equal, they would love to support us, but it still has to make business sense. So when you're connecting with customers, it's important that you're providing a solution or a service that they actually need help with and you're making their life easier. Mayor Rickman, he said during his introduction that getting ideas from some of the folks from the communities is really tough because in small businesses, there's procurement laws, right? So if you know that there's net terms and if you send an invoice or you provide a service that's gonna take 30, 45, 60, 90 days, sometimes they can really put a strain on a small business. But at the end of the day, if that's that business or your customer, your ideal customer's standard operating procedure, you gotta meet them where they are. You can't, I can't say, hey, you like what we sell, but you gotta pay me upfront if that's not the way they do business. Making it easy to do business is really important. And then another one of our mentors that's kind of taken us under his wings, a quote that he gave us that really resonates and it says gentle pressure relentlessly applied. So being professionally annoying, so following up with people, staying at the top of mind, just it could be a checking call, letting them know there's any updates or things that you're doing or even just information, sharing information. You never know when a customer is gonna make a buying decision. So just being at the top of mind, keeping up with that is really important and some things that we continue to do on a daily basis. The next connecting bucket is with your internal team. I think that's one of the things that a lot of times it's overlooked is how important is it to retain and to keep and build a culture in your organization that people wanna be a part of. If you look around now, especially with the workforce and labor, there's a lot of options. So, and that's good for the workforce. And there's more higher paying jobs. There's more flexibility. People, we've realized one of the things about COVID is that we realized that it's actually okay and you can be productive from working at home. And before a lot of businesses, unless they could really see you and manage you and micromanage you and see exactly what you're doing by the minute, they didn't think you could be productive. So one of the positives that's come out of COVID is that we can meet virtually and also that we can work virtually. So with that, that means it's opportunity and there's competition in the marketplace from a labor standpoint. So what are you doing to make those connections with your internal team to make sure that everybody feels like they're visible, that their opinions matter, that their voices are heard and that they truly are making an impact. And one of the things that we've been able to do and that we're still building, we're still a young company, but is that we, I feel like we have everybody aligned in what our purpose is and what our vision is and then everybody's driving towards that same direction. It doesn't mean that we don't have different agreements about ideas and how to get there, but at the end of the day, I think the spirit of it is everybody wants what's best for Rhino. And then the byproduct of that is that sometimes you get to experience individual success. So from an employee standpoint, just being able to be more inclusive. And I think there was a great question that someone asked Dr. White and it was how do you get buy-in from executive leadership, being more inclusive with diversity. And to me, being fortunate enough to lead teams in different organizations is that I've always just thought that our team should look and mirror what our community looks like. And it's really hard as a business to just cater to one demographic of people, period. So if you have customers that look and they come from different backgrounds and ethnicities, I think your team should reflect that. So that's part of it is like, you should reflect what your community looks like and what your customer base looks like. And then connect them professionally. It's kind of what we're doing now, right? So obviously you got linked in, but just join organizations. This is really truly where I think a lot of the secret sauce is, is just always being available. And we're all small business owners. We're typically the biggest cheerleaders of our business and advocates. And any time that you have the opportunity to introduce your business or your ideas or what you do to others, you should take advantage of that. And that means both national leaders, policy makers, local. We've been fortunate and very privileged to build and develop some really good relationships. Senator Scott's team, there's some of the most solid people that you can ever meet. And it's the people that are behind the scenes that we have really good relationships with their truly care about their constituency and making introductions to help your business grow. Representative Clyburn's team, Janice Marshall that runs his foundation, like just being able to help that way. And for instance, we told you just met with Mayor Rickerman. So sending out those invites to your local leaders and inviting them into your world. And it's kind of surprising at first by how receptive they are and really how willing they are to jump in and help and provide assistance in whatever they can. And that necessarily means asking them for business. It's just asking them for contacts and letting them know that you're here and that you exist. And then the fourth bucket for me is community. It's like, how do you connect to your community? And that's a really important one. It's one of our key pillars that we have at Rhino is giving back. And as we continue to grow, we want that contribution to grow with it. And up until this point, we're really proud of it. We've donated over 800,000 masks. We've done a lot of local partnerships. Dr. DeCosta's office who works with minority communities and indigenous communities in our state, helping them get some of the PPE and some of the supplies that is really hard for some of these different underserved communities to get. So yeah, so those are the main things. There's obviously more ways that you can connect. But I think if I had to summon all up professionally it's really important. Joining organizations, being really engaged in them. I think after me, you're gonna hear Dominique with the NMSDC. That one is a big one. That's the hack. And Dr. White spoke earlier about sometimes you don't wanna lead that I'm a minority on business. It's perfectly okay to do that. It's one thing to say that you should do business with me because I'm a minority on business. And then there's another one, as we heard from Ms. Jordan, that there's big corporations that are actively seeking to spend with minority or underserved businesses. So why not put yourself in that position to take advantage of that and then take advantage of those different connections. And instead of just being a part of something truly being engaged in it, with the NS, MDCR, COO, Elliot Haney, he went through their leadership program. And there he got an exposure to all different types of people in different industries. And that was really big. And it helped us as a young company with not much industry experience. It just made us visible. People were willing to meet with us. We never pretend to be more than what we're not. And I think people can realize that. And because of that, more women's like, Hey, you're, you probably need some help here. Let me introduce you to such and such. And then the lastly, and I think he's on here too, but just having mentors in different industries. Like one of my biggest mentors is Antonin Gunn. I believe he's on here. I heard his name earlier, but that's my guy. And he's been a mentor to me for over 20 years, every since I've known it. So he used to be in a medical space, but just from a leadership perspective, keeping the real with you, having someone in different spaces in different industries that you can share ideas. Because I think at the end of the day, as business owners, we all have similar challenges that we face on a daily basis. And how do we accomplish that? And just reaching across the aisle and talking to people with similar experiences and challenges has always been helpful for us. And I'm not sure how we are with time, but. Well, you know what? I want to take a few minutes for Q&A. I think you gave us a fantastic overview to really talk about how you overcome some of the challenges of being a supplier in terms of a diversity program with these companies and making those connections. So let's just drill down if we can on a few of those in the next couple of minutes. Talk if you would. You talked a little bit about this, about some of the connections that have really benefited you. But for those who are on our meeting today and on the call, name one or two local organizations and maybe even a national organization that is really a game changer in terms of being a member of, either because they do help you with networking or they help you even with your own personal growth and development in terms of being able to present like you're doing today and being able to connect with those suppliers that really make the best impression or even with other resources, things like technology. What are maybe one or two organizations either locally or nationally that you have found have really benefited your company? So great question. So I think obviously the big one is and you'll hear Dominique talk, the National Minority Supply Diversity Council is a big one because they're the most respected certification for minority businesses. And what that means is that there's the folks like AT&T and the larger businesses they go there first to look for vetted sources that they know. And this is a thorough process and I really appreciate that because they want to make sure that you are not only a minority on business but you are minority ran business and that's a key difference. And then for our industry, we're part of HIDA. HIDA is the Health Industry Distributors Association and that is one of, being in business, sometimes you got to join association and organization is just part of the game. You got to do it. But HIDA has been one that we've been highly engaged in. I sit on a couple of sub councils and we talk about supply chain and it gives me exposure to some of the bigger players in our space like the McKessons, the Medlines, the 3Ms, the Cardinals. Like I sit on the board with those people and councils with those people. So I'm here in firsthand like some of the challenges that they have that we're able to convey to our customers. So I would say on our industry, HIDA is one, then the NSFPC is definitely one. You know what? You did something else that I'm so glad that you touched upon and talked about the resources that are available through our elected officials. And I know the political climate right now is so charged in a lot of negative ways where sometimes people just say, you know what? I'm not dealing with politics at all. But the people who are in office are here to represent everybody, right? And here to help everybody and here to serve everybody. And you talked about the critical resources and I've worked with Senator Scott staff on a number of projects. They are top notch. Congressman Clyburn staff as well, Ms. Marshall in particular. But if you would just touch on the importance of not only engaging with our elected leaders but being knowledgeable, you know, about the laws and things that are being put on the table and making sure that your voice is heard because I think that we pull back from that instead of leaning in a lot. Yeah, for sure. And that's one of the biggest takeaways is that they don't really care how you vote. They're here to help. And that's what they're for, right? They're resources to us. And part of it, I think whatever space that you're in is really becoming a subject matter expert and becoming and dominate that space. And if you're new like us to a new completely new industry, it's not necessarily about the number of years that you put into something, it's a number of time. So to get caught up, we spent many 15, 16 hour days around the clock just to understand what we were doing. And then once you get to that point where you become knowledgeable, then you're able to see different challenges that you face as an industry. And we've been fortunate, we've been very fortunate and privileged to be featured. We've been featured in Bloomberg, New York Times, Miami Herald, the local places. And that brings a different level of spotlight and it gives you the ability to be a flag bearer for other folks that's coming behind you. Because it's not necessarily about just creating a lane in a space that we can be successful in, but it's creating a path that people that can come behind us. Because there's plenty of more people like us that are more talented, they have more opportunity and the only thing they need is maybe some introductions. So anytime that you're able to take advantage of those relationships from our policy makers and get introduction and they introduce you to more people, down the line you're able to share that information and the knowledge with other folks that are coming behind you. Are there any certifications or any local networking opportunities that some of these business owners should consider tapping into? Certifications, well I think for the purpose of this call, making sure that you have your MBE certification and there's different bodies in every municipality and the state has a different one that they need. The city uses the one that we have from NMS DC. And then also like one of the things that we're, I'm a part of now is it's a founders group and it's just a community of local entrepreneurs and mostly in tech, so I'm probably the only non-tech person, I take that back. But anyway, it's a founders group and what we do is we meet once a month and we just collaborate and we share and we have someone that does IT and coding. We have Tyler, he's one of my mentors. He owns diesel laptops and if you keep up with him on LinkedIn, he went from a garage to four locations, tens of millions of dollars in revenue type company. So just being able to sit at a table with other leaders in different industries and to share and collaborate. And I think one of the things that's important is that for whatever reason we get this mentality where we don't want to share information and we don't want to collaborate with others because we're thinking we're giving someone else an advantage or something that you spend a lot of time developing and you just want to give that away. But it's the only way that we're really able to move forward together is to collaborate and to share ideas and it doesn't necessarily have to be in the same space. I'm not saying connect dots, you don't have to connect dots for people but being able to collaborate and share ideas is really important. I think I call that the got mine mentality. Once people figure it out for themselves and then it's just like, all right, we put it all down on lock but that's not the way this whole process is supposed to work. I'm keeping an eye on the clock. Let me try and work in two more very quick questions that as quick as we can be. But I'm just interested to know what would you in hindsight after starting a business in the middle of COVID but even aside from that as a minority business owner what would you say was your one biggest challenge and how did you overcome it? Great, so the one biggest challenge for us is was definitely on the financial side. We started our business with $10,000 and literally if we had to start this business in 2022 it'd be impossible and the reason I say that is because hospitals are on net terms and some of these purchase orders can be large purchase orders. It'd be hundreds of thousands, it could be a million dollars. So it's one thing if someone is financing that for you is another one if you had to fund it. So this is where your background professionally even if it's not in the space it's always ways that it's gonna transfer over to a new career. And we had financial, we had electronic payments background we had finance background. So as anybody that's been in business those first two years are tough and it's typically because to a bank you're not bankable yet you don't have two years financial. So you really gotta bootstrap it and you gotta finance your own bills. What we were able to do and I think this is a hack we were able to leverage our knowledge on the credit card processing side. So if our customers required terms how do we do that? So we started out AmEx gave us a credit card I think at first it was like $15,000 a month and we had to pay it off. And then we got up to the point where we're spending $300,000, $400,000 a month on our credit card. And what that did is it allowed we had to pay it off every 30 days but it allowed us to extend terms to our customers. So my advice would be like make yourself easy to do business with. If you don't take credit cards that's probably something you should look at especially in regards to the city because some of those decisions that they can make if this under a certain amount they can put it on their purchasing card and then there's not extra levels of approval. But if you only take checks or wires or cash and you're missing out on some easy low hanging fruit. So just from a financial standpoint leveraging some of the resources that you already have that may be from an institution standpoint you're not mature enough to have yet because you haven't reached two years until you get to the point where your bankable and banks are willing to extend lines of credit. Listen, you have covered a lot of ground in terms of how your company has grown the networking opportunities, the certifications what it means and the benefits of being a supplier of a minority owned business. Let's close out in this last two minutes with just on, I'm gonna say inspirational level, empowerment level, whatever you wanna call it but there had to also be a leap of faith to do what you did and make that decision to leave that full time job and to launch into this new business opportunity in the middle of COVID and then to strategize and grow the way you have over the last several years. But just what is it that you tapped into personally to allow you to really step into and fulfill this training? The unsung hero is by far our spouses our significant others and that's the thing is if you're gonna be an entrepreneur you have to have your partner has to be on has to be on the same train as well. So like having a, and I can speak this wholly for all of the partners that right now like our wives have been amazing they understand that we're chasing the dream they understand that it takes a lot of time and energy. We have small kids I have a nine and a seven year old so how do you balance building a business from scratch but also being present at home and making sure that your family gets the equal amount of time but having someone that really understands what you're trying to accomplish and then also having, I respect people who live in a household with two entrepreneurs and they jump in at the same time because I mean you gotta eat what you kill I think someone said that earlier. So having a stable income helps it takes a little bit where you're not as much risk averse but truly entrepreneur people are just different we're wired different and we understand that there's a lot of risk but that's the fun part of it. And a lot of times when you leave corporate America and you start something for yourself you don't realize like how big of a relief it is and even if you're starting from scratch from a revenue standpoint from a monetary standpoint you're building something for yourself and that gives you energy and if you're truly if you have purpose and you're passionate about what you do then you're just willing to do what it takes for your business to be successful. Fantastic. We appreciate your time. Will you please share with us how our participants can contact you if they'd like to follow up on any of the great information that you've shared. Sure, yes. So my personal email is Lance at RhinoMedicalSupply.com I'm an area opportunity for us as a social media piece so that I don't have any handles on social media to share. That's all that. We're worse. We're the worst with that. But it's an area of opportunity. So there you go. Well listen, there might be somebody on here whose specialty is in social media and marketing who can connect with you and help you out with that. I've been told by one of my mentors that I need help with that. So I'm not gonna say any names who said that to me but yeah. Okay. Well listen. Yes, no, so Lance at RhinoMedicalSupply.com I'm open. Time is like one of our most valuable the most valuable commodity we have. I'm open with it. So if there's anything that I could do for anybody to help just let me know. I'm available. Well we thank you for your time today. I haven't been able to really go through the chat but I've seen a lot of notifications pop up with some great questions for you and a couple of them about some of the acronyms that you have mentioned. So if you do still have time to jump in the chat I'm sure our OBO staff are trying to help out with that as well. But a lot of great feedback to what you have shared. So if you have time to jump in the chat and follow up with that we sure would appreciate that as well. Lance, much success to you. We appreciate you. Thank you again. Thank you so much. Really appreciate the opportunity. It's our pleasure. All right, everybody, I told y'all we were gonna have a dynamic power package and we're gonna keep moving through and talk a little bit about understanding the Minority Business Enterprise, MBE, one of the acronyms that you heard Lance mention there, the certification process and the benefits. So you heard and mentioned our next speaker, Dominique Simpson Milton serves as the president and CEO of the Carolina's Virginia Minority Supplier Development Council, CVMSDC.org. That's the website there where you can get more information about the council. As an international connector, Milton's goal is really to create wealth by certifying, developing, connecting and advocating for ethnic minority-owned businesses, MBEs. Voted as a top 25 supplier, diversity professional, Dominique is truly a specialist in new business development. She's a proud HBCU grad of Spellman College and holds an MBA in marketing from Penn State. She currently is working toward a doctorate in business administration and has received numerous awards for retail performance, business growth, as well as product expansions. We are delighted to have her with us today. Please welcome Mrs. Dominique Milton. Thank you so much, Judy. Are you gonna be joining the slides or am I doing you? Oh, you have my slides up, so we are good to go. Thank you so much. It is a pleasure to be here today. Can you hear me okay? We got you. Okay, outstanding. Well, I wanna thank the city of Columbia for having me. Aisha, you could not have done a better job with the lineup because let me tell you, you set me up properly. You had three of our customers to go before me. So Lance Brown and Dr. Nika White are two of our star MBEs. It has been a pleasure for me to watch them grow over the years. And so they are a testimony to what we can do to help businesses grow. And then you had AT&T, one of our, she was humble there. She didn't say that she was a member of the billion dollar round table. There's very few corporations that are part of the billion dollar round table. Our presentation was so thorough because they give away, they not not give away, but they spend over a billion dollars with minority businesses every year at AT&T. So they are a corporate customer of ours nationally and then Dr. Nika White and Lance Brown with Rhino Medical are MBEs with our organization. And that's important to notice we go through this presentation. So one thing I wanna note about Dr. Nika White is we have one word in common that we love. It's my favorite word. I believe it's one of her favorite words. And that is intentionality. As we go through this presentation and as you listen to all the speakers today, being intentional is key. And I put in the chat earlier on, I applaud each of you for being here today because you're speaking with intentionality. You've chosen what you wanna do with your time today. And we need to choose where we spend our time. We need to choose where we save our money and where we spend our money. We must be intentional. So today I wanna just jump into it. I wanna talk to you about how fast you can grow when you grow with help. I'll tell you my story. My story is that I was an MBE. So I was where many of you sat, sit right now and we went from a $0 to over $20 million in less than six years because we engage with advocacy organizations like the one that I'm the president of today. And that is CV MSDC. So we're gonna talk about expanding your reach. Next slide, please. So this is me in the middle, a little bit better makeup job than today. But that's me. And I used to wanna be Oprah and market all at the same time. And I wondered how in the world did they get this all done? But I can't get it all done. But when I realized that they do it because they have help, right? You can do more, you can accomplish more when you tap into resources and utilize the help that is available to you. And that's all we're gonna be talking about today. How advocacy groups can help you to grow your business, how they can expand your reach. Next slide, please. So you can click it a couple of different times. So we have organizations that go from hot sauce. I like to say you can click it a couple of times. Hot sauce to jet planes, right? So bottom left-hand corner of this organization, you're gonna hear from them in a minute with their video. But I knew them when they started out in the kitchen in Charleston, South Carolina and now they have national distribution. Then we have top left corner Fatima. She has all things fire solutions. Bottom right, Lincoln's LLC has a jet company. And so as I said, from hot sauce to jet planes, if you wanna charter a plane, just by the hour he's available for you. And he grew his business, he actually doubled his business during the pandemic because people weren't flying commercial. And then my all-time favorite top right-hand corner is Janice Bryant-Hauroyd. Janice started her business with $1,500, right? You heard Lance talk about people starting in the garage. She did just that. She started with a dream and she became the first African-American woman to build an own a billion dollar company. All of these are members of our organization. So it doesn't matter whether you're at the startup stage or whether you are in the stratosphere, we have billion dollar members in our organization. We can help you grow and we can help connect you to elevate your business to the next level. Next slide, and let's see if we can run videotape. Can we run tape there? Make sure the sound is on. We were looking for some new and innovative ways to source and interact with all diverse businesses. One of the ideas that we came up with was to host a buying daisy bet right here at Lowes X Watters. Lowes supplier diversity invited 44 vendors to its inaugural buying daisy bet. Buyers and vendors learn more about each other, giving Lowes time to get to know a couple from Charleston, South Carolina. Chicago Wilson-DeBriano was a paramedic with the New York City Fire Department and served at Ground Zero on 9-11. He moved his family to Charleston in search of a new life and along with his wife developed a unique product. What we make is a gourmet burger marinade and gourmet burger sauce. What's unique about it is it is both gluten-free and low-intensity. We like to call this an accidental business because when our products were created, we weren't trying to have a business. We were just enjoying a barbecue with our family. We wanted something special and we got fresh herbs and spices that were very flavorful. We threw it into a bowl, put those hodgepodge with our burger meat, put it in the patties and we just grilled it. Our family and friends loved it and I said to Chevalo, I think we should sell this and that's literally how it was born. It was a total accident. The Buying Days event helped make Lowes more approachable for this small company and their products will soon be in 543 Lowes stores. Supplier diversity really helped us to navigate everything, to understand what it took to become a supplier and do business with Lowes. Without them, we would not be in this position right now. Lowes can definitely help us to become a household name. So I'm excited to be in the number one store for selling vegetables in the United States. So that's pretty awesome. Thank you. We can cut that off. So three points I wanna make about this couple is one, they're creative. They stepped outside the box. I would have never thought to connect them with Lowes, right? But because they had sauce and Lowes sells grills, they saw the connection and they made the reach to go to Lowes. The second thing that I will tell you about this couple is that Lowes said that they were the most coachable suppliers that they met. You have to be coachable. Sometimes you all are so close to your businesses that you're not willing to hear that that label color needs to be yellow as opposed to white or red as opposed to green as it's gonna sell more. So always be coachable. And the third thing that I wanna talk about with this couple is very, very important is that they are servant leaders. If anyone on this call wants to get information from them, wants to learn how to get distribution in Walmart or Lowes or wherever it is, they have a program called Recipe for Retail where you can go in and learn how to get your product to market. I had an MBE who was getting ready to pitch to Coals one night and his deck just was not on point. And in the middle of the night, Monique reached out to him, gave him her deck and he was able to utilize that deck to get a better response from Coals. So, one of our previous speakers talked about the crabs in the pot, thinking that we can't help each other. I want you all to understand the concept of the pie. You can go to the next slide. I want you to understand the concept of the pie as we go through this presentation. There is a pie. And a lot of people think if I take a piece of that pie and I give it to someone else, I'm gonna have less. I want you all to have the mindset of more, the concept of adding and growing through giving and helping others. The more pieces of pie you give away, the more seeds you're planning and you'll be able to help others along the way. So that pie grows as opposed to getting smaller. And when you have that mindset, like the couple that we just saw has your business will grow and escalate. All right, so who are we as an organization? I saw that coming through the chat. CVMSDC is one of 23 affiliates of NMSDC. Roderick, you need to put your phone on mute. Of NMSDC. Yes, ma'am. Okay, great. Thank you. So we are one of 23 affiliates of NMSDC. We're a 501C3 nonprofit and we have over 14,000 members, 13,000 NBEs and over 1,500 corporate members. And there's a $401 billion impact in the work that we do. I'm gonna get into that a little bit later. Next slide. Ying Maguire is our national president. Next slide. Hit return one more time. So our mission, I never liked to have a presentation without sharing our mission. Our mission is to expand business opportunities for minority business enterprises and create mutually beneficial links between our corporate partners like AT&T and our NBEs like Dr. Nita White and Rhino Medical. And so we are set up. This is our structure. You have the NBEs on one side, you have our corporate partners on another. We have community partners down at the bottom like the SBA. And I saw some of our other community partners on the list today. And then we're in the middle. I have a small team of seven and I call them the small and mighty team because they accomplish a lot to help our NBEs to grow. Up above, this is very important for each of you. We have six rings. And so our rings are more like small conference room tables. There's the MLP ring, which is the Midlands Low Country PD ring, which is comprised of Columbia, Charleston, Myrtle Beach, all things to the water from Columbia. We have meetings once a month. There's the upstate ring. They have meetings once a month. And Dr. Nita White is a part of that ring. And at those tables, all the corporations come around the table. So you get your Michelin, your BMWs, your Denny's of the world, your Clemson universities. We pull up to the table and we share opportunities and you get to know each other on a different level. And you all know it's not, people do business with people that they know, right? So it's not who you know, but who knows you. And when you're at the table, when you show yourselves present, that's when you start to grow up, okay? Next slide, please. Okay, so we do four things with our organization and most organizations that do advocacy work are quite similar. They have very narrow focused work. And our focus is certification. We have the largest certifying agency of ethnic minority businesses in the United States. We set the gold standard for certification. Then we help develop you. So just like a carnage or tune up, you need to be tuning up your business, no matter where you come in. If you come in at the startup level with a million dollars or multimillion, we have developmental programs to help you. You heard Lance talk about a program that his business partner went to, but we really helped him to retool their business. And so we provide those programs for free for our members. Then we have connecting opportunities like this, like major events that we have throughout the year where we bring you to the table so you can have matchmaking sessions and connect with those businesses that you want to do work with like the AT&T's of the world, the cities of Columbia, the world, B&W's, Boeing's and the like. And then just by nature of our sheer size, we can advocate for you on a national, regional and local level. When we went into COVID, we helped to fight to make sure that the light stayed on, water stayed on for small businesses. We gave out PPP loans. We gave out grants to make sure that our businesses were staying afloat. Next slide, please. Just some of our corporate partners, this is just a small list of our corporate partners. I told you we have over 1,500. These are the ones that locally give us more than $15,000 a year and support us in terms of scholarships for our MBEs for the developmental programs and just help us to do the work that we do, okay? So if you see somebody there you want to do business with, that's another reason to connect with us because we help you to connect with them. Next slide. All right, so CVMS DC does not guarantee business. We are like the HOV lane on a highway. We help get you there faster. There are less cars there and it's a direct route. I always tell people you have to drive your own car, you have to pump your own gas and when you get there you have to open the door yourself. We just help put you on that faster lane which is well worth it. Next slide. Okay, so we talked about the $401 billion economic impact. You know, when we first started supplier diversity back in the 70s people were doing this, oh, it's the right thing to do. We want to give minorities some opportunities. Well, it is so much more than the right thing to do. Yes, it's the right thing to do, but why? It's important because there's an economic impact behind supplier diversity. For every dollar that is spent with a minority business it's a $1.72 return to the economy. And that happens in terms of economic production, income supported, job supported and state and local taxes. Next slide. This is what I just talked about that dollar invested if AT&T gives Rhino Medical a contract or if HM Health gives Rhino Medical a contract there's a $1.72 that goes back into the environment because he can now hire more people, there's jobs, there's income supported through that and it's community development. You heard him say he has a warehouse so he had to rent that warehouse space. So it's a trickle down effect as to why there's a strong economic impact with supplier diversity. Next. So I like to say that you all have all heard the saying, give a man a fish and he eats for a day, teach a man a fish and he eats for a lifetime. We wanna take that so much further. Next slide, please. You all know how to fish but we want you to have your own fishing fleets. Next slide. We want you to have your fishing processing plans, right? We want you to be able to change the economic structure of where you are. Next slide. Okay, so how does it all work and how do you benefit with certification? As Lance said, there's different types of certification. There's WeBank for women-owned, there's veteran-owned, there's minority-owned. When I was an MBE, we had every certification that you can get because each certification brings with it different benefits. I might have a developmental program that WeBank doesn't have. I might be giving out a different grant than somebody else is. So get as many certifications as you can qualify for but it's not just about the certification. You have to be engaged with that organization. You have to be involved, okay? So it's advocacy, it's development, connections, verification, it's a faster way to success as I just talked about. Next slide. So these are the different types of certification that are out there, okay? Next slide. So certification evaluates the ownership, management, control, citizenship, expertise and independence of an organization. You have to be 51% managed and controlled by one or more ethnic minorities who are US citizens to be certified with us and many other organizations out there. The company must be for profit. There are some organizations that will help you if you're not for profit, but we are all about helping you grow and changing the economic landscape. A company must be an independent entity that can demonstrate real and substantial ownership. We check all of this because we don't want somebody just to put a person in charge of the business and they don't know anything about the operation of the business. So we inspect to make sure that you truly are a person running that business. Next slide, okay? So here you have to provide and demonstrate that you understand the operations and you're gonna have to upload about 30 pieces of paperwork. It's all done on the computer, but we help you with all of that if you need help. The first time it's pretty hard. As you recertify year after year, it's much easier. There's only two or three pieces of paper. You have to upload after that. Next slide. This is a story of Jeff Foster. We're gonna send this slide deck out to each of you later. But Jeff, when I was an MBE, he had a small plastics molding company and now he is a tier one supplier to BMW. There's not a car that rolls off the line at BMW without one of his parts in it. He just got a major contract with Volvo. He has a clean room and he built his building in an economically impoverished area and opportunity zone. So he has changed the landscape of where he's operating. A great example of trickle-down economics and a great example of another servant leader. Next slide. Okay, let's roll this tape very quick because she summarizes everything we talked about and then I'll be able to wrap it up and get us back on schedule. Thank you. My passion is to create a healthier and more productive workspace in a very cost effective manner with my green plants. Buckingham Green has been a business for 36 years as of October of 2018. We grow and we continue to grow. We've been really fortunate that we've been able to survive three different types of recessions and it's made us more resilient. I started with the Caroline of Virginia Minorities Acquired Development Council about 30 years ago. Their certification program is one of the strictest nationally. I wanted to be sure that if I was going to be certified that I was correctly certified. You have to establish relationships. It's not something that's gonna happen overnight. So I always recommend to fellow certified MBEs that you have to go to the events. You have to be seen. You have to have your capability statement involved on committee, a project, when they ask for volunteers, volunteer, because then you get to know not only the staff but the appropriate partners because they are the volunteers that are putting together an event and that's how I got a lot of work. I would go to events, you meet some company people and they say, oh, we have an opportunity here and it just starts snowballing from that point on. I have a fabulous team of people. We have over 350 years of service. When you're really passionate about what you're doing, you love it and it's valuable work. You get to love what you do and do what you love. All right, thank you so much. Next slide. All right, so we can skip this slide. Next slide, I wanna get you back on time. All right, so these are our fees. If you're class one under a million, it starts at $400, it goes up from there. But if you're listening today, we took the time to be here today, there are scholarships that are available for MBEs if you qualify. So you can also apply for a scholarship. Many of our corporations are paying for the certification. Next slide. All right, this is how you can contact us. It's info at CBMSDEC.org. I encourage you to visit our website. The email for our registered certification person is there, margillette.brown at CBMSDEC.org. We also have two major events coming up, March 22nd is our annual meeting. And please save the date for BLC 2022, which will be August 8th and 9th in person. Thank you so much for allowing me to speak today. And do you have any questions? All right, Ms. Milton, I thank you so much. I don't see any questions in the chat, but if we do have any come in, we'll be sure to follow up with you. We do thank you for your time and your expertise and the wealth of knowledge and information that you've shared with us today. My pleasure. I answered most of the questions I saw come through. So we're good. Okay, thank you. Fantastic, that was my observation as well. Thank you kindly. All right, everybody, we are gonna push right through and turn it over now to the city of Columbia procurement and contracts staff. They are going to discuss with us for the next 10 minutes or so. How vendors can access procurement opportunities within the city. We are glad to have with us Gary, Porth and also Jewel Buff. Good afternoon, everyone. Go ahead, Jewel. Well, my name is Jewel. I'm with the city of Columbia's department of procurement and contracts and I'm the junior buyer here at the city. We work very closely with the OBO with making sure that all of our local and minority businesses are receiving our business and that they're doing business with us. One of the key things that I've heard today repeated over and over is connections and I cannot stress that enough. Connections is huge in this. You have to let us know that you're there. I kind of relate that to something that happened when my daughter was young, she would always say, oh, I don't like this vegetable. I don't like Brussels sprouts. And I was like, well, how do you know that you don't like them unless you try them? How do we know that you are there unless you let us know? So with that being said, we have tried to make it so easy for our vendors to register. And we're always here to help. If you have a question, reach out to us. Just ask, one of the first things that I said when I started over here on procurement and contracts is I do not feel fulfilled unless I'm helping someone. So let me help you reach out to us. Let us know that you're there, register. That is the biggest thing that you can do to let us know that you're there is to register through our website. There's a couple of different ways that you can get there. We have our eBid system. Can I go to the next slide? Our eBid system, this is our online bidding system. Just it makes everything so much easier. You can go here. You can take a look at all the bids that we have available out there. You wanna do business with the city. That's where you're gonna find the majority of that business. We're gonna post it out there. It's not a secret. We advertise it. We want you guys to bid on these projects. It's very simple to get started. You can go to our website, colombiasc.gov. There is a link to this website from our procurement and contracts page. If you go under departments from colombiasc.gov, go under departments, pull up the curament and contracts. We're gonna give you a link right here to get to this exact website. Next slide. There's that website if you wanna go there directly. I know we can get this stuff put in the chat for you guys too. Very simple. You see the little blue person there on the screen. You're gonna click that plus sign and it's gonna walk you through exactly what you need to do to register as a vendor with this city. We go to this website every day. I know I spend a lot of time on this website. I'm checking this website repeatedly daily to see if vendors are registering. Who is registering? If you guys have any questions about any of the registration process, please reach out to us and let us know. And we'll definitely get our contact information put in the chat for you guys too. One of the biggest things that I can say is we have a bunch of commodity codes listed. And that's just basically having you guys let us know what you're specializing in. So make sure that when you're going through there you take the time to really choose the commodity codes that apply to your business. When we're getting ready to put out a bid on the street to have you guys, all of our vendors register or excuse me, all of you vendors have the opportunity to bid on these projects. We're gonna let you guys know about that. We're gonna send you a notification through the email that you've registered with according to the commodity codes that you choose. So therefore, if we have a construction project come up we're gonna go through, we're gonna look at the commodity codes for those particular construction projects. And those are the vendors that we're going to send notifications for. So if you're a caterer, you're not gonna get notifications that we have, you know a construction project coming up. So please make sure that you choose the correct commodity codes. That is one of the biggest things that you can do to make sure that you're getting the correct notifications for the projects that we have out there. So with that being said, like if you have any questions make sure you let us know. Make sure you reach out to any of us over here at procurement contracts. We're here to help you guys. And I'm gonna turn it over to Gary. And if you have, like I said, any questions make sure you reach out to us. But Gary's gonna let you guys know about some of the projects and some of the certifications. Thank you, Jill. Again, it's a pleasure, my pleasure to be with you all this afternoon, Judy. Thank you for your participation with us today. You've done a wonderful job. It's been some great information that's been shared during the conference. I hope it's been beneficial to you all who are participating. And I just wanna reiterate some of the things that Jill said. First off, let me introduce myself. My name is Gary Porte and I am a construction procurement manager for the city of Columbia. I work in the procurement and contracts department. And what that means basically, I tell people in the short version I buy paving, water, sewer, those kinds of things for the city. That's the majority of what I handle. And of course, we've got other departments or other divisions in our procurement contracts department, one for professional services, also goods and services in which we do work in that goods and services department as a junior buyer. But I've got three two-bed coordinators and a contract specialist to work with me. And when we get a project from an end user, somebody primarily, most of our work comes out what we call Columbia water, those paving and water and sewer products. I'm talking about, we do some paving projects for public works as well. We'll put that package together into a procurement and then we'll post it on this website that Jill's been referring to. I can't reiterate enough how important it is that you all register in our website, the slide that's still up on the screen, that's the address again that will take you directly to our, we call it EVID for short, but it's H-T-T-P-S, colon forward slash forward slash Columbia S-C dot iron wave dot net. And then you'll come to that page. And again, when we put bids out, you can see the bid when we do construction bids, you can actually see them without being registered, but I'm hesitant to even tell you that. One of the things you can't do is you can't ask a question on a bid. We do have a question table and put bids out in case something's not clear if you don't understand it. You cannot submit a question if you're not registered and you also can't put a bid in on the product. So we wouldn't want you to get to the end of it and not be able to bid on it because you weren't registered. So it's so important that you register. And again, those commodity codes that Jill talked about, it was those commodity codes whereby you specify what services or goods that you are, what are you selling? What do you provide? And based on your registration, when we then put out a construction bid, let's just say it's for sewer pipeline work. What it does is the system automatically will go through and search those commodity codes of all the vendors that we have registered. And if it's something that we're putting a bid out that has sewer work in pipeline work or manhole work, if you register for that, it's saying that you do that kind of work. The system will automatically send you an email letting you know that there's a solicitation out right now from the city of Columbia that involves the kind of work that you do or services that you provide. And it'll tell you that it's there. It'll give you a link that you can go look at that bid and see if you might be interested in putting a bid in on that. Also, it's a lot of information. And as Jill said, we're here to help. I don't think we've got our contact information on there. My name is Gary.Porth, G-A-R-Y.P-O-R-T-H at columbia-s-c.gov. If you have any questions, please don't hesitate to email me and I'll be more than happy to use if I can answer. And trust me, there are a lot of questions I can answer, but I think I can probably send you in the right direction to Jill or someone else in our department who can get those questions answered for you. Jill handles the registration process. When you all register, she will then, Jill will have to verify that the information is correct and then she will okay it and you all of them will be set up as a vendor and you'll be set that information. Two other things I wanted to talk about and I think Aisha or Melissa mentioned these earlier. We've got a lot of what we call Columbia Disadvantaged Business Enterprise Program projects that we put out that have a Columbia Disadvantaged Business Enterprise goal for the project. We've got our 15% DBE goal that the city uses on all of our products, but also that CDBE goal is listed for those products I'm talking about. And you might not be a bit or it would be what we call a prime but you may be a subcontractor and you might be interested in bidding on the work as a subcontractor. Maybe some of those products are huge products that we do. And you can attend a pre-bid meeting and they have when we do a CDBE product and I'm using CDBE for Columbia Disadvantaged Business Enterprise that's our acronym. Usually right after we have the pre-bid meeting our Office of Business Opportunities will conduct an outreach event. And what that does is helps connect any subcontractors that might be interested in working on that project or bidding on that project it connects in with the prime bidders who will likely be placing the bid for the product. So I would highly encourage you all to take a look at getting registered first off and that will notify you of any work that we put out. And then also the programs that we do and we've got a mentor protege program too that OBO spoke about earlier. And those are, I don't want to step on OBO Office of Business Opportunities toes but very good program we have also that pairs up a mentor with a protege and then that's what we put a workout under those programs and mentor protege as a traditional mentor protege where the protege which is an up and coming business a lot of times a DBE will then get at least 20% of the work for that entire project. And then we also do some projects that are protege only. So the protege basically steps in the shoes of the prime and the protege actually gets all of the work. Now they can sub some out if they want to but they can do all of it. It's a very good program too and those are usually smaller products that are designed to help younger and upcoming vendors and contractors kind of get used to doing the work for the city that we do. It kind of shows them and leads them along the path and they've also got the mentor to lean on as they're hitting that bed together and put it in. And then the last thing I want to do I got a couple of about out of time but I want to tell you some of the products that we've got currently out on our bidding website and just to mention a few of we've got a water project, it's a water mine, water main pump station rehabilitation basis better not pump station improvements. It's actually bid number 017-21-22 and it's got an 11% CDBE percentage goal for it. So that means 11% of that work hopefully will be awarded to by the prime bid or two DBE, CDBE subcontractors throughout. And again, we try to look at CDBEs first which are the Columbia Disadvantaged Bidding Center Prizes and they're from the eight county area in and around Richardson County and then we move out to DBEs, Disadvantaged Bidding Center Prizes in that area and then we moved to DBEs throughout the whole state to try to award those projects to that portion of the work to DBEs and CDBEs. There's also we've got bid 19 which is a broad river, it's a sewer project sanitary sewer project and rehabilitation and it's got a 17% CDBE goal on it. So you might want to take a look at those if that's any of the work that you might be interested in doing. We've also got another sewer project of Somalia Drive Sewer Main Improvement Replacement Project and it's bid number 022-21-22 and it doesn't have any office admittance opportunities programs with this one because it is a FEMA project which is the Federal Emergency Management Associate Administration, excuse me and it's being funded federally. So again, we won't let us put any local geographic preference programs on it but we still try to achieve that 15% DBE goal for that project and that's one that's currently out of bid as well. It bids on March the 24th of this year and then we've got several other large projects coming up bid 18 which is another filter rehabilitation project with two of our water plants, the Canal Plant and the Lake Murray Water Plant. It's got, this is 11% CDBE project and then we've got another sewer project of Gravity Sewer from Green Lone Drive to Burnside number one pump station. It has a 17% CDBE goal for it and then we've got another combined sewer repair project with three different locations on that one and it has a very good CDBE and I don't know what the goal is on that one but I'm thinking it's somewhere between 10 and 15% I believe but if you look at the bid when it gets started it'll show you what the CDBE percentage is and again, if anybody's got any questions as Jewel said, if you all will contact us and I don't know if any questions have come in if they are and if you all have time, Jewel and myself will be happy to try to answer those questions today. So thank you very much and please contact us and let us help you any kind of way we can, we'll be more than happy to do that. All right, I'm sorry, Judy. I just wanted to add one thing. The projects that Gary just mentioned we posted in the chat for everyone to take you directly to that link. I know some people weren't writing things down. You wanna go to it right away. Information's in the link. Apologize for interrupting. Thank you so much, Gary and Jewel. Thanks, Judy. Yes, great information and we wanna make sure everybody gets the information that they came here for today. So check that chat and of course the OBO staff will be happy to follow up with you as well. We have just a few minutes left. Two last quick presentations for you. The first, Mr. Roderick Stevenson, SCDOT's Lead DBE Certification Analyst with information regarding the SCDOT certification process. All right, well, good afternoon everyone. My name is Roderick Stevenson, Lead DBE Certification Analyst with SCDOT and I wanna thank you all for allowing the SCDOT the opportunity to present on today along with such an exceptional panel of speakers, just kinda overwhelmed with the wealth of information as well as inspiration that's been offered. So I wanna thank you all for sharing but I won't be before you long. The topic that I'll be covering on today is the process of becoming DBE certified. And before I do that, you'll need to know what some of the qualifiers are for this program. Now briefly, I'll find the four main eligibility criteria. The list is as follows. The first criteria is social disadvantage. The second is economic disadvantage. The third is ownership and the fourth is control. And I'll provide a brief description of each. So there are six classes of individuals presumed to be socially disadvantaged and these individuals are women, black Americans, Hispanic Americans, Asian Pacific Americans, subcontinent Asian Americans and Native Americans. And to be considered economically disadvantaged, the owner's personal net worth must not exceed $1.32 million and in addition to the business owner's grocery seats, the grocery seats must not exceed $26.29 million and that's for DBE applicants and 56.42 for AC DBE applicants. And in regards to ownership, the firm must be at least 51% owned by socially and economically disadvantaged owners or co-owners in order to qualify for this program. And that disadvantaged owner or excuse me, or owners must possess the power to direct and control the management and policies of their firm. Now let's talk a little bit about the certification process. There are just five steps to becoming DBE certified and just three steps to the DBE application itself. Now one, not two, but actually three steps to the DBE application. And in order to gain access to the DBE application, you can do so by visiting our website listed on the slide. And so let's talk about those five steps. Step one, you'll mail in your DBE application along with all of the required supporting documentation. And I refer your attention to the supporting documents checklist found in part three of the DBE application as your guide. And you have step two upon receiving your DBE packet, the assigned analyst will conduct an initial review. Step three, and after the initial review has been completed, the analyst may provide a request for additional information known as an RFI. And that RFI is due within 14 calendar days. Then we move on to step four. Once we've received all the requested information and timeframe allotted, the analysts will schedule to conduct an onsite review, which is typically done in person or just depending on the situation, we may elect to do it virtually. So a last step is step five. The analysts will prepare a recommendation for approval or denial. Now we based upon all the information that you've provided us with thus far. And that will be in accordance with whether or not you've met the criteria referenced in the federal rules and regulations. And last but not least, we'll just quickly go over some of the benefits of being certified. And so upon being certified, you'll have the access to government contracting opportunities. You'll be added to our directory, which serves as a tool to network with state agencies, prime contractors and subcontractors. And you will have potential to participate in a variety of supportive services, marketing, training and technical assistance. So for more information on doing business with SCDOT, again, you can visit our website at scdot.org. Or if you have any questions regarding our DDE program or you need some guidance in regards to filling out your application, feel free to reach out to me using the information on the slide there and I'll be more than happy to assist. So that's my time on the thank you guys for listening and I hope to hear from you soon. Rajik, thank you so much for sharing that great information. We appreciate your time and being here today. Before we have our closing comments, we wanna invite Mr. Johnny Birch, the program coordinator for the Office of Small and Minority Business Contracting and Certification to share some final nuggets of wisdom about their certification process. Judy, Johnny was unable to join us but we will provide his contact information to everyone who attended so they can follow up with him and then how to receive that certification. Fantastic. Well, I think we have plenty of information to start making some connections today and start building a wealth of resources and to follow up with our wonderful OBO staff. With that, let me just say it has been a wonderful event. It has been my honor to help moderate today's event. I hope you have a lot of takeaways to follow up on. Be strategic, be intentional in how you use this information and how you share this information with those who are not able to be with us today and know that our city OBO staff is available to assist and serve you in any way necessary. I hope you leave this conference feeling empowered, uplifted and supported knowing that you have resources available to help build your success. With that, I would like to turn it over now to Ayesha Driggers, our deputy director for the OBO to offer any final Q&A and our closing remarks. Ayesha, again, thank you for the invitation to participate today. Thank you so much, Judy. You did a wonderful job as we knew you would. We appreciate your partnership and your eagerness to share this information with our business community. Thank you so much. I also wanted to share our Minority Business Opportunities Directories on the screen right now. That's just the front page of it, but we will send it out to everyone via email this afternoon along with a survey and the recording of the event where we'll have a YouTube link for everyone to view. But in this directory, we have a lot of great information regarding contacts, direct contacts with the Columbia Department. Typically, we hold this event in person and we would have booths set up with a different department, but since we're in a virtual setting this year, we have provided specific contact information and the services that the different departments would need. So you might not think that the service you provided is something the city may purchase, but you may be surprised that there are a lot of different goods and services that all the different departments may need. We've also included some of our community partners on Richland County, the Department of Commerce, Richland School District 1, DOT, Savannah River site. All of their contact information is in here, as well as the certifying agencies that for anyone, I know we had several questions on certification, so that is on here as well. And then our different compliance programs that were mentioned is in this directory as well as information that Jewel and Gary provided regarding eBid. So again, we will provide this to you via email and it's also available on our website. This event was a joint effort with all of our OBO staff in our different departments. We really appreciate everyone coming together to provide this service to you. Also, I think as well noted, there were a lot of connections and network being taken place in the chat, which is wonderful. We love to see that. So we have saved the chat and we will also provide that to everyone. It's so wonderful when we see those connections being made even in this virtual environment. I hope you had a greater understanding of the procurement process and our commitment to our small business community. If there's anything the Office of Business opportunity can provide to you, you can give us a call at 803-545-3950 or email us at OBO at columbiasd.gov. As you see on your screen, I think this is a previous slide, we do wanna make note, if you are following us on social media, we are streamlining all of the social medias at the city of Columbia, so we will deactivate our OBO account on March 1st. And so anyone that wants to stay tuned to anything that's going on at OBO, you can follow our city of Columbia handle on Twitter, Instagram, and Facebook, as well as you can send us a text message to 228, so that you can be added to our mailing list. We send out a weekly newsletter with a lot of great information regarding upcoming events, resources, funding opportunities, as well as information from our different community partners. So one thing I wanna see if Melissa Lingler wanted to offer any final words before we close. Thank you everyone for joining us. This has been a wonderful event. Again, thank you, Judy. Thank you to all of our presenters, our public and private sector presenters. We really appreciate everything that you've done for us today. And to our small business community, we are here for you as Mayor Rickman said, we're open if you have any questions or any ideas that you wanna share, please let us know. Everyone have a great rest of your day and take care of yourself and each other. Bye.