 Hey, Gulfcon Giants family, your host, Eric Coffey here with another episode of the Gulfcon Giants podcast. Today I want to bring you guest, Heleny Moon, CEO of IITOS Technologies. If you are interested in a story about a woman-owned business, technology company, how to get started in the IT sector, the challenges of growing a business, the challenge of starting a new business, hiring employees, this is the episode for you. A lot of people think that the IT sector is saturated and that it's difficult to make ends into that particular marketplace. Well, stay tuned for this particular episode to let you know how IIT and IITOS Technologies is making end roads. Looking forward to your comments or feedback below. Also, by the way, if you have not already noticed, we have updated our free course. If you're not part of the free course, freegovconcourse.com, check it out. We've added 20 new on-demand modules that you can take from everything from top legal issues with a small business to does the government buy what I sell and more. Thank you for watching. I hope you enjoyed this episode. My name is Heleny Moon, and I'm with IITOS Technologies. We are located in Manassas, Virginia. I am the CEO and owner, and we provide data management and IT services to the federal government. Nice, nice. Welcome, welcome today. Thank you for coming on. And I know right before we got started today, you were mentioning that this is your first podcast. Yes. And that you were a little bit out of your comfort zone. So what's interesting is that I find, you've been in business for five years, just under six years, right? Yes, yes, yes. So as a new business owner, because you're still new, relatively new business owner, do you find that you often have to step out of your comfort zone? Yes, yes. But that's part of, you know, growing. You know, I think it's expanding your knowledge and trying new things and trying to be a good leader. Sometimes you have to be able to come out of your comfort zone in order to be a good leader. Okay, okay. Now, let me ask you something. What made you come on a podcast today? Well, again, this is one of the things that I was, I know a lot of my colleagues have done, and I know it's very good to get out and to talk about the company and provide exposure. And, you know, we do a lot of great things and I'm not one to be on a panel or anything like that. Gotcha. But I thought, you know, this would be a good stepping stone, doing possibly doing something like that. Okay, no, and I agree with you. I think that this is a great way for someone like yourself to come on and again, this is a one-to-one conversation, but it's going to be broadcast to a lot of people. So this is a great way where you're not under so much intense pressure. You're in the comfort of your home as I am. And so, you know, today's conversation, again, telling your story, telling people about what you do, your experiences as well, hoping that they can learn from those. Because again, a lot of times, I know for myself as a business owner, when I first got started, I wish I could hear the stories of other entrepreneurs as they embarked on their journey in the federal arena. And so that's what we're hoping today to share through you and your voice. So with that said, I looked at your background and the last three positions were all database managers. Yes, yes. Management, project management, with the last position that I had was with GDIT back in 2015. But I've always been involved in helping with the proposals and transitioning from when the re-competes come around. So I've been involved in that process and onboarding and offboarding and creating the team with new contractors come on board. So I was comfortable with the process. So it was just a natural progression. I really wanted to take a little bit more control of the services that I provided. So that was one of the reasons why I stepped into creating my business. And that was actually the question that I was going to ask. You know, what made that transition happen? Now, you said you were comfortable with it. So you felt, were you, I guess, a different way to ask the question, did you have a desire to have your own business for many years or was that a newly formed desire towards the end of your career? You know, that's a good question. Yes, I've always had a desire to be independent and to build something on my own. Unfortunately, the timing, being a single parent, it just never was, I just never felt secure enough to be able to take that risk. And fortunately, throughout the different projects that I've worked on, I've built relationships and other colleagues had encouraged me. And, you know, I was in a unique position because whereas I was just, if I were just starting off and not having a network, it would have been a lot more challenging. But because I have a network and because I was thinking about it and I had encouragement, I really almost had like the first two contracts immediately because colleagues knew they wanted to support me, they wanted to get my assistance and they challenged me and they provided me opportunities. We would like you to help us manage this. Do you wanna be our employee or do you wanna start your business? You tell us, you know? So I had two opportunities like that. And so for the first couple of years, to me, I was in a position in my life where my kids were older and I was able to take that risk. And, you know, even though to me it wasn't a complete risk, I gave myself that time from when those contracts ended. Okay, let me see what I can do in those, you know, a couple of years and see if I can make this happen. Of course, key scenario can always come back to, I've got a position to come back to. Right, right, absolutely, absolutely. No, that's great. So is that something for a small business starting out? Would you, would that be, you know, because a lot of people ask me, well, Eric, when do I make that decision, that leap to go from employee to entrepreneur? You said that you, you know, what are some of the things that you would say for that person or to that person, excuse me? I would say that you have to do your research and really understand what you're giving yourself into and what you're gonna need. A lot of the stories that I hear of other companies, even things that I've learned on my journey is making sure that you really understand what's important for you to be successful in that area. As I mentioned, I have, I had several, I've been in that arena. So I understood, okay, it's networking and it's also being able to perform and do the job and building a good reputation. And then understanding what's important to the government. How do they get to you? How do you learn about opportunities? And through conversations and I understand that these are certain things that I need to look at. And here are my struggles when I start the business. You know, I'm not gonna start off with past performance, you know, right? But one of the, a lot of the struggles that small business has when they're starting off is, you don't have a lot of past performance. So you can use your professional service experience as that. But I also knew that was gonna be a struggle. So I didn't really focus too much on getting contracts for the first couple of years because I had that foundation of the different contracts. But I was building a good foundation to build upon. Understanding, getting my marketing materials together. What set of signs do I need to get? They're gonna be used. Having set of signs isn't the only thing that you need but it's, you know, depending on what agency that you're going after, you're gonna wanna know how are they procuring the services or products? And you don't wanna be spending a lot of time on going after things that aren't really gonna benefit you but you also want to be able to make yourself attractive to other partners as well and to build that past performance. So, you know, so I learned just certain things what I wanted to do, well, industry certifications were important, you know, quality, figuring out what my path is gonna be and then slowly building upon that every year. Well, it sounds like you gave yourself plenty of time because you didn't say six months or a year. You said my first couple of years. Yes. So it sounds like you set your expectations. Yes, yes. I knew that, I mean, one of the first goals is I knew that I wanted to be in the A-day program. Okay. And one of the requirements with us, you had to have a couple of years contracting experience. So I, you know, pretty much to the deadline, the two year mark, I had my paperwork already, you know, in hindsight, I wish I had waited it a little bit longer but I knew what was expected. I talked to other people what were their challenges when getting through the certification. What do I need to look out for? And I tried to get myself ready so that I didn't have to struggle. And so it happened pretty quickly, you know, 60 to 90 days. You said in hindsight, you wish you waited a little bit longer. Why is that? Yeah, because although I understood the proposal part of it and the execution executing under contract, I didn't really understand how to market to the government. And so I felt like I lost a good six months. Six months? That's not bad. I mean, people use five years on the A-day. They lose five years. I was lucky because my first contract as a sole source was at the literally almost at the end of my first year. Okay. You know, so, but that was after going to numerous outreaches and going to the agencies and talking to them and face to face. And I also, I was in a good position because I was a project manager. So I was in contact with some of the end users and the small business that they became to know who I was when I came to the events. But it showed that, you know, I was being persistent and luckily, you know, one of the contracting officers, eventually they started knowing who I was. And they say, oh, you know, I may have this opportunity that may be a really good fit. So it's being out there because you want to make sure, they want to make sure that you're not just there for, you know, that you're there for a long term. Right, right. No, it makes sense. It makes sense. What is one thing that was hard when you start your business that is still hard today? I think, you know, making sure that you have a good pipeline and looking and forecasting. Like where you were setting your goals, it's the sales process as for services is not a short process. So you need to be able to not only understand where your financials are and what your cash flow is like, but how are you gonna get your next contract and how many things you have in the pipeline that will occur and you can get, that you can close by the time that contracts end. Now, tell us, you said services. I see some of your specialties include software, Oracle Warehouse Builder, you know, different Quest software programs, languages. Can you tell us about the specific services that you offer if I were, or someone wanted to contract you out for a project? Yeah, yeah. So we just finished a contract this past September with a civilian agency where we did a cloud migration. Okay. So we were, we've migrated one of their financial systems into the cloud. And so that required us to, you know, really understand the system and the looking at the design and making sure that the data was coming in correctly and also providing them advice on how the new design, it was unusual for us because you typically do not design your system at the same time as you're migrating. You typically, you know, you design a system and you get that foundation and then the application developers will then start building and then the migration comes after. It was challenging because we were doing it at the same time. So we had a lot of configuration issues that we had to make sure that we were in sync with, you know, the developers. And so it was challenging. We also helped with doing a data analysis. We helped one agency, a federal agency, DOD agency set up their data warehouse. Our strengths is managing data and making sure that, you know, we're getting rid of redundant data. We don't, that the, that systems can easily talk to one another and are designed in a way that you can also run efficient reports and analytics against the data. You said that systems that can talk to each other. How many different types of database systems are there? Well, the agency that we did the data warehouse for we built probably 90% of their applications. They were in design in-house. Okay. So it was an agency that manages contracts. So all of the internal systems had to do with the contract management lifecycle. Right. We're from pre-award to contract closeout and auditing. So all these systems, really the main system revolved around suppliers, contractor information. So schedules, line items, yes. Can you develop a custom solution? Yes. Okay. That sounds really difficult to say the least. It sounds pretty difficult. It sounds like something that, you know, one of those big, large, like you said, a general dynamics IT would do, you know? That's me. Yeah. I mean, it's, I enjoy being a contractor working on various contracts that just not constantly being exposed to new innovative solutions and new techniques is technical techniques that is really wonderful. So I've always enjoyed that part of it. Which, how did you come into that, the IT background? How'd you come into the space? I was self-taught, actually. Well, you're a hacker? Yeah. I was just teasing. Yeah. You don't have to say that. You work for the government now. You know, interestingly enough, my background is in marketing. And I went from one school, ultimately I started off with being pre-med to chemistry. Then I decided, you know, I think I'm gonna stick with computers. But by that time I had made all of those leaps. I really only had two years. So my parents said, well, you're gonna graduate in four years. Okay. So pick whatever you can get in four years. So I looked at what I had and a marketing degree was something that I didn't have to add another year. And so I did that. That brings me to a question that I have that I ask occasionally. How do you feel about formal education versus self-education? Did you say you were self-taught? Yeah. I mean, I don't think it's a requirement as long as you understand. And I think being in the technical field, it's having that formal background isn't always critical. I do think that as far as maybe business concepts or having formal training like having your PMP, you know, yeah, I would definitely want somebody to go in and understand like a methodology, like learning how to do the agile and scrim methodology, but the technical somebody can pick up. And anyone who really is interested can pick up a book. And there's so many tools online and free resources that you can, you know, expand your technical expertise. No, that's true. That's a very good point. That's a good, I like that. On your website, you wrote, management of socioeconomic and industry compliance, for example, ISO 9001 2015. What does that mean? So those certifications are industry certifications. So the ISO 9001 is a certification that basically says that you providing, you have process in place to provide quality services. So that you're doing your, you know, you're doing peer reviews, your processes are documented, customer service that you're following up in, ensuring, you know, that you're meeting all of your deliverables. And then also for 20,000, that's more risk management and project management service oriented policies. I guess I've only heard of that when it came to like part. Does that make sense? Yeah, yeah. So there is, so if you're providing products, you wanna make sure that how are you handling the quality of products that you're providing to your, how are you, I guess that would deal with returns and wanties and I think that's more when you're manufacturing it yourself. Right, right, right. But there's also the ISO 9001, which is for services. Okay, that's something I learned today, interesting. And is now, does the government contract you out to perform this service? Yes. Okay. Our contracts are typically three to five year contracts. And so, you know, unless we have like a large vehicle that it's, I know some of the large IDIQs will last maybe five to 10 years. And then the task orders come out based on the agency's need. Were you familiar with, and I know you said you were familiar with the program side and proposals, but how do you just rattle off the task orders and IDIQs? Were you familiar with all of that as well? No, no, no. Yeah, right? No, I mean, I just heard you rattle it off. And I have to remember that everyone listening to this doesn't always know what these things mean, right? And so we use these accurate, no, that's okay. Again, I do this for a living. So I just, that's why I asked the question, were you as confident in knowing these different vehicles prior to starting? No, no, it wasn't. I didn't know what an IDIQ was. I didn't know what a BPA was. I didn't know what an FFP was. So it's just government speak for, you know, the type of contract that you're going after if it's a blanket purchase agreement, which is BPA, firm fixed price, you know, are you doing the job for one set price or are you billing it as a time and material? But, you know, I think that's that you can, it's good to understand the basics of the government acronyms. Right. Especially when the different agencies may have similar, but similar acronyms, but they mean different things. So also understand which ones mean what in each of the agencies. Right. For example, you know, CO and KO. Yes, yes. That's a very common one that people often ask about. Yeah. How did your company fare last year with COVID and the pandemic? We were fortunate. We had a good year. So we actually had, in terms of profit, we did it better than we did the previous year. And I think that's just because a lot of it was, we didn't spend a whole lot of money in the certifications. I think the previous year, we put more money into the certifications. And, you know, it was helpful to be able to get help from the government, you know, for the PPP loan. Okay. So we took advantage of that to make sure that we could keep our employees on staff. So we were very lucky. Now that brings me to something else. When you first got started, I know you had some contracts in the beginning. What was your first hire? Myself. Okay, what was the next hire? I had an admin to help me with just the administrative because making sure that you, that's a big thing. It's amazingly, the administrative and operating takes a lot of your time. So you don't really want to spend a whole lot working on that. And it's something that is very helpful to get off your plate. And then also having sales people to do sales and marketing and trying to get the leads. But I think for the first couple of years, it was just two to three people. Okay. And again, all this is very helpful to set the expectations for, you know... And I also had to wait too, because keep in mind that, even though I was getting paid for the contract, I really shook a drastic pay cut for my first couple years. It wasn't really till the first contract that I really paid myself a salary because I knew I would have to save not only to make sure that I was investing in the business, but also I knew at one point that I would need to hire good people and that I would have to make sure that I have enough revenue or a cash flow to pay people. So, you know, when you get a contract, you don't automatically get paid. You get paid, you know, maybe after the second month, you know, because they've got to get you in the system and then it takes three days. You've got to submit your invoice and then they've got it, you've got 30 days or 45 days, whatever your terms are. And then so, but in that time, you have to be able to pay everything. So you need to be able to be in a position to do that. Luckily, and because I didn't have a whole lot of credit, I had to make sure that I had some reserves and luckily my first contract, I barely made it. I barely made it for my first couple of paychecks because I wasn't able to get a loan. Nobody would talk to me even when I had the contract. You know, I said, well, I got the contract. You know, I just need it to help fund payroll. But yeah, sometimes you have to make sacrifices. Like, you know, pay my employees, but I will pay myself, so. Were there- Don't do what you gotta do. No, no, I like that. I like that. And I like that you said that you tried to get a loan with the contract and it didn't work out. Not that I'm happy, but I just, there's a lot of people that say things like that. If you get a contract, you take it to the bank and you can cash it in and it'll give you money against it. Yeah, no, I had not had good luck. Now it's funny because I'm in, I don't need a loan, but, you know, now they wanna, now they're coming to me and say, are you sure you don't need this? What if we can get this line of credit to buy your products? Cause they know we've extended our revenue stream to products now. Okay, okay. They're trying to talk me into loaning me some money on that. I find that that is the strangest thing that these organizations, they do not wanna give you money when you need it. And then when you don't need it, they push money on you. Yeah. I mean, I thought I had a really good, I mean, I had a big financial plan and I was showing them that I was settling, you know, increasing my revenue every year. And then, you know. Maybe they're waiting for the winners. That's the only thing I could think of because that resonates with so many of my guests, very similar stories. Yeah. Yeah, very similar stories. No, that's great. Tell me about a time, or did you have a time where you wanted to quit? At least once a month. I played more than that. Okay, just pick one. Pick one you could share. Yeah, I mean, if it was easy, I think everybody would do it. You know, I have a good group of people around me that I can call to get advice from. And when I have a bad day, you know, I'll call them and they'll call me now, you know, walk through it with me and advice versa. So, you know, it's been, I think of, you know, ultimately why am I doing this? You know, and yeah, I could go back and work for myself. I mean, work for a company, but that's the whole reason why I started this. I wanted to be in control of my hours. I wanted to get more control on the products and services that we, not all contractors are the same. Some people just think of it as providing bodies on the contracts. For me, it's more about doing a good job. I really enjoy working with the government and really helping them and seeing, you know, my efforts help them in either reducing their costs or making things more efficient with, you know, making their life easier. Right, right. No, that's a very noble goal to go after. So no stories, anything recent you could think of that you said made you want to call your friends. You said once and much you want to quit. Yeah. So, you know, it's... Maybe not being paid on time. You know, the people, the relationships that you build even people who say they want to help you and they just, you know, because you're small, they really don't have your best interests at heart. And so trying to be, to me, I'm very, I'm very upfront. I'm very open, I'm very open with everyone. You know, even if it's something bad that I need to tell you, I will... My thinking is, you know, we can work through our problems but if you don't tell me what your problems are, then I can't help you fix it. Right. And so I never want to, you know, it's just very, I don't know, it's just very upfront sometimes. So I want to be, like I said, ethical and I want to do it the right way. And I found that a lot of the challenges are just even when you think that you're doing all the right things and you still, you know, your colleagues doesn't do half of the things that you do and they get, you know, the contract. Right, right. Because either their connections or... Right, whatever reason. Yeah. So that's one of those disheartening things. Yes, yes. So you just have to brush it off and know that you're moving forward and, you know, be persistent. No, no, no. And I think, I mean, it does take a while because I think doing it that way, it may take a little bit longer to get into some of the agencies. But by the time that you do, I think that your reputation and your relationships are a lot better and they have a better foundation than just going in and just saying, oh, I have to set aside. It doesn't work that way. You know, just because you have your set aside doesn't mean that you're gonna get a contract. Right. Or it doesn't mean you're gonna get the job done. Yes. More importantly, right? More importantly, I noticed that you did the 10,000 Goldman Sachs program. Yes. What other trainings have you taken along the way? Any last that's helped you in your journey? I try to take this much. I mean, I still, even though I've been in this industry and I know quite a bit, I'm always learning. So I'm always taking advantage of what the small business provides me with retraining, whether it's, how to better market your business, how to use certain tools or how to make a go and no go decision on a bid. Okay. Because all of these things are really critical because one of the things that I learned is when you first start off, you feel like you wanna go after everything. But then you take a step back and then you say, am I really spending my time in the most efficient way? And am I getting the best return in doing this? So you have to really start understanding which opportunities you really go to and then you really do wanna have opportunities that you're tracking for a while or that you know are coming up rather than waiting till the end. Oh, that's a great, that's a very good example. I'm looking here on your website and you wrote an article, and again, it's a few years old, but it was related to a ransomware attack. Okay. And do you remember the article? Yes, I vaguely. Faguely. It's like three years ago, wait, yeah. Yeah, vaguely. Well, you know, the reason why I asked is because recently they had solar winds. Yeah. And so I just wanted to see how did that attack that you wrote back in 2017 compares to the solar winds attack and are there solutions that you guys are working on that can help those types avoid those or eliminate those or protect their systems? Things like that. So we have part tools that we use are Komodo. So we manage all of our end-to-end devices. We have an end-to-end manager. And so we submit all of our patches and ours isn't automatically. We really try to, you know, I know with the solar winds, I think that believe that was a patch that was released automatically. We try to stop doing that. And so we try to go in and or small companies. So there's not really a whole lot that we need to, that we have in place. Like we don't have a large office. We have a few employees, but we do educate our employees on making sure that they have security awareness and every year. And then also detecting, you know, fishing scams and we try to secure our network by implementing all of these. You know, having multi-factor authentication. More recently, in order to do work for the DOD, you have to have a CMMC certification, which right now there is no, there are no auditors, official auditors to do it. But, you know, we've done a gap analysis and we're trying to, we're actually in our, just started the process of trying to see what we need to do in order to make sure as a small business that we're ready. So if there is a requirement that we can meet it. And so I think there's four levels and I believe that we, we will probably be able to make a level three of that, which is, to me, I think is a good place to be as a small business. So I think we're ahead of that. Very happy to say that. Okay, no, no. No, yeah, I know it's quickly approaching us all. And I think, I don't know if it was, when I was looking through your profile today that I mentioned that in GSA, the writing CMMC and some of the contracting language. Yeah, we just submitted GSA stars. Okay. That had a requirement to show them how you plan to, to get to CMC and the timeline. So that was the first one, first vehicle that, that we submitted for, that required that. Okay, that's stars three. Mm-hmm, yep. Is it stars, stars four? Stars four. Is it, they're on four? Yeah, I thought, I thought three was, I thought GSA stars was three is the current one. I could, you could be right, I could be wrong. Okay, that's fair. Three, four, you submitted for the one that's, well, let me tell you, they delayed it so long that they extended the current stars and then it ran into the new one. So, yeah. I'm just hoping that I'll be able to, to get that vehicle that'll help me a tremendous amount. You know, and not only will extend our A&A status to go after opportunities, but it'll be our first vehicle that we're the prime mom that others, other our team members can leverage as well. Right, right. Absolutely, no. That's great. The, you said you did different types of trainings by the SBA. What about any books that you recommend or aspiring small businesses? Anything to think of that you've read recently or in the past that you frequently suggest? The tape marketing. Oh, I remember the tape marketing. I remember that book, the tape marketing. Okay. And this is probably my second pass at reading through it. It's got some really good advice on just understanding your customer and how to better define who you're selling to and promoting your company through social media and which I, probably that's my weak area and I need to do a little bit more on that. Well, I think this is a great first start. Yes, yeah. I'm on LinkedIn. Yes, I friend requested you today earlier. Yeah. But as far as, you know, you know, creating a blog, actually I was just talking to a colleague of mine and maybe we were thinking of possibly doing a YouTube channel. That'd be great. Yeah, so we'll see. Let me know when you want to do the YouTube channel. I have a little bit of experience in that. I have a little bit of experience in YouTube. So no, that's great. Let's what type of agencies would you like working with now? So again, if the people from the government are listening to this and they're saying, wow, I really like her, she sounds great. I like the concept. Who is it that you want to talk to out there for your company? Who would you like to speak with? In the government? Yeah, what agencies would you like to work with that you're not currently working with? Well, we're looking at getting more involved with Veterans Affairs, HHS, and State Department, where they're made in an Air Force. And we, you know, we're looking to do more work with. Right now we are working with the Marines, but we'd like to extend our work there. But right now, I think the main ones are HHS and Veterans Affairs. Is there a need right now that the HHS has that you think you could help fulfill? Yes. So record digitization and records managements as far as the, as far as innovative products, what we're trying to provide is more surveillance systems. And so right now, as part of our innovation, we'd like to get more involved with surveillance systems and with drones. And so we want to be able to work with the different agencies through some of our partners that we have to offer that, you know, especially with the shootings. And I think it's, you know, I think it's the products that we have can be very useful in identifying, you know, where shots are being heard or fast leaks. So I think those would be really great to get involved with this year. If HHS is listening to this, where should they reach out? www.idos.teak.com. OK. Is there a general email they should send it to? Yes, info at theidos.teak.com. OK. All right. You'd be surprised who's listening out there. All right. I mean, remember, you know, and starting your organization and I'm sure you've had this experience, right? So you worked really hard to reach out to the government agencies, correct, in the beginning? Yes. Were they happy now that you're working with them? Yes. Yes. OK. We actually just got our really great CPARS operating from the cloud migration services that we did. So I was very happy because this agency does not like to get out more than satisfactory. So it's very big to get exceptional. So very proud of the team in getting that exceptional rating. That's an accomplishment. And you should celebrate that. I was on, I had Emily Harmon, who used to be the director of Navy Small Business. And she said that, as small businesses, we don't celebrate our wins enough. And we don't tell people enough about our wins. And sometimes at some agencies, they're not necessarily small business friendly because the only stories that they hear are the negative ones. Yeah, that's true, actually, because you really need, and not so much selling when you go to the government to say, this is X, Y, and Z, but really telling them the story to make yourself stand out with one of the contracts that we did. When we first, when everyone started teleworking with COVID going on, there was a mad dash to get everybody set up to telework. So we had to transition the entire agency so everyone was 100% telework. So we had our VDI person imaging all the laptops and in a very short time frame to get everything ready. And everyone up and running. So I think that's a good story. We can tell them we were able to get 4,000 users up and running within four weeks or three weeks. So it's things like that to really tell them a story that they can understand and they can relate to. Yeah, no, absolutely. No, thank you for sharing that. I think that's a great story to share and to highlight of your company and of your success. So that's great. And that's what we need to do more often. And then that will convince some of the leaders out there that, hey, this small business was able to do that. Do you think that you could have done that at your, any of your former companies? No, no. You know, when I started off my first job with, as a consultant, I was very shy, very introverted. Being the only woman in that team also was very intimidating. This was in my mid-20s and having to prove myself and I had some very good experience with people that were on the staff like I would just build in the relationships. Just helping them. And my nature's always been to want to help somebody, you know, even if it's a colleague of mine and they're struggling with some idle mind, helping them with something that they're struggling with. We can put our heads together and think of the solution. You know, it's not a matter of getting creditors. As long as they're successful, I'm successful. But understanding to really kind of make your own path because I think at the beginning I was very self-conscious or voicing my opinion. And I think, but I think after time, I was able to build people's confidence in my ability and I was given more leadership opportunities. Okay, okay. No, that, and those leadership opportunities is, will let you to your next company and the next company and then eventually founding your own organization. Yeah. I mean, I wouldn't, thinking back then, I would have never been able to go to an outsourcing or an outreach event. Wow. You know, I just would have been too scared or what do I say? And now I'm able to, now I'm coaching people. You can do it. Come on, this is what you say. You know, it's trying to build up their confidence as you know, after you've done it and with everything. If you, with practice, you get a little bit better at it. Right. Let me ask you something different question. What's a recent Amazon purchase that you've made that's made you happy or smile? It does not have to be related to the government. It has nothing to a government. Okay, my, this literally just came in this morning. Okay. But my, what do you call it? My light. I have my own setup with my microphone and I have the lighting. Ah, okay, okay. Oh, it's like a ring light? Like a ring light? Yeah, it's not a ring light, it's square. Okay. But you can touch a setting. So, because I knew I was going to be on this podcast. So, I... Oh, so you've got a light. So that's, so your lighting, that's what makes your lighting so great. Yeah. Oh, that's awesome. That's a good one. And I ordered it last night at like one o'clock in the morning. And it arrived. I took the chance. I said, it'll arrive between nine and three. I said, well, hopefully it'll arrive before and it literally arrived 30 minutes before. When you jumped on. Yeah. That's a good story. I like that one. That's a good one. That's a good one. I like that, I like that story. Are you, in terms of daily habits, are you a night person or you're a morning person? I'm a night person. Okay. And I just probably, I like the night just because it's very quiet. I can get my thoughts together. I mean, working at home, it's not have more privacy, but just when we were going back and forth to work, I really enjoyed having the night to myself. Just relaxing. So I'm a night owl. That's all right. Any odd place that you worked at or odd job that someone might never guess? An odd job? Yes. One of your odd jobs. Oh yeah, yeah. I used to be at bartender. Did you really? Yeah, I used to be, I used to bartend and there was at one point in time, I was working two jobs, one for pizza hut and one for Little Caesars in different days during the week. And then during the day, I would be, I was a manager and then on one of my night gigs or weekend gigs was to be, I was all workaholic. So I was bartender. I was bartender. See, I have four jobs. Wow, so you're a manager. You worked at Little Pizza Hut, Little Caesars and then you're bartender weekends. Yeah. That's it. I like to keep busy. Yeah, there you go. Yeah, this is before kids and anything like that. Right, right, absolutely. So did you start working young? Yeah, my first job was at Hecinger. I don't know if you remember, it was a hardware store. It's sort of like Home Depot and they went out of business but it was over in Maryland. So I was a cashier, 15, 15. Okay, so you start working at 15? Yeah. Okay, all right. No, no. My first job and I've been working never since even though even if it was during the summers, I would intern on the hill on the house side and for a few years when I came home from college and I used to be a stock worker. Really? How did that go? That wasn't for me. I've had very interesting jobs. I always came back to computers. It was one of those, do you remember what's it called, the boiler room? Yes, yes, I'm a boiler room, that I know. Do you remember Shradd Note Mock? It was based off, that movie was based off of that company and that was a company that I got my license through. And they were teaching me how to do call calling and this is before I knew very much. I didn't know what was going on. And then, yeah, it was very interesting. I didn't get involved in the sales. I stayed there long enough really to get my security license and then I was out of there. And that was very, that was challenging because obviously for reasons related to what was going on with the SEC, a lot of people were blacklisted. So I was very fortunate to get a position with like Mason, a very reputable brokerage firm, but it just turned out that that wasn't my calling. Oh, that's fair. No, that's fair. Hey, that's why I ask these questions because it lets you know a little bit more and learn about the person that rather than your story is one-dimensional, right? No one's story is one-dimensional. There's all these different facets that makes up the character of the person who we see in front of us. And I like to learn about that. That's, you know, I've had odd jobs as well. So that's wonderful. Okay, one other rapid-fire question. If you were not doing this, what do you think you'd be doing? I'm not sure what I would be doing. You know, I had an event, life-changing event when I was in high school. Okay. I was hit by a car when I was 18, 17, and I lost my leg. And so I have a prosthetic leg. And so before that, I was very athletic. And my husband jokes around like he's, because he keeps saying, I don't know how you could have been that athletic person that you were because I am such a plus. So he's always making fun of me. But I think I would have done something with sports. I would have, you know, done something with, I really enjoy tennis. I competed in tennis. If I could, I would have done something, something that was physical. If it wasn't tennis, I, you know, my thought I would have loved to have gone into the military. And I just never got that opportunity because I, you know, considered damaged goods, I guess. No, no, no. Oh, wow. No, but you could maybe a trainer or coach something like that, supporting athletes. Yeah. Sure, sure. A lot of people, if you don't make it professionally, they become coaches and trainers. I have some people that I know that are golf pros that, you know, they train rich people how to play golf because they were the top collegiate athlete coming, you know, but they didn't quite make it to the pros, but now they just train. But I always enjoyed, even with, in college, I was very, very physical person. I mean, obviously my metabolism was not, it's what it used to be back then. And that is active, but, you know, I think that's why the military would have been a really good fit for me. I think with the combination of, with the services that, you know, the education that they would have provided, but also being able to go through the boot camp. And I think I would have really enjoyed that. Well, it sounds like to me, though, through the sports and physical activities that you were competitive. Yes, I was. So that carries over into business. Yeah, yeah. So that's a trait that carries over in the world of business. It's just like sports, competitive in nature. Yes. In fact, one of my podcast guests said that he trains his salespeople, his BD people off of the Michael Jordan story because Michael Jordan, yeah. He, in the Netflix special on Michael Jordan, he talks about, similar to what Kobe Bryant does, is they change into another character, right? To, before he gets into a game. And so he trains his salespeople, his BD people, to model that. And so they've become a character, become a different person when they're out making calls and trying to talk to agencies and set up meetings. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, I can see myself. I mean, my dad and some of my, when I was a manager, I had a lot. I'm not sure as I get older, I might have less patience, but people tell me I'm really patient when I'm trying to teach people. So maybe I'm maybe a teacher or coach. Yeah, that's perfect. I really do. I mean, I love working with other small companies because I love giving and sharing my knowledge because I hate people, I hate it when I see people struggle and unnecessarily. So I, you know, my nature is to, hey, you know, you can do it like this. Don't do it that way. It'd be so much easier this way. Don't do what I did. What types of companies do you like to work with or help? Are the ones in your field, IT? Yeah, you know, I have built through the different, I did scaling for growth, which is a program over in Richmond to help small businesses. And so through the different networks, I've met people, even orientation when I went to the 8A orientation, other people who are in the same business or either selling products. Now that I've been doing products, I have one of my dear friends who, I call her for advice and she's trying to get into services. And so she's really great at products. And so we give each other advice. And when she had questions about pricing or contracts, is this the way that this is supposed to be? I'll tell her, no, you know, this isn't the way it's supposed to be. This is what you should ask for, you know? And so we watch out for each other. That's great. Entrepreneurship can be lonely at times, especially being the CEO, not being able to talk to your employees about some of your challenges and issues. Then also not even being able to talk to your spouse sometimes because they don't know understand the business or what you're dealing with. Yes. So we need that network. Yeah, I do wish that I had, it is a struggle sometimes because I'm the only owner. I wish that I had some partner that I could talk things through. So it really, you know, I really do enjoy that camaraderie with the other small businesses. Yeah, no. I always recommend, I was part of a group called Entrepreneurs Organization, EO, that I recommend people look into. It's great camaraderie of entrepreneurs, business folks, that built their own businesses from scratch, not someone who inherited a business, to go over a business, someone actually built it from start and there's certain benchmarks that you have, but I know that you meet, you know, those minimum thresholds to be eligible. Yeah, I mean, one of the things that I learned with the scaling for growth, they put us in groups of four or five and it was our CEO group. And, you know, I still keep in touch with, you know, the partners in my group from really nice friendships. And the one thing that I've learned is, even though that we were in different industries or companies were maybe selling different products or services, our struggles were very similar. How do we retain, you know, good employees? How do you manage onboarding, off-boarding? How do you deal with cash flow? How do you read your financial law? All those common things that brings us together. Yeah, no, I agree, I agree. Well, it looks like we've approached our time. I wanna let you leave some parting words for folks out there, tell us how to read you. And if you don't mind sharing a closing statement. If you're looking to get into this, be patient, do your research and don't get disheartened, you know, because it is gonna be gonna take some time, but, you know, if you do your proper research and you build the right networks and you are good at what you do, that I think, you know, you will be a success. And happy to, you know, share and answer questions. You can reach me at H-E-L-L-E-N-I dot moon at E-I-D-O-S-I-F-N tech dot com. And then also my number 703-819-3860. And you're on LinkedIn. Yes. Are you active? Yes, I am. Okay, okay. All right, good stuff. Now, listen, I wanna thank you today, Alani, for coming on and sharing about your company, sharing about your organization, getting out your comfort zone, right? Telling us a little about yourself. I think that hearing the four job story humanizes you. Because a lot of this technical stuff, it could go over our heads. So I think we all know, you know, pizza hut, little Caesars, we all know those types of jobs. So that, you know, brings us all back. I think many of us, you know, working in our teenage years, our formidable years in our 20s, no one could have predicted where we'd be at 10 years or 15 years later, so. Yeah, yeah. That's pretty, I think that's pretty neat. So I wanna thank you for coming on today and sharing your story. Thank you so much.