By Michael F. Carmichael
March 17, 2011
Every small business has to start somewhere. For Manisha Dotson, CEO of Milwaukee-based Nisha Industries, a building maintenance and security firm with 40-plus employees, it was cleaning bathrooms.
She had worked for Wisconsin Gas for 30 years. “I knew that by starting out so young I would be able to do ‘30-and-out’ and be too young for Social Security. But I still wanted to work, to keep paying into Social Security. So, I started a janitorial business with my children who were 9, 10 and 13 at the time. We started picking up trash, vacuuming, mopping floors and cleaning rest rooms.”
Her break came when she acquired a large multi-year contract with a Wisconsin company to clean 10 construction trailers. Initially her company was a franchisee but after landing her big contract Dotson went off on her own. She became certified as a minority-owned enterprise, a woman-owned enterprise and finally entered, and was approved for, the U.S. Small Business Administration 8(a) Business Development Program.
Designed to help small, disadvantaged businesses compete in the market place, the 8(a) Program offers a broad scope of assistance to firms that are owned and controlled at least 51 percent by socially and economically disadvantaged individuals. According to the SBA, the program allows entrepreneurs who are otherwise considered disadvantaged to gain access to the economic mainstream of American society. One aspect of the program in particular helps thousands of aspiring entrepreneurs gain a foothold in government contracting.
Participants in the 8(a) Program can receive sole-source contracts, up to a ceiling of $4 million for goods and services and $6.5 million for manufacturing. While Dotson hasn’t taken advantage of this particular aspect of the program, 8(a) firms are also able to form joint ventures and teams to bid on contracts. This enhances their ability to perform larger prime contracts.
Getting 8(a) certification is a thorough and lengthy process, explains Dotson, but well worth it. “You have to provide financials, you have to show past tax records. They ask past and present customers for performance evaluations so that they know what level of service you provided them.”
Interviewed during an appearance at a local job fair, Dotson said it was going “extremely well. “We not only train our own employees but we provide training and services for other agencies,” Dotson says. “We provide drug screening and background checks for them. Our training programs are located in some Wisconsin Workforce Investment Board offices. Most agencies don’t have time to train, so that’s an integral part of our mission.”