Rebuilding Your Business

Some small businesses depend on contracts to stay in business. When it comes to keeping the business afloat, the quality of a contract is more important than the number of contracts help. Unfortunately, Laura Glynn has recently learned what can happen if you depend solely on too few customers, reports The Washington Post.

Glynn, president and chief executive of Bethesda-based Glynn Technologies, said her company earned $5.65 million for more than two years’ work managing Web sites for the agency. Now, her once 20-person firm is down to just four employees and she is trying to find commercial work as she struggles to rebuild the company.

Her predicament demonstrates the struggle faced by many smaller government contractors, some of which rely on just one or two contracts. As the budget shrinks, industry advocates say, these companies become even more vulnerable.

Even though Glynn’s company received high marks in a late-2009 performance review, HHS informed Glynn in the summer of 2010 that it would not be exercising the additional option years and would instead recompete the contract.

In a statement, the department said the decision to end the contract “was based entirely on the Department’s increased needs, which were not included in the contract and could not be awarded to Glynn Technologies on a non-competitive basis.”

Glynn said she is now trying to pick up the pieces, building a social media site with some paid content. Additionally, Glynn Technologies has some work with commercial financial institutions and is teaming with other companies in pursuit of government contracts.

“My goal is to survive,” said Glynn. “But I have to definitely rebuild, and I am pretty much starting from scratch.”

Photo by Jewish Women’s Archive

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