Diverse groups creating business diversity

Mercer Business, Feb 01, 2005 by Grobman, Marc

The following phrasing may sound corny but the assertion it makes is true: Diverse organizations are utilizing diverse strategies to increase diversity in New Jersey business.

They believe diversity is good for business. After all, says Sherine El-Abd, a member of the New Jersey Commission on Civil Rights, and past executive director and current consultant for the Egyptian American Business Association, when businesses "develop a financial portfolio and diversify, they are richer and more secure. it's the same with employees. If you diversify you are... much richer."

The pro-diversity organizations contacted for this article employ various complementary methods to increase diversity in business: self-help, advocacy, technical assistance, and preparing for the future.

At the Statewide Hispanic Chamber of Commerce of New Jersey (SHCC), selfhelp in part takes the form of providing technical assistance through workshops on how to start a business, obtaining financing, using new technology, accounting processes, filing government reports, franchising, and conducting international trade, says president and chief executive officer Daniel Jara, (pronounced, HA-ra).

Similarly, the New Jersey Chinese American Chamber of Commerce (NJCACC) holds conferences and workshops, says chair John Yeung, on how to become certified as a minority owned business for state and federal government contracts, how to export goods to China, and intellectual property rights.

Yeung is also chair and CEO of Youngtec, a software development and services firm in Edison. He says the NJCACC, which he helped found in 2003, seeks to develop networks among members, major corporations and government, and to develop strong bonds between China and the U.S.

Greg Williams, vice chair of the New York-New Jersey Minority Supplier Development Council and its Minority Business Input Committee, says the group is organizing its 1200 minorityowned business members into a network of minority service businesses that can give its more than 400 corporate members "one-stop shopping" for information technology, janitorial, sales and marketing" support.

Williams is a former Mercer Country resident who served as chairman of the New Jersey Development Authority, which provides technical and financial assistance to small business owners and new businesses that are unable to get financing from traditional sources. He now lives in Ridgewood, where he runs G.W. Enterprises, a firm that trains people in public speaking, negotiating, marketing, and how to get publicity. He also speaks to corporations on diversity.

In 1999, Williams ran for Mercer County freeholder, and says he told minority organizations, "We cannot sit by and wait. We have to reach out to sustain our organizations and create our own opportunities." Minorities are "segmenting into their own little groups," such as Asian, Latino, and black chambers, says Williams, so they can focus on their needs.

But sometimes minorities are blocked from opportunities, and that's another reason they form their own chambers - to advocate for themselves.

African-American owned businesses have only a 35 percent survival rate, compared to 49 percent of white-owned businesses, says John Harmon, president and chief executive officer of the Metropolitan Trenton African American Chamber of Commerce (MTAAC, pronounced em-TACK), citing Small Business Administration statistics. "It takes an African American chamber to advocate for... a level playing field," he says, and "for access to resources to ensure black businesses [are] effective in the pursuit of success, to assimilate and grow."

The SHCC also acts as an advocate to have our businesses be part of procurement efforts to get contracts with state, county and local governments" says the SHCC's Daniel Jara. He said procurement from government is a "major hurdle." We need more diversity in the procurement process, he says, but the participation of Hispanic businesses in New Jersey contracts "is close to minimal, not reflecting the population or the contribution that Hispanics have made to the state financially."

New Jersey used to have a set-aside program for minority and women-owned businesses, says Karen Wolfe, spokesperson for the New Jersey Commerce, Economic Growth & Tourism Commission. The program once set aside seven percent of state contracting dollars for minority-owned businesses, three percent for womenowned businesses, and 15 percent for small businesses, she says, but changed in 2003 to comply with a legal ruling. Instead, women and minority-owned businesses may now register as small businesses, to be eligible to compete for a 25 percent setaside for small businesses.

The Commerce Commission's Office of Business Services also helps support minority businesses with technical assistance, such as developing marketing and business plans, getting information on procurement opportunities, and becoming certified as minority-owned businesses for the inclusion in the New Jersey Selective Assistance Vendor Information (NJSAVI) Web-accessible database, which now lists 6500 approved women and minority owned businesses. "SAVI is a benefit because it provides marketing exposure to corporate buyers," says Wolfe.