For immediate release - May 20, 2005
(DALLAS) - Working with minority contractors, promoting the Dallas County Community Colleges diversity business program and keeping business flowing are a matter-of-course for Paula Spivey when she comes to work each day at the DCCC District Service Center in Mesquite. Spivey, coordinator of DCCC’s diversity business program, likes the challenge and enjoys interacting with business owners and community leaders as part of her regular routine.
Those efforts - which have almost doubled DCCC’s use of minority suppliers for the system from $4.7 million to $9.2 million in contracts over the past four years - have earned Spivey the admiration of her colleagues in both business and education. They also brought her recognition this month from the U.S. Small Business Administration as the region’s Minority Small Business Champion of the Year.
Bill Weddle, director of risk management for the Small Business Development Center at the Bill J. Priest Institute for Economic Development (part of DCCC), nominated Spivey for the award because “… [s]he goes well beyond her job description to ensure that everyone has an equal opportunity to compete for business with Dallas County Community Colleges. Paula always looks for potential contractors in areas that are unserved or underserved by minority contractors. And her care and concern spill beyond that point - she also introduces minority contractors to diversity business people at other companies and assists them with finding additional opportunities.”
Spivey is responsible for the effective management and administration of the supplier diversity program for DCCC, one of the largest institutions of higher education in Texas. In addition to her work with minority contractors, Spivey’s other duties include serving as a liaison with external business assistance organizations, ethnic chambers of commerce and minority/women business councils; developing departmental policies and procedures in keeping with governing law; managing a budget; designing collateral materials; and preparing and presenting internal and external training programs.
The award recipient has spent the past 10 years as a project manager for DCCC with increasing levels of responsibility in the areas of supplier diversity, procurement and facilities management. Spivey has almost doubled the use of minority suppliers for the system by designing and implementing M/WBE training programs, new advertising strategies and a diversity business program Web site.
Spivey’s training programs have enabled M/WBEs to better understand both the process and procedures for submitting more effective bids, and the new advertising strategies and Web site have provided more information that the multi-ethnic business community in Dallas County could use. “Now more minority- and women-owned businesses in our area are bidding on DCCCD projects,” added Weddle.
Spivey, who holds a master’s degree in business administration from Texas Woman’s University and a bachelor’s degree in advertising from the University of Texas at Arlington, previously served DCCC as project coordinator for the facilities department. She also has announced her plans to join Parkland’s diversity office this summer.
A member of the Dallas Alliance for Business Development, Spivey serves on the Super Fair Tradeshow planning committee, its construction subcommittee and the vendor outreach subcommittee. She also is a member of the Dallas/Fort Worth Minority Business Development Council and serves on its certification committee, E-Awards committee and Access Tradeshow steering committee. She is an advocate for M/WBEs in Austin as a public policy participant, and she volunteers her time for the Hispanic Contractors Association, the Black Contractors Association and CAAPCO - a coalition of professional and community organizations. Spivey also volunteers as a job coach for Jacob’s Ladder, a program which helps people who currently are on public assistance programs to enter or re-enter the work force.
The Dallas native is serving her fourth year as secretary of the board of directors for the North Central Texas Regional Certification Agency and as chair of the NCTRCA membership ad hoc and nominations committees.
Spivey previously received the Women Who Mean Business Award in 2003 and the Best of the Decade - Supplier Diversity - Mcompany Award, also in 2003. She was nominated for Corporate Advocate of the Year and Corporate Volunteer of the Year awards in 2004 by the Black Contractors Association.
Press contact: Ann Hatch, 214-860-2478