FORT BELVOIR, Va. –
A Defense Logistics Agency leader was unanimously selected as vice chairman for the Federal Office of Small and Disadvantaged Business Utilization Directors Interagency Council.
Dwight Deneal, DLA’s director of small business programs, will serve in the role through fiscal 2024. The group, which includes small business advocates from the Defense Department and federal agencies such as the Department of State, meets monthly to share best practices and discuss issues affecting America’s small businesses.
“DOD is very focused on supporting warfighters, but we all share the same pool of vendors,” Deneal said, adding that the U.S. president has an ambitious agenda to drive small business contracting forward. “We are all facing the same concerns of meeting that initiative.”
As vice chairman, Deneal plans to renew council members’ understanding that they must work together to drive the industrial base forward.
“If you think about where we are now in today’s time with a decline in our industrial base, it’s even more critical that we have strong small business leaders who understand acquisition policies and procedures and who support the growth of our industrial base by partnering together,” he said.
Deneal said collaboration can lead to opportunities that advance whole-of-government missions and support vendors. A shared outreach initiative with the Department of Veterans Affairs and Health and Human Services, for example, could help strengthen alliances between medical vendors and federal supply chain experts, he added. Another possibility: targeted outreach by DOD elements that all support aging weapons systems.
DLA’s inclusion of surge clauses in contracts that involve supplies and services typically needed during disaster relief and humanitarian assistance is one example of the agency’s contracting success that Deneal highlights for fellow small business leaders.
“These clauses help our vendor base understand they’re not just signing up for a step-and-repeat type of support. If there’s a crisis or war, we need them to scale the volume to match emerging needs,” he said. “I try to help others in this community understand what that looks like and how we get our small vendor base to sign up for that.”
Deneal also learns about contracting strategies from other agencies that could potentially support DLA’s mission as well as upcoming changes in small business policy. Annual National Defense Authorization Act bills typically include updates on government spending goals in the small business sector.
“Being ahead of the curve on potential policy changes helps me keep DLA leadership and DLA acquisition executives informed of things that might impact us,” Deneal added. “From my perspective, that’s one of the many benefits my participation offers to DLA.”
Deneal has been involved with the council since he became a small business advocate in 2014. He is in line to become chairman in fiscal 2025.