The show’s guest in this episode is Kizzy Parks. She’s a GUINNESS WORLD RECORD title holder and she’s a serial entrepreneur.

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Learning How to Find, Bid, and Win Profitable Contracts with Kizzy Parks

Hey, everybody. It’s great to be here with you live on the experimental leader Podcast. I’m super excited to be here today. And I’ve been thinking about bottlenecks. I love thinking about bottlenecks. I think they’re super interesting. And I wanted to tell you a story about my son. So my son’s a competitive swimmer, his name’s Emerson. And he, we’ve ended up in New Mexico, and he’s training here. And he wanted to, he was feeling nervous, because he was afraid he couldn’t get a tough enough workout. Because he sort of tried on a whole bunch of ideas like was it the coaches, was it the team was it like, so he’s trying to figure it all out? And we started talking about it, we realized that the bottleneck was actually the number of lanes because they’re a small team, they just had two lanes. And they couldn’t set the pace time, fast enough so that he could get a workout without him lapping the kids that were behind them. And so it was actually constraining his entire ability to succeed. And so we were able to talk to the coach, the coach was super responsive. They’ve added a lane a couple of days a week for those really specific workouts that are big long workouts where he would lap, the other kids. And there’s another couple of kids who are as fast as he is on the team. And so they’re really excited about this ability to train hard. And it has me thinking about where in our lives we as leaders ran up against bottlenecks, where can we actually not succeed, because of some bottleneck that’s constraining the flow in our organizations in our teams in a way that keeps us from being able to do what we need to do to iterate in the way that we need to iterate to improve to be the best that we can be. So that’s my challenge to you for this week, is look around and see where your bottlenecks and see where you can make one shift that changes everything to help you remove a bottleneck, so that the flow across your organization is better.

And today, I’m really excited about our guest. Our guest is Kizzy Parks and she’s a Guinness World Record title holder and she’s a serial entrepreneur. And I’m looking forward to talking to her about government contracts and all the things that she knows. So I am super excited to talk to Kizzy Parks.

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Welcome to the show.

Thank you so much for the introduction, Melanie. And it’s a pleasure to be here.

Well, first of all, I think I’m fascinated and I’m sure everybody else’s tell us what kind of Guinness World Records you hold?

Yes, it is for number of skips of a rope in 60 seconds while wearing flip flops. Like the really cheap flip flops that you purchased at the convenience store last minute because you forgot him before he went to the beach. And the number that I achieved was 182.

Wow. So that’s like more than 3 per second. Yes. Wow. And like, and I’m just like, so I’m always fascinated by structure. So like, is the kind of flip flops actually defined in the record?

Yes, they asked for photos of the flip flops videos of the flip flops of link to where you can commercially purchase them. And they literally had to be like the flat flip flops with a toe thong that you wear and you’re scared it’s gonna break after wearing it on a long, long weekend.

Super interesting. And when did you achieve this record?

Almost a year ago.

So not very long ago.

Oh, not at all.

Wow. And what how do you want to do this? Like, why was this important to you?

I love David Goggins. And he has amazing book and just content out there and I thought, wow, you know, this navy seal this amazing athlete, amazing human being worked and actually set a Guinness record. I thought, Well, man, I want to be able to do something like that. And he’s an ultra runner too. So I’ve always loved jump rope, love, love jump rope. And I thought this is a great way to celebrate a foot surgery I had and just to show that I’ve kind of overcome all of that. So I got the idea from David Goggins, and because of a foot surgery, and then viola, I set the record

And so do you train for something like that? Or do you just like, try and do it every day till you make it? Or what? How do you do? How do you do that?

I trained with my trainer, Derek, who I work with, basically daily. We were very serious about it because it’s very important to be focused. So we trained every time that we worked out, we would train first thing, the I worked on my technique, because of always jump rope. But when you jump rope in flip flops, it changed how your foot would hit the ground. So I had to adjust my jump and focus more on my toes and keeping my feet in the flip flops. Because you know, when you wear flip flops, your feet get a little sweaty. And so you can’t slide and then the other thing is, I would drift because I was jumping so fast, that I would start to drift, and it would eat up time. So I’d make sure I’d work on my technique. And then I would jump so fast that I would just like it was like I was so blurry. I was it was blurred vision, where I couldn’t see. So I what I would do is focus on something. And I would jump and just trust like it’s okay, it’s blurry, but I know not to mess up as you’re spinning so fast. It was so fast. It was super, super blurry. And then he would coach me from the side because you we I wanted to make sure we practice the same way in which we were going to do it live. And so I had him on the side and he would coach me like, Okay, this is our goal, our goal is for you to start clean. Then 15 seconds in, you go hard last 30 seconds, you go really hard. He’s like our objective is no mistakes. You could have a mistake. But that was the plan that we had and ended up leading to.

You know, if you have if you lose your place, or you have to stop, you’re not going to make the record. Like if there’s there’s no recovery from that.

You can start again, they cut, they would count every single jump, but then it would just eat up time because you literally only had 60 seconds. a plan is always in draft, a strategy is always in draft, you’re constantly updating it based off of the new information you find.

Wow. And then when you did that got the record. I know. It’s so funny. I’m fascinated by No, this is awesome. Um, when you got the record, did you? Like did you have people there one thing or like was an event when you got the record.

So for the record, I had to have five people present. So I had like a witness, I had three people to to count the jumps. I had another person there for time. And every single one of the amazing five people who were there to support me had to also complete a document stating that they were there, I had to take pictures. We had to videotape my jumps in slow mo regular pace. Then all of that was submitted to the evaluator, typically you see the Guinness employee with a jacket on and they’re present, but because of everything going on, they weren’t able to be there. So the information was submitted, he reviewed it. He said the jumps were so fast that he had to watch it five times, even with the slow mo and had asked his wife, and he actually shared the result during zoom. So we had a video call. But yes, you had people, you’d have proof and they had to state that that they were there and that they actually agree to the information that was on their piece of paper.

Interesting. All right. Well, I can’t tell I was much longer because it’s such a cool. It’s such a cool thing. And AJ is saying her dedication paid off. That’s awesome. That is so cool. Um, well, I want to shift and I want to ask you some questions. Can you tell us a little bit about your company? I know you have several companies, but this one is more focused on government contracts. I think that’s the one we’re talking about today. Can you tell us about that?

Yes. So currently, I am focused on helping people find, bid and win profitable federal government contracts under the umbrella of Gov con winners. As a person with over 10 years of experience in federal government contracting. I realize that many people underestimate the federal government as an option. or they received questionable advice, or maybe they just don’t even know where to start. So my experience through my flagship company of being awarded over $50 million in federal government contracts led me to this new journey of just being able to help people find bid and win profitable federal government contracts.

Cool. And I think I, we talked about this before the show, I think, like, I just want to, you know, be be a pretend client for a minute and just sort of talk about like, you talk about this. I know, as a revenue source, you said, a lot of people don’t think about it as a revenue source. If I were to think about coaching, for example, and I know there’s lots of coaching in government contracts, how would I think about it? How would I? What would be relevant for me, as a business owner thinking about going after something like this?

You first have to ask yourself, if you’re looking to go after it, as a prime contractor, if you’re looking to find it bid when or and or are you looking to work on these type of efforts as a subcontract, or 1099, that’s supporting it. So for instance, the federal government is often looking for executive coaching, leadership, training retreats, anything in everything that a private sector company wants, and potentially a company could hire, hire someone like you to provide the coaching, provide the training, provide the webinars, provide the assessments, and you would receive a fee, but the contract is actually underneath that prime contractor. So one approach is through relationships. It’s reaching out to people through Facebook, through LinkedIn, through social media, especially those who own a government contracting company in your area of interest, so that they know, hey, if I ever win something, and I need help, I can count on you to provide that said service. That is one of the quickest ways to get into government contracting.

So you’re essentially looking to be a subcontractor for someone else, but they’re controlling. So then you don’t have any interface with the government at all.

I am focused on helping people find, bid and win profitable federal government contracts under the umbrella of Gov con winners. Click To Tweet

You may have interface you’re serving in this expert role. And in this expert role, you could literally be the person training a roomful of soldiers or sailors. You’re interfacing with them, you could be the person who is providing a leadership assessment, it’s coming from your email account, it’s going to government employees or military members or even other government contractors. Or it could be a situation where you create the content, or you provide some other type of information. And the other company, then presents it.

Got it. And so I assume that’s not usually like where you help customers in finding that kind of work. Yours is more in the interface with the contract itself. Is that right?

All of the above? Oh, interesting. It is it is all of the above. Because when I first started out over 10 years ago, I was in graduate school, I was praying not to get jobs, and I was offered an opportunity to further subcontract. And that was my kind of gateway in is I noticed not only in the government side, but even on the private sector, which I repeated this model you have those were the companies spending money on marketing, the companies spending money on finding bidding, winning, the companies doing all of this and you’re just showing up and singing, right? You’re the one providing this expertise to the company. And it’s it can be extremely rewarding, because you also can learn often during that. So I help those who are interested in being experts, because some people have said, I just want to make a few $1,000 A month or supplement my income. I don’t want to have employees, I don’t want to have an office. I don’t want to do any of that. Then there are those that are more entrepreneurial. They take this entrepreneurial approach. They’re like, Look, I just want to sell things to the government products services, I want to turn a profit. I’m open to any and everything. Let’s go. And I work with those type of individuals too, because the government spends over $600 billion a year on contracts. So the sky’s the limit. It’s all about what you’re interested in what you find to be provide you joy.

And why would someone choose to work with the government as opposed to the private sector?

Great question. One, the government always will pay, they will always pay as long as the terms in the contract were met. In my entire existence in this space, I’ve never had an issue where the government said no not paying your invoice or up sorry, that agency shut down and file for bankruptcy, we can’t pay your accounts receivable, I’ve never had that. The second thing is the government will pay you interest if the payments late. Typically, if a payment arrives, after 60 days, you will receive interest. Third, yeah, it’s awesome. And this has happened many times, and they spend lots of money every year on interest. Third thing is the federal government has contracts that are multiple years. So especially, you know, taking leadership training, coaching, often it may be a one year program, or it’s a one and done or, you know, you it may just be based on the need or what’s going on in the world at that time where with the federal government, you could potentially win what’s called a base plus four, which is a five year contract, providing ongoing services where you’re paid a set amount of money every month, so that helps with your cash flow. So that’s what’s really valuable in this space.

Interesting. What else should people think about as they’re like? How do people decide if they want to do this? What would be the challenges to going after this? Let’s call it vertical?

You have to understand and understand the code that is going on with opportunities. Click To Tweet

Yeah. Number one is you have to, you have to be okay with the various missions of the government agencies. So if that’s not for you, then don’t go this space, this place? If you are someone who’s who’s maybe not for war, or not for regulation, are you have questions about the government, or you’re anti government, this is not the place to go. But it’s no different than the private sector. If you are maybe vegan, perhaps you have decided you’re not going to work with companies who have a different view or who process meat. So that’s number one, because we have worked with, with agencies who create things that literally kill people, and you have to be okay with that. It’s very, very important. It’s very, very important. The next thing is you have to have patience. You know, you’re government agencies, composed of people. And so you have to have patience in this space. And keep that in mind, you have to keep that in mind, you have to have a lot of patience. The third thing is, you have to ask yourself, if you want to be a commodity or not, are you interested in a transactional relationship, or actually a relational relationship, you have to ask yourself, because again, there’s a lot that they buy. But there’s also many, many companies in this space, like IBM, Deloitte, Lockheed Martin, Amazon. So in addition to 1000s, and 1000s, of small businesses that you’re competing against, you’re also competing against big companies, and they’re not going to broadcast that they want a janitorial contract. That’s not sexy. What sexy computers and weapons and tanks, right? So you have to keep in mind that you don’t want to be a commodity, you want to make their life easier. And you need to stand out by being able to do that. Because if not, then you can be replaced in this space.

Interesting. What’s the hardest? Like, what’s the actually I’ve really more specific question, what’s the timeline involved? Like if I woke up tomorrow and was like, okay, cuz he, let’s go find a government contract. Let’s just Let’s just do it. And I got over any of my questions or whatever we are just starting, when would I look at? Like, what what would that process look like?

So the Small Business Administration has shared that on average, it can take 14 to 16 months to land some type of contract. That process can be expedited if someone decides to go like that expert route where you’re supporting an existing contract. So the first step is you have to decide what do you want to sell? Hands down. That’s number one. However, comma, you have to then keep in mind and have to ponder Are you interested in In selling it in the way in which the government buys it. So this is very important. I’m gonna go back to the leadership training example. So there have been those who will come to me I have this Leadership Program is an amazing program. I’ve administered it to 500, kazillion people, I know that Air Force will want it.

They probably will.

Are they looking to buy it right now? Probably not. So what they may be interested in is project management training, or communication training, or save a back training. That’s these are real trainings that are out there. So you have to ask yourself, Okay, I know my wheelhouse is leadership training, I know, I’m an amazing trainer, I know, I’m stellar with content, Hey, maybe I could still offer this save a bad training, why not? Because it’s still training. Or if you’re like, not want to do any of that, I just want to offer this training that I offer, then you have to keep in mind that you may not have many sales, because they don’t know about your training. And does that fulfill a pain or any kind of situation that they need a resolution for? So it’s very, very important. The next thing is, once you decide, then that’s where you really get going. So if you decide that that you want to so this kind of goes to that question, if you could put that question back up, this actually pairs really well with Yes. So yes, I teach companies how to respond to proposals in this fits for those, especially those who are looking to be very entrepreneurial.

And let me just let me just read this question, because you’re just so busy. The question is, do you teach companies how to write the RFP (Request For Proposal) ? Do you write them or do the companies themselves, complete the RFP after you train them?

So it’s, we teach people how to write how to respond. But most important, you have to understand and understand the code that is going on with opportunities. Because many believe it’s a numbers game that you just bid on a ton of proposals, federal government, state government, private sector, and eventually I’m going to win, okay, perhaps. But we want an easier way of really understanding what they’re looking for, for using you to determine if you’re a good fit. And if you have a high likelihood of potentially winning. So I would add that into to this is really understanding what they’re looking for, as well as we help with the proposal process. And that goes along with those who want to be entrepreneurial. If you’re like, look, I want to be entrepreneurial, then you definitely need to understand and you’re going to need to bid and go that route. For those who are experts. The best approach is to connect with businesses. There’s a link. It’s called the dynamic small business search, the website, sometimes very, very slow. And you can find businesses in the area of interest and all their contact information is there. So I suggest you reach out to 100. You email you call you connect with them on LinkedIn. And you never know, they may need someone like you. And your specialized leadership training that you know that air force is going to love.

Because they have their relationship holder, they’ve already done the Savior back training they already have, they can say, Hey, would you be interested in something like this? Got it? That’s really interesting. Thanks for that question. AJ Ruiz, that was a great question. Um, want to just shift into your leadership of your organization? What tell that tell us a little bit about the size of your organization, how many people are in your organization?

So for my flagship organization, there are almost 100 People now. So it’s, it’s amazing. So it was just me, the very beginning. So there’s almost 100. And what’s great is I have all these systems, processes, and most importantly, amazing team members who run with K parks consulting with KPC. And so the way it’s structured is I have a director of getting things done, who acts in a president capacity and operations. And then under her, there’s a team leader. There are some other leaders who are then connected to different government contracts that the firm has And we have a amazing accountability process in place, which we call quality reviews, to make sure that everyone is meeting the expectations as well as they align with the culture of the company. Because many think, oh, companies virtual How do you know somebody’s working? How do you know if they’re performing? How do you know that they’re earning with all these interesting questions. And by having the accountability in place, and we use Google Excel sheets to do this, it’s really helped ensure that everyone truly is is a pro’s Pro.

And do you find I, I’m always curious about this question, because I think it’s like, it’s like, the wrong question. But it I find, is everybody working? Like what? What are your thoughts on that given? You know, we’re two years into pandemic, people are working remotely? I’ve been working remotely for 20 years. Do you find that people do their work at home?

Of course, I see that as a question that comes from a place of insecurity. Yeah, me too. And a person who asked that question is super insecure, maybe they have some issues around control. And, and so they think, you know, I have to see you. I have to know that you’re there. I have to be able to go down the hall to talk to you. I mean, these are all things that I hear. And I think well, but often, you know, some have said that 80% of time spent on the job, people aren’t really working on the job task.

Yeah. I had a client who did a bunch of research on this, mostly cuz he was trying to figure out how to work from home because he was getting really like people could actually experience burnout at home because there’s some contract between you and the employer. And it appears that research shows most people work about three, three hours three and a half hours a day, like really targeted push the you know, marble forward kind of work. And, and so I always think it’s interesting to you know, we may actually burn out everybody working at home because they actually work six or seven hours a day and it’s twice what they used to do. So it’s an interesting argument.

It truly is, you know, and it goes back to what works best for you as a leader, you as an employer what works best and from day one when I formed my flagship company I wanted and I built a virtual environment.

Where can people find you Kizzy? And who should find you?

Yeah. If you are interested in learning more about federal government contracts, please contact me my name is Kizzy Parks. You can Kizzy parks, I pretty much look the same. I may have blonde hair, I would platinum at that stage. But I am on LinkedIn. You’ll see some light bulbs in my name. I’m on Instagram. I’m on Facebook as Kizzy M. Parks I am on Tik-Tok as Kizzy M Parks. And I am also on Twitter as Kizzy KPC I post more about cryptocurrency and of teas on Twitter, but still feel free to reach out to me.

Oh, well, it has been so great to be here with you for precio saying it’s so great to have the opportunity to learn with you. It’s been just amazing to be with you. And I’m really curious about what we can add at the experimental leader about this. So I’m looking forward to chatting a little more with you. And thanks for being on the show.

Thank you for having me. And thank you all for watching live as well as watching and listening to the replay.

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It’s great thanks. Well, it’s just been amazing to be here with Kizzy today. And I’m still thinking about bottlenecks. And I’m fascinated by how she got her records and all of the different areas that she worked on improving flow. So there’s sort of the visual field there was how her feet landed on the ground. I’m sure there’s something about how fast her arms went around. And and I really just want to leave you with that thought today of where are the bottlenecks? What are all the bottlenecks, there’s always only one bottleneck by the way, there’s only the one that’s next. Once you clear that one, it becomes clear what the next bottleneck is, but you don’t have to work on multiple bottlenecks at once. So think about what your bottleneck This week, feel free to write it in the chat below. I’d love to hear what I’d love to hear what you think about as your bottlenecks and what you’re going to do to work on them. Also, I’d love to give you a copy of my digital book, The experimental leader, which is I hope that somebody is going to give me that in the chat. I think Oh, it’s on the screen here. So it is our digital book is free. It talks all about I mean, it’s our book, we just put it in a digital format for you. digital book dot experimental leader calm, you’ll get a free copy of the book. And I would love to have you read it and tell me what you think. I always love hearing what people think about my book. I’m really proud of it. And it’s been great being with you today. Go experiment.

 

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Kizzy Parks

As a kid, I’d clean golf balls located in an alley behind my friend’s house and resell them through a fence to golfers. I used the money to buy FUNYUNS® and Nutty Bars.

I always knew I’d become an entrepreneur and earn an advanced degree in psychology. My entrepreneurial spirit meshed well with my inquisitive nature as an adopted child who always wanted to, and then met, my birth family. Driven to be the successful business owner I always knew I would be. I went on to earn a Ph.D. and establish KPC over a decade ago.

Today, I own and operate multiple businesses and have over $60 million in government contract awards.

Through GovCon Ultimate Edge, I help service-based small business owners learn HOW to win profitable federal government contracts through the powerful 7-Step system to grow their bottom line.

If you want to learn more and WIN more, text me at 305-853-9481

FUN FACT 🌟
I’m a GUINNESS WORLD RECORDSᵀᴹ titleholder!

 

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