Making minority-owned, women-owned and small business contracting a reality

While government agencies require businesses with which they contract to meet a specific quota for purchasing from minority-owned businesses, many hospitals are exempt from these requirements. Sutter Community Hospitals in Sacramento, CA, however, established a goal to purchase a certain percentage of their services, supplies and equipment from minority-owned, women-owned and small businesses. Several attempts to get a program off the ground met with failure due to problems with locating appropriate businesses and with excessive paperwork and requirements of government entities the hospital system tried to work with. Eventually, Sutter's Materials Management Department defined, in a simple format, what it considered these businesses to be. Without a complicated qualifying process, Sutter had added 74 minority-owned, women-owned and small business suppliers to its vendor list, and 34 are currently providing products and services to the hospitals. It is thus able to build community support, keep money spent by Sutter in the community and engender cultural conscientiousness and acceptance throughout its facilities.