HISD Team Lead for Supplier Diversity Bernard Willingham shared a success story Tuesday on Global Momentum Construction, a minority-owned business that partnered with a global construction firm to land a HISD building contract.

“They kept saying, ‘We’re not ready,’ but I watched them grow and saw them prosper,” Willingham told about 100 small-business professionals at the Greater Houston Business Procurement Forum’s monthly breakfast. “They put in the work, and they established relationships. They did all the right things that we asked them to do.”

Willingham highlighted Global Momentum for forming a joint venture with Turner Construction Company in order to create bonding capability and bid as a prime contractor with Turner for HISD bond projects. HISD recently awarded Turner contracts for construction manager at risk (CMAR) services for three bond projects – the building of the new Dowling Middle School and Bellaire and Yates High Schools.

“Today, I’m very proud to say we’re a contractor for the largest school district in the state,” said Global Momentum president John Preston after being called on stage to talk about his company’s recent success. “Prayer, patience, persistence – if you can achieve these things, you can be where we are today.”

Turner was impressed with Global Momentum’s persistence and dedication to improving their bidding process. After bidding and not winning projects, Global Momentum would follow up to learn why other subcontractors won and utilize the feedback on future bids.

“They learned from their mistakes, so we decided to joint venture with them and pursue bigger work together,” said Turner project executive Todd Granato. “We knew they didn’t have the bonding capability and the finances, but we knew they had the go. Global has been an asset to Turner as well – they have a strong network and talk about our projects to everyone.”

At the program, Willingham told the audience that HISD is serious about helping minority- and women-owned business enterprises (M/WBEs) form valuable relationships.

“We’re going to do everything in our power to help your business, but you have to do the work, too,” Willingham said. “Know what our challenges are, know who to talk to, come to us with solutions for our problems. Everyone who does their homework does well with us.”