The GovCon Room

In this episode, Chip George, President, US Federal at Mpathic, breaks down how the federal contact center and help desk market actually works. Chip traces his path from Navy ROTC and active duty through telecom, networking, storage, and cybersecurity sales before moving into services, joining a business that grew out of VSO and was first tested by a COVID-era program requiring hundreds of agents in a matter of weeks. The conversation then turns to measurement: first call resolution, answer and hold times, Net Promoter Score, and the review cadence behind them. Chip explains why pain points in federal engagements are rarely about price and far more often about service quality that eventually reaches an elected official’s office, and walks through pulling ticket records and recorded calls to find the real top call drivers, which routinely differ from what the agency assumes. He closes on where AI fits, from tier-zero agents and after-hours coverage to agent assist, where AI surfaces the answer for a human agent mid-call.

In this episode, Ezekiel and Capture 411's Christy Mee walk through seven ways federal contractors can mine historical/expired RFPs to sharpen their capture strategy — from decoding Section M to spot shaping cues and make go/no-bid calls, to using the PWS to identify capability gaps and start recruiting key personnel early, reverse-engineering pricing from incumbent contract data via USAspending and SAM, and reading Section L and the Q&A for signals about page limits, bidder interest, and potential fundamental flaws in the solicitation. Along the way they use a live $22M NNSA Headquarters Support Services RFP as a working example, and close with a discussion on how deep familiarity with an agency's contracting history can turn a cold outreach into an informed, relationship-building conversation with a contracting officer.

In this episode, Leon Burns, President of Open Technology Group, shares the story of stepping into leadership of his late father's federal IT firm — a company founded in 1991 that has survived more than three decades in government contracting. Leon walks through how he started from the ground up, working help desk at the Department of Treasury before moving through operations, sales, and account management, all before taking the president role after a six-month trial period. The conversation then shifts to the current state of the federal market: the procurement slowdowns of 2025, the growing role of AI in proposal writing, and why Leon believes relationships and past performance are now more critical than ever as technical solutions increasingly become commodities. Leon closes with his vision for Open Technology Group's future, including deeper integration of AI into their delivery model and a focused push to build teaming partnerships within HHS and DOD.

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Scotty Stock is a Chief Warrant Officer in the United States Army Reserve with over two decades of military experience, from fixing laundry units in Iraq to managing the classified IT architecture that keeps Army Reserve intelligence soldiers ready to fight. In this episode, Scotty breaks down how the government actually procures technology from the inside. He walks through the full cycle from articulating requirements and navigating budget processes to using contract vehicles like CHESS and ITES-3S, and explains why most procurement failures start with a poorly written statement of work.

Naveen Krishnamurthy, CEO of Riva Solutions, joins the show to trace his path from the dot-com bust to building a federal contracting firm over 17 years. He shares hard-won advice on scaling from small to mid-size, why founders shouldn't give away equity too quickly, and how to mature a delivery organization past the $30M mark. The conversation also digs into where the industry is heading — vehicle consolidation, the rise of "prove-it" procurements, and why he's betting big on AI across his business. His parting message to fellow leaders: don't sleep on it, or you'll fall behind.

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Chris Wicke has spent 20+ years pricing government contracts. In this episode, he breaks down the biggest mistakes small businesses make when pricing proposals, why pricing during capture is non-negotiable, and how to build a price-to-win analysis that actually tells you something. He also shares his take on the new executive order pushing the market back toward firm fixed price — and what that means for vendors competing right now.

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Curtis Porter, President of Innovative Works, went from $5-an-hour electrician helper to building an automation and controls firm serving NIH, the State Department, and private energy companies across the country. In this episode he traces the full journey: the early career detour that gave him hands-on skills most engineers never develop, the years at GE commissioning power plants he had no business being alone at, and what it actually felt like to win a federal contract, order the equipment, hire the people, and then watch the government freeze all spending for six months. He closes with where he is taking Innovative Works next and the one problem every small firm eventually runs into.

Indira Rice Donegan is a Signal Corps veteran, CEO of RIDO technology consulting, and board leader across some of the most influential organizations in the federal space, including AFCEA, and the Albert J. Meyer Signal Corps Regimental Association. In this episode, she shares her take on burnout and why she doesn't subscribe to it, how service organizations build real relationships in GovCon, and what the current administration's priorities around DOGE cuts and AI mean for the future of federal contracting.

Tracy Marcinowski, Managing Partner of Strategic Acquisition Solutions and former Assistant Commissioner for Acquisitions at GSA's Public Building Service, joins the podcast for a candid look at what it actually takes to navigate federal acquisitions from both sides of the table. Tracy traces her career from contingency contracting in the Air Force to overseeing a multi-billion dollar leased and owned property portfolio at GSA, sharing what she learned along the way about the relationship between contracting offices and program offices, and why collaboration almost always beats the silo. The conversation covers the upheaval of 2025. paused RFPs, workforce reductions, centralization under GSA, and the Revolutionary FAR Overhaul. and what those changes mean for companies trying to compete today. Tracy breaks down how outcome-based acquisitions are reshaping what government actually asks industry for, why shorter solicitation timelines are already showing up in the market, and how companies that connect their work to the agency's mission consistently outperform the ones that don't.

Leslie Steele has been running InterImage for 30 years. She started it on a dare from her husband and never went back to corporate America.

In this episode, she talks about what it actually takes to get in front of the right people in federal — and why relentlessness is the only strategy that has ever worked for her. She also gets into how she thinks about priming versus subbing, competing full and open against large businesses, and navigating a market where government contacts are disappearing faster than you can replace them.