SBA National Small Business Award Nomination Period Opens
The U.S. Small Business Administration is now accepting nominations for its 2017 National Small Business Week Awards, including the annual Small Business Person of the Year. Since 1963, National Small Business Week has recognized the outstanding achievements of America’s small businesses for their contributions to their local communities, and to our nation’s economy.
The dedicated website www.sba.gov/nsbw/awards provides forms, criteria and guidelines for submitting a nomination.
SBA Awards given in celebration of National Small Business Week, April 30 – May 6, 2017, include the following:
- Small Business Person of the Year
- Exporter of the Year
In a change from past years, businesses are required to have had SBA assistance in order to be nominated for these two awards. Individuals who have received one type of SBA assistance such as, but not limited to an SBA loan, SCORE counseling, Small Business Development Center (SBDC) assistance, and Women’s Business Center (WBC) assistance, government contracting assistance, disaster assistance, Emerging Leaders Initiative (E200), or Boots to Business Training are eligible.
In addition to these National Small Business Week Awards, the SBA’s Iowa District Office will be presenting state-specific awards in several categories. SBA assistance is not required for these nominations. They include:
- Iowa SBA Small Business Community of the Year – presented to an Iowa community that best exemplifies an ideal collaborative economic environment for start-ups and small businesses. Last year’s winner was Sioux City.
- Iowa Women in Business Champion of the Year – presented to an individual(s) who has demonstrated a commitment to the advancement of women’s small business ownership. Nominees may or may not be small business owners.
- Iowa Minority Small Business Champion of the Year – presented to an individual(s) who has demonstrated a commitment to the advancement of minority small business ownership. Nominees may or may not be small business owners.
- Iowa Veteran Business Champion of the Year – presented to an individual(s) who has demonstrated a commitment to the advancement of veteran business owners. Nominees may or may not be small business owners.
Iowa nominations for the following national-only awards are also encouraged.
- Phoenix Awards for Disaster Recovery
- Federal Procurement Awards
- Jody C. Raskind Lender of the Year
- Small Business Investment Company of the Year
- Awards to SBA Resource Partners
For nomination criteria and submission instructions for the Iowa awards, please e-mail Dave Lentell at the SBA’s Iowa District Office at [email protected].
All nominations must be submitted no later than 2 p.m. CST, Monday, January 10, 2017. SBA will no longer be using the Small Business Week online portal. All nomination packages may only be hand delivered or mailed to an SBA Office. Email submissions of SBA Awards forms will not be accepted as they contain personally identifiable information (PII).
