Anyone who works with SBA 8(a) program applications will tell you that it can be very difficult for a woman to demonstrate gender bias to the extent necessary to gain admission to the program.
But for a woman-owned small business business, the road to SBA 8(a) program admission may have just gotten a little easier, as the result of a recent decision by the SBA Office of Hearings and Appeals. In Strategygen Co., SBA No. BDPE-460 (2012), SBA OHA held that the SBA’s 8(a) admissions office had repeatedly erred in evaluating a woman’s claims of gender bias, and ordered the woman-owned firm admitted to the 8(a) program.