Leadership Team
Joe Wynn
President - Board Chairman
Civic & Business Leader; US Air Force Veteran Director Vets Group Training Academy Chairman NAACP Veterans Affairs Committee Member of Mayor’s Veterans Advisory Board Treasurer, VET-ForceaJoe founded the Vets Group in 2004, as a non-profit organization in Washington, D.C. for Veterans to achieve economic empowerment through Education, Training & Entrepreneurship. In 2010, Joe established and manages the Vets Group Training Academy that offers occupational skills training for high demand occupations in the Information Technology (IT) industry for veterans, their families and persons of limited means. The academy is certified by the DC Education Licensure Commission, the Maryland Higher Education Commission, and the Dept. of Veterans Affairs and partners with Cisco, Microsoft, and CompTia.
Veterans Advocate: Serving the Washington D.C. community for 20 years; Joe was previously appointed as a Commissioner on the Veterans Disability Benefits Commission by Leader Nancy Pelosi; Chairman of the Armed Services and Veterans Affairs Committee for the NAACP; and a member of the Mayor’s Veterans Advisory Board for the District of Columbia. He has received recognition awards for his advocacy as Veterans Small Business Champion of the Year for the Small Business Administration (SBA), VET-Force, Blacks in Government, the United Black Fund and MEA Magazine.
Legislative Liaison: As Special Advisor to the Director of Government Relations for the Vietnam Veterans of America (VVA), Joe consults on matters relating to Veterans Employment, Small Business and Entrepreneurship. He serves as National Vice-Commander and Legislative Liaison for the National Association for Black Veterans (NABVETS), and serves on the Executive Committee for the Veterans Entrepreneurship Task Force (VET-Force), composed of over 200 organizations and affiliates, to monitor the impact of legislation on small business programs for veterans.
Educational Attainment: Using the G.I. Bill, Joe attended the University of DC and Howard University, completing a Bachelor’s degree in Computer Information Systems, a Master’s degree in Business, and two years toward a Doctorate in Organizational Communications. He also graduated from the Computer Learning Center majoring in Computer Programing and certified as a Microsoft Computer Specialist.
Military Service & Past Experience: A Vietnam-era veteran, Joe served with the 66th Strategic Missile Squadron stationed at Ellsworth Air Force Base South Dakota and received an Honorable Discharge. Designed and managed a pre-apprenticeship program for veterans with the Washington Metro Area Transit Authority (WMATA). Managed projects for Veterans with disabilities for the Service Disabled Veterans Business Association at the Dept. of Veterans Affairs. 
Ron S. Washington
Board Treasurer
Ron is a seasoned business professional with a wealth of experience in communications, marketing and sales. He is the retired Chairman of the Board for AirGo, a construction, facility support & product distribution company, based in Las Vegas, NV with offices in Atlanta. The company is a verified SDVOSB, and Ron is a decorated, U.S. Marine Corps Vietnam, combat veteran.
He has a B.S. degree in Business from Chicago State University, Chicago, IL, and a Master of Science in Communication (MSC) degree from Northwestern University in Evanston, Illinois. He belongs to several commerce, communication, public relations and industry specific professional associations.
He is a keynote speaker, workshop trainer and subject matter expert on communications, marketing & sales, emerging market consumer and community issues, as well as veteran and other small business development strategies. He resides in Las Vegas, NV.
Kim Harwell
Board Member
Kim Harwell is a consummate entrepreneur. He maintains more than thirty years of business and technological expertise in the government, telecommunications, and marketing fields. Kim has founded and led organizations that have generated an aggregate of several billions of dollars in revenue. Kim regularly writes articles for United States Cyber Security Magazine, and has written articles for numerous other publications. Also, Kim has written numerous E-Books on government contracting and is in the process of writing his new book, “The Blueprint to Government Contracting”. Kim Harwell is a highly sought after speaker, trainer, sales coach and expert in the areas of sales, business, government relations, and technological advances.
Kim is the founder and Chief Executive Officer of National Bid Network (NBN) and its subsidiary GovPurchase. NBN’s mission is to provide user friendly research tools, business training, consulting services, and B2B business development tools for commercial businesses, government contractors, and government officials, in a profitable manner, at an affordable price. The results will be to save billions of tax dollars for the American people, provide more opportunity for small business, which in turn, will create more jobs, and boost the US economy. One of the primary ways we achieve this is by owning and providing the most comprehensive government contracting online data tool. GovPurchase is the largest databases on government contracting (www.govpurchase.com).
GovPurchase assists thousands of companies worldwide in doing billions of dollars annually in federal, state and local prime contracting, subcontracting, teaming and commercial business. This is performed via the GovPurchase online tool (www.govpurchase.com), the world’s largest database on government contracting, combined with excellent customer training and support. Corporations such as Bosch, Colt Defense, Exide, Smith and Wesson, Brunswick, DB Consulting Group, and thousands of other large, mid-sized, and small businesses worldwide count on GovPurchase for critical government contracting business development and research information. Government agencies such as the Department of Homeland Security, The Department of Justice, TSA, The Army, The Navy, and others use NBN to locate and verify government contractors for set-aside and other opportunities.
In 2014, National Bid Network was nominated for the Maryland Business of the Year, by the Maryland Chamber of Commerce and the Maryland Office of Military Affairs. Also in 2014, GovPurchase was a finalist for DC business of the year and Kim was a finalist for DC Businessman of the Year as nominated by the DC Chamber of Commerce.
Kim has one son, Kim, a graduate of Northwestern University and Detroit Country Day. Kim was also a four-year starting wide receiver at Northwestern, and had some professional football experience.
Rhonda Smith
Board Member
Strategic Consulting, including business plan, sales strategy development, deployment of technological solutions to address business issues is the responsibility of Rhonda Smith. She also develops a timetable for the study, application, and testing of the technology and collaborates with internal technical teams to guarantee consistency in usage. she create technical user guides and express technical instructions in clear commercial language. Her duties include investigating a company’s IT architecture and system, finding holes, inefficiencies, and problems with IT systems, establishing a project completion timetable while taking the needs of the business into consideration. putting in place a technological solution to fulfill business needs. evaluating and detecting security issues, advising on technological best practices, working with the internal technical team to ensure tech competency.
Queen Jones
Enrollment/Outreach Specialist
Miss Jones conducts interviews for incoming potential students. Supervises staff pertaining to office duties. She is also responsible for the organization’s outreach and networking activities within the Developmental population, which includes contributing ideas and leads for identifying new referral sources and providing the necessary follow ups. Miss Jones is responsible for connecting with local community based professional organizations. She is expected to travel to various community activities as well as plan and coordinate outreach activities in designated areas that are intended to identify, capture the attention and interest of veterans and non-veteran community that meet the requirements of the program.
Carene Simon
Community Outreach Facilitator
Carene Simon is in charge of organizing and carrying out outreach. Through the creation of sponsorship agreements and the development of connections with companies, people, and other pertinent organizations, he is in charge of bringing together members of the larger community. He serves as a representative of the business and collaborates with the management group to create and carry out initiatives that increase company visibility in the area. His obligations include keeping track of outreach events, workshops, appearances, and other communication opportunities in the community. He helps with the planning of special events, such as occasions to thank donors and volunteers and other fundraising activities.
Vera Batey
Student Advisor
Vera Batey is the Student Advisor at VETS group. She oversees student enrollment cases as the academic advisor. She puts together enrollment packets for new students. She also gives advice to students about their academic choices. She runs the orientation for new students. She helps to update student policies and course curriculum. Ms. Batey supports the promotion of IT programs and organizes Open House student advisory meetings. Through job fairs, conventions, seminars, PowerPoint Presentations, and employer work sites, she supports community outreach services that inform employee/employer workplace wage and leave laws and encourage legal compliance to employers and healthcare providers.
Faith Deveaux
Administrative Assistant
At VETS group, Faith Deveaux serves as the administrative assistant. She performs several administrative and coordinating jobs. She plans and coordinates activities and programs in addition to performing crucial operational tasks.
Her duties include assisting with the program’s planning and coordination, creating, maintaining, and updating student records using Excel spreadsheets, managing communications through media relations, social media, fostering positive relationships with outside organizations that refer students for training, planning meetings and events and maintaining an agenda, using appropriate technology for all administrative procedures, and creating paperwork and forms using MS Word.
IT Support
Aumed Muhamad
IT Consultant
Aumed Muhamad, President/CEO Nova HiTech, inc. Provides managed IT services for the Vets Group training facility.
Natnael Mekuria
IT Tech - Intern
Natnael Mekuria is The VETS Group’s IT intern. He collaborates with a vibrant, distinctive, and creative team of IT experts. He closely with the IT Data Service Manager and Executive Director on a range of IT tasks, such as repurposing old desktop and laptop computers, data governance, cloud storage and retrieval, and hardware and software setup and support.