Navigating Reconciliation

Thoughts on Becoming a Consultant and Supporting Indigenous Priorities

Image: National Indigenous Peoples Day banner available at rcaanc-cirnac.gc.ca

At the beginning of 2022, I decided to pivot my career to become a consultant. I started in the federal government in 2000 and rose through the ranks to become an Executive. I worked in federal Departments with the majority at Indigenous Services Canada and its predecessor, Indian and Northern Affairs Canada and I was exposed to the impressive work taking place in Indigenous communities and organisations from coast to coast to coast. It was through this work that I became a supporter of Indigenous economic development and Indigenous innovation.

When I decided to become a consultant, I quickly identified Indigenous economic development as an area of interest. With my extensive government experience in policy and program design and implementation, I have a unique set of skills to support Indigenous economic, environmental and social development. But is having the skills set enough?

I do not think that it is. As a non-Indigenous consultant, I need to understand my role in supporting Indigenous priorities in a country where my settler ancestors have historically taken up that space from a position of power and privilege.

As described by Amnesty International: “Being a genuine ally [to Indigenous communities] involves a lot of self-reflection, education and listening.”[1] I have taken many walks thinking about my role in this space and my potential contribution. I have read articles and spoken to Indigenous friends and mentors. Although I have more questions than answers at this point, I have identified three main principles to guide me as I start on this journey of Reconciliation in my role as consultant.

My three guiding principles are:

I am grounded in my own ancestral history.

Dr. Lynn Gehl describes this principle in the “Ally Bill of Responsibilities” noting that “effective allies must sit in this knowledge” to avoid undermining Indigenous People’s efforts.[2] My ancestors were quite literally colonizers. I can trace my maternal lineage straight to Father Labelle who was responsible for colonizing the Laurentians, the northern area of Québec. There is a town named for him and a huge statue where he stands stoic in his colonial confidence. I cannot deny that. I will own it and be honest about who I am and where I came from. I will not dwell in the guilt of generational offences but rather I will sit in the presence of who I am and trying to be as a supporter, a collaborator, a genuine ally.

I am educating myself on an on-going basis.

Working at Indigenous Services Canada, I learned about the country’s history and the oppressive structures that have been set up to the detriment of Indigenous Peoples. The public school system in which I grew up in did not include these topics in the curriculum where Indigenous Peoples and their founding of this land was invisible to me. It falls on me as a non-Indigenous person to educate myself, namely through research and reading, to understand this country’s past and the inter-generational impacts of its oppression. Inspired by the late Sarah Robinson’s Truth and Reconciliation Action Plan,[3] I strive to continue to educate myself so that my understanding deepens with time and remains meaningful in the work that I am carrying out and the relationships that I am developing. I will lean in to the learning process and be open to adjusting my worldviews when they are challenged by Indigenous colleagues and clients.

I challenge my frames of references.

As a white non-Indigenous person, it took time for me to come to terms with how Eurocentric my life view was. For example, I found it difficult to wrap my brain around the idea that the economic system as it exists in Canada is not the only way for an economy to be constructed and that it has been created by excluding Indigenous Peoples. When I was introduced to the field of Indigenous economic development, situating monetary profit within a larger frame of reference – relational economics - was foreign to me. Carol Anne Hilton’s book “Indigenomics: Taking a Seat at the Economic Table”[4] was a game changer. It required that I put aside my colonial frame of economic reference and open my mind to another way of doing things that places Indigenous values at the center of Indigenous economic projects. As I work to support Indigenous priorities, I seek to challenge my colonial approaches to identify the Indigenous worldviews that existed before my ancestors set the playing field for economic, social and environmental development.

With these three principles close to my heart, I begin my journey as a consultant striving to support Indigenous priorities. I have not figured it all out yet, but what I do know is that I will strive to listen more than speak and to support more than lead. I will ensure to check in, along the journey, to validate whether I am bringing value-added to the landscape. With this in mind, I hope to be able to chart my own path of Reconciliation in a way that is productive for both Indigenous clients and for myself.

[1] 10 ways to be a genuine ally to Indigenous communities (amnesty.org.au) [2] ally_bill_of_responsibilities_poster.pdf (lynngehl.com) [3] Rainwatch_T&R_PersonalActionPlan.pdf (squarespace.com) [4] Carol Anne Hilton, Indigenomics: Taking a Seat at the Economic Table (Gabriola Island, BC: New Society Publishers, 2021).