From the Introduction
A book from a Chief is rare. Over the last fifteen years or so, I have been asked by many people, both Native and non-Native, “When is your book coming out?” I have written many articles and have given hundreds of keynote speeches all over North America, as well as speeches in Australia, New Zealand, Germany, and France, but when people asked me about putting my thoughts and what I have learned over those many years of leadership down on paper, I never gave it more than a casual thought.
It took a child to change my mind.
Back in December 2016 I received a letter from Siera, a little girl I had never met. Her grade four class was doing a project on leadership, and at the suggestion of her dad, she had selected me as someone to interview. I imagine her dad had heard of the Osoyoos Indian Band and me through the many media reports on the success of our economic and business development. The Osoyoos Indian Band (OIB) has more businesses and joint ventures on a per capita basis than any other First Nation in Canada, a fact that has turned us into an economic power in the South Okanagan Valley of British Columbia.
In Canada there are over three thousand federal Indian reserves. Some are very small (only a few acres), and the biggest is the Blood Tribe in Southern Alberta, which sprawls over some 350,000 acres. In the United States there are 326 federal Indian reservations, with the largest being the Navajo Nation, at sixteen million acres. White people in the U.S. call where Native people live “reservations.” In Canada, white people say “reserve.” We who live there call it simply “the Rez.”
My Rez, the Osoyoos Indian Band, is one of those rare First Nations that has more jobs than it does band members (540 members, with more than a thousand jobs). We own a golf course, cement company, cultural centre, RV park and campground, two gas bars, winery, vineyard, sewage and water utilities, and forestry operations, plus thousands of acres of leased property in vineyards, a hotel, preschool and grade school, and commercial and residential properties. We have gained national attention through such highly visible business pro-jects as our joint venture with Arterra Wines, Canada’s biggest wine producer. We had Canada’s most famous race car driver, Jacques Villeneuve, build his signature racetrack here on the Osoyoos Rez.
The Osoyoos Indian Band has focused on putting what I call the original “treaty relationship,” based on business and economic and social independence, into action. Not long ago, a Globe and Mail article called it “The Miracle in the Desert.” In a way, it is exactly that. The Osoyoos Indian Band proves that when a First Nation is not dependent (in a welfare state) but independent (in a business state) while contributing to the local, regional, and national economy, it is good for all of Canada and the United States.
In her own little-girl handwriting, Siera asked me five questions, and she said she hoped that I would respond in writing. Now, I had received requests like this before, from students of all ages from across the country. I’m always deeply honoured and I make sure to free up time to accommodate such requests. I have also written multi-page personal thoughts and feelings that I have shared from time to time with Osoyoos Indian Band staff and members. But this was different.
Siera’s questions were excellent. They reminded me of something often said by leadership expert John Maxwell: “Good leaders ask great questions.” I decided to answer the five questions in far more detail than a grade four student would need, as I also wanted to share my answers with my own kids as well as with members and staff of the Osoyoos Indian Band, of which I have been Chief for over thirty-five years. I answered the little girl’s questions on leadership in many pages, and after my grown daughter Sarenna read my answers, she said, “Dad, you really should write a book.” That gave me the push I needed.
Recently, I received a surprise phone call from former prime minister of Canada Brian Mulroney. He told me, “The only thing that lives on in history are books. So write a book so your children and grand-children can read the words you leave behind.” This book is not a biography, but it is about my time as Chief of the Osoyoos Indian Band. It is about the leadership path I have been on since I started organizing sports teams as a teenager, and that continued later as I became a lifelong student of Native issues throughout North America. Most importantly, though, it’s going to tackle issues that have and continue to confront North America’s Native population (racism, multi-generational trauma, economic disparity), and it’s going to do so with some tough talk . . . it’s not always going to be pretty or popular or politically correct, but it’s going to be the truth, from someone who lives the Rez experience every day.