Sandi L Boucher explains why Indigenous communities hire kin and community members first: it's survival and protection, not nepotism. She describes how relationships come before business, unlike mainstream practice, and urges non-Indigenous business owners to respect this approach.
Chapters
This one's gonna blow the mind of some people. I just know it. I can hear the comments, I can hear the judgment now. They may even have a nasty word they want to throw at me. They. Because I know I'm not talking about you. You would never do that. But we better talk. Hi, everybody. My name is Sandy Boucher. I'm Red Thunderbolt, woman of the Loon clan and a proud member of Seine River first nation in Treaty 3 territory in Northern Ontario. And I have a piece of information that might just blow your mind. As I said in the intro. So here it is. Mainstream non indigenous Canadians create relationships or build relationships with, with the people they work with. I don't think that part surprises you, but you might be surprised to learn that Indigenous people work with the people we have relationships with. Did you see the difference? Mainstream, I'll build a relationship with the people I work with. Working with you comes first. Non indigent or Indigenous people we work with the people we have relationships with. Relationship first. I need to know I can trust you. Now, I said in the intro, some people are going to have a really nasty word they want to throw at me. And the word is nepotism. And I hear it thrown around in talk, in conversations about first nations communities all the time. And it drives me flipping nuts. Because you know what? In my mind, it's not nepotism, its survival. I'm sorry. On countless different occasions, Canada did their best to do us in, to eliminate us from the conversation, if not Mother Earth. And we had to figure out how to survive. And if you're going to crucify me for wanting to make sure my family survives, go ahead and crucify me. I want to make sure my kids and grandkids are safe and my community members are safe. And then out into the bigger world. That's survival. I run my business. I'm going to hire people that care about the work I do as much as I do. By the way, I don't have any family members working for me right now. Every now and then they do short term contracts. None of my permanent staff or my family. So don't judge. But if they needed a job, if my daughter needed a job to help support her family, you can bet that I'd find a way to create one for her. Go ahead. Like I said, judge me. That's mainstream judgment. I don't even care. So we work with people we have relationships with. I'm going to repeat that. We work with people we have relationships with. So many. So what have I Been saying a hundred times over, build the relationship. I can remember. Here's the story for you. A while back, an individual from a First Nation community that I had not worked with had reached out to me and wanted to learn more about my company. He did share that they were interested in working with me, but he wanted to hear more about what I do. Or actually he just said he wanted to hear more. We agreed to meet for coffee. I went in. I was spending too much time in mainstream because I went in prepared to tell him all about my business, and he didn't care two beans to hear about my business. There goes Baby Blue. He wanted to hear, what's my community? Where am I from? Give me an example of some of my teachings. And he didn't ask it like that. It just came up in conversation. Wanted to know about my children and grandchildren, what my journey was like. Once he heard enough and realized, yep, this chick's authentic, then we started talking business. Built the relationship first. Now you, non indigenous person, are seen as the cat by many and we're the mouse or the bird. So don't come at us and think, you know, we're just going to build this relationship on your term. First you got to prove you're a safe space. When we start asking questions, then you know you're getting closer to the goal. There's nothing wrong. And by the way, if we build a relationship with you and we know you're in business, we're going to ask what your business is. Why? Because we work with people we have relationships with. Keep that in mind, business owners. That might be a really important fact for you to consider. Until tomorrow. Take care. I love you. Bye bye.
