Indigenous entrepreneuring: pe-kīwēwin, values emergence, and values enactment

Indigenous entrepreneurs operating in western markets must often contend with tensions between their traditional values as Indigenous people and the values of the marketplaces in which they work. This can lead to colonial dissonance (Jobin, 2023) such that Indigenous entrepreneurs feel they are operating their businesses out of synch with their traditional values systems. In this study, I seek to explain the role of values in entrepreneuring markets made up of Indigenous entrepreneurs. As an Indigenous (Michif) scholar, I engage Indigenous research methodologies in this study. I am guided by a Métis methodological approach called kishkeeyihtamaaniwan kaa-natohtamihk (learning from listening and paying attention) as articulated by Forsythe (2023). I use conversational interviews, participant observation, and arts-based analysis (Leavy, 2020) to gather and analyse participant stories and relevant data. All participants of this study are Indigenous beadwork entrepreneurs who belong to one or more Indigenous Nations throughout the geographies currently known as Canada and/or the USA. This work demonstrates that through the co-creation and enactment of shared, Indigenous business values, groups of Indigenous entrepreneurs can transform the marketplaces in which they work into community spaces. With this study, I contribute to Indigenous entrepreneurship research by explaining the processes through which Indigenous entrepreneurs can manage colonial dissonance, by (re)orienting their business decision-making around Indigenous values. Further, this work contributes to literature on free spaces (Evans & Boyte, 1986) by demonstrating the thus far unaccounted for role of love (Verbos & Humphries, 2014) in the maintenance of free spaces. This work also contributes to emancipatory entrepreneuring research (Rindova, Barry, & Ketchen Jr, 2009) by demonstrating how entrepreneuring can unfold as a relational process by a group of entrepreneurs. Methodologically, this work contributes to entrepreneurship research through the development of Indigenous Beading Analysis. Practically, this work contributes to Indigenous entrepreneurs by empirically supporting the validity of enacting Indigenous values as a pathway towards business success. Finally, this work contributes to research participants by providing them opportunities to engage with the knowledge shared in this report and by offering tangible opportunities to develop their beadwork through gallery events associated with this study.