In celebration of Native American Heritage Month, Vernon interviews Pamela Standing, Co-Executive Director of the Minnesota Indigenous Business Alliance (MNIBA). Pamela shares strategies MNIBA employs to connect Indigenous business owners with resources.
Pamela Standing’s experience demonstrates that Indigenous-run organizations and businesses can thrive, achieve financial growth, and succeed within the mainstream business system without sacrificing cultural values. She is committed to bridging the disparity gap through cooperative efforts, collaboration, and establishing partnerships and alliances that lead to resource sharing.
In 2019, through her partnership and contract status with Cooperative Development Services (CDS) she was able to participate in CooperationWorks’ co-op developer training series. It was through her participation in this program that inspired her exploration into how Indigenous language, Cultural Lifeways and practices aligned with Eurocentric cooperative practices. This was funded by the Native American Agriculture Fund.
Pamela Standing brings a new lens to expand the use of cooperative approaches in Indigenous communities throughout the U.S., a greatly under-developed space in the cooperative world. Working with Cooperative Development Services (CDS) as a contractor under a USDA grant, she was able to interview approximately 50 Indigenous-led cooperatives in the U.S. and a few in Canada to create case studies. CDS provided the editors and in 2020 she was able to write and publish the first-ever Guide to Indigenous Community Cooperative Development.
Standing holds a BA in Education and a MBA in International Business. She is a citizen of Cherokee Nation.
