Wildfire Series
Welcome to Wildfire, a podcast brought to you by Ember Connect. Ember Connect is a free, digital platform for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander women and allies.
Wildfire Series
Reframing the Narrative: The Power and Potential of Indigenous Enterprise
Michelle Evans, Director of the Dilin Duwa Centre for Indigenous Business Leadership, shares her remarkable journey from theatre director to business academic and reveals groundbreaking data on Australia's Indigenous business ecosystem.
• Indigenous businesses generate $16.1 billion in revenue annually, comparable to Australia's timber industry
• 13,693 active Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander businesses employ 116,795 people and pay $4.2 billion in wages
• The Indigenous business ecosystem is deeply interconnected, with businesses supporting and supplying each other
• Key challenges include access to business education, capital investment, and developing networks with non-Indigenous financial institutions
• Evans created the Murra Indigenous Business Masterclass program, now in its 16th generation
• Indigenous businesses deliver benefits beyond economics: employment opportunities, self-determination, intergenerational wealth, and cultural knowledge sharing
• Evans emphasizes the importance of mentorship and collaborative data building to showcase Indigenous economic contributions
• The Indigenous business sector aims to shift away from disadvantage discourse toward recognizing its sophisticated leadership and unique value
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Speaker 2:Hiya, I'm Narelle Henry, a Noongar woman living out here in Perth in the wild wild west.
Speaker 3:I'm Tessa Hayes. I'm a Wadjala born on Paramount Country and now living and working on Wadjak Noongar Butja.
Speaker 4:Hi, this is Michelle Evans. I'm the Director of the Dylan Dewar Centre for Indigenous Business Leadership at the University of Melbourne and Melbourne Business School. I'm a Koori woman from the Hunter Valley in New South Wales and live and work here on Wiradjuri country in Albury, New South Wales in Albury, new South Wales.
Speaker 3:So, if we just kick off, can you tell us a little bit about your life's journey to date and what brought you into the work that you're doing at the moment?
Speaker 4:I guess what has really brought me to where I am today leading a business leadership centre is not quite straightforward. I started in theatre and always wanted to be a theatre director. I guess I've kept with the director bit, but it's certainly a long way from the arts to academia and leading quite an intense research centre at the University of Melbourne. I guess being in the arts maybe now you're getting. How was I not so employable? But I wasn't. In the mid-90s Everyone wanted to see the word management in your CV and certainly I didn't have that per se, even though I managed very complex projects. I didn't have that from my education. So I went into an area of arts management and I studied that at the Victorian College of the Arts in Melbourne and it just really opened up my life to being back into areas and working with Indigenous communities across Victoria.
Speaker 4:Working in community radio being a part of founding Three Cool and Deadly, which is Melbourne's Indigenous radio station, continues on today and becoming the founder of the Willens Centre for Indigenous Arts and Cultural Development at the Victorian College of the Arts to support, you know, Indigenous elite artists who are trying to create new content and really speak to not only cultural knowledges but building up these incredible vehicles through artistic creations to share culture and also to critically engage with ideas around identity and the future. So I got really excited about that and was really happy to lead the Welland Centre for over seven years. But during that time one of the areas that I got really excited about was as an arts manager. By then labelling myself in that way or identifying in that way, I noticed that a lot of Aboriginal arts centres necessarily have Aboriginal arts managers and a lot of Indigenous artists were being managed by non-Indigenous arts managers and it came a real factor for me. So I built a new course at the University of Melbourne for Indigenous Arts Management and it was during this time really where in teaching that course and working with incredible Indigenous artists and arts managers across the country, that the idea around Indigenous leadership really started to emerge as a space for me to be very interested in and I thought I might do my PhD then I had done my Master's by research, returning to some of those earlier cultural projects that I'd done back in Newcastle and the Hunter Valley, asking questions about you know, is there really long-term outcomes from these sort of short, exciting cultural projects that you do with community and trying to understand a sort of theory of change, if you will.
Speaker 4:And I thought to do a PhD. I'd really want to understand Indigenous leadership more and it was at that point that I had a very big sliding doors moment where I had to find out where to study leadership, and the only place you could study it at that time, which was the mid-naughties, was in a business school, and I had been in the arts all of my career up until then and it was a real change for me. I eventually, after a couple of knockbacks and trying, again, got into the PhD program and studied around Indigenous arts leadership and I think you know, when I entered the Melbourne Business School where I did my PhD, there were no other Aboriginal people studying at that time. There have been Aboriginal people go through MBAs there, but only a few and far between over the history of the school. So I really wanted to, you know, have more people there to talk to really and to work with. Um, it was uh, yeah, I was so used to being in community and working with students and young people and doing programs and being out on regional tours etc. That it was a real shock to the system at how exclusive the business school was, and certainly to our communities.
Speaker 4:So I set about establishing an Indigenous Business Masterclass program in 2011.
Speaker 4:I worked on a sort of regional consultation tour in partnership with Kinaway, the Aboriginal Chamber of Commerce in Victoria, which was also setting up at the same time, and just really trying to understand what Aboriginal business people wanted in a business program, what sort of business acumen training would be really handy.
Speaker 4:And I guess that program, which continues on today and we just recently had the first module of our 16th generation of the Murrah program go through just a couple of weeks ago in NAM has just been such an incredibly generative collaboration with Indigenous entrepreneurs across Australia, talking about what type of research we need, what type of other programs, how do we democratise business education out into our regional and remote communities all sorts of things that Indigenous entrepreneurs have been calling for, and that's really led to not only the development of now the Dillendua Centre for Indigenous Business Leadership, but has really directed me to have that rich collaboration and to really be have those feedback loops, I guess, with all of the different alumni that I've worked with over the last century of my career at the University of Melbourne and Melbourne Business School and Victorian College of the Arts.
Speaker 2:I am blown away by how much you've done. And then I almost fell off my chair when you had said that you were an arts first, because I didn't know that and you wanted to be a director. You've got some extraordinary achievements there. I think I need to take a second to process that test. Just ask the next question.
Speaker 3:I actually was just going to read first. Just read an excerpt that I pulled from one of your research papers, which says the Indigenous ecosystem makes an important contribution to the Australian economy, With 13,693 active and alive businesses and corporations in 2022, generating $16.1 billion in revenue, employing 116,795 people and paying $4.2 billion in wages. In terms of generated revenue, the ecosystem is around the same size as the Australian timber industry. Now, I found that myself really interesting, because I had no idea of the you know the size of, as you say, the Indigenous ecosystem. So what are, I guess, what are some of the challenges and opportunities that you've found in your research facing Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander leaders and entrepreneurs for Australia?
Speaker 4:Islander leaders and entrepreneurs. Yeah, it is exciting to now have these descriptive statistics, these facts and figures, I guess, to help us describe the Australian Indigenous business ecosystem. And we really want to focus on calling it an ecosystem because there are so many different players and actors in this space, meaning, you know, from sole traders through to really sophisticated investors and corporations, aboriginal and Indigenous corporations, and community-controlled organisations and all sorts of other businesses, commercial and not-for-profit, in between. So it's, and why it's important for us to understand it as an ecosystem, is that what we find, certainly from our rich, slower research, our qualitative research and you would find this too from people talking to you is how integrated the ecosystem is, how many different um pathways between and and circularity of um financial and and and programmatic commitments happen between these businesses and and these different organizations. They they're not just siloed off, they're actually oftentimes working together, working and supplying to each other, and I think that's a really important part for us to understand the leadership and the relational leadership of our Indigenous businesses and our Indigenous business leaders.
Speaker 4:I think you know the challenges facing Indigenous entrepreneurs are really well known and that includes just, you know, access. I think always that's a big part of my why access to business acumen, training and education and having having those people who you can turn to to work on your business not just in the business and and they really need to, and I'm really committed to and I think it's a real challenge for Indigenous entrepreneurs is having those skills yourself and polishing those skills for yourself, because that is the most generative bit of education you can invest on in your whole life. Because if you're the one creating your strategy not consulting it out to someone else to do and then you execute it, if you're creating, know your markets so well, of course you do you're running your business. You know your clients and your customers. Why wouldn't you want to invest in that even more rather than concentrating and, um, relying on risk outside of your business? So I think that that's a real challenge a challenge of time, obviously, resources, but also the logistics in your life of creating space to invest in education around your growth plans for your business.
Speaker 4:Clearly, capital and capital investment and understanding what sort of money you need for the sort of business that you're trying to grow, and I think it's more to that point we always talk about, you know, access to capital biggest challenge, and it really is. It is because you know we're what just over one generation since assimilation policies were full throttle in Australia managing and curtailing Indigenous economic empowerment. So we're only one generation and I'm certainly seeing it in people who come through the Murrah program, for instance, who are going from being born in very, very humble, very poor beginnings to being making quite serious money in a period of 40 years of their lives or even less. And that huge jump is is, I think, exciting challenge, not not necessarily a negative challenge, but it can be and that is about developing the mindset for how and understanding the, the, the tensions involved in managing wealth and social mobility for Indigenous for yourself as an Indigenous person and your family in the context of our communities which are still facing entrenched poverty and entrenched disadvantage. So I think there are a number of challenges.
Speaker 4:But just to circle back on the capital piece, it is essential for people to have trusted banks and investors to go to and to really develop those relationships in what makes sense and great financial sense for their businesses. So I think that's a bit about your networks and how you understand and have access to people who might be in those places. And again, I think that's another challenge that the broader ecosystem has is we're really good at networking together and and amongst ourselves, as we should well be in developing those sort of contemporary kinship relationships across businesses. But, moreover, it's the networks with non-indigenous lenders and investors and banks that will support the operations and the potential growth of your business, and how you develop out all of those sort of networks is absolutely critical. So all of the challenges I spoke about are, of course, also opportunities, and that's the big piece about challenges and opportunities.
Speaker 4:But I do see I've probably thought about and heard about this idea of thinking about trade is a really big actionable item in the Indigenous business ecosystem and there's a lot of different players for it the Austrade or DFAT and and some of our Indigenous business sector players like Supply Nation and the Chambers that are really dedicating time to supporting businesses who want to think about trading their services or goods internationally because there are bigger economies than Australia and thinking about how does what you create, how is it of value?
Speaker 4:More broadly, to whom is it of value and how will you create those networks and develop those networks to understand and go for trade relations, and I think that's where we're going to see some of our sector start to grow. But just even reflecting on $16 billion in one financial year in terms of a contribution to our Australian economy and knowing Narelle and Tessa, this is only a partial figure, oh my God. That excites me because it just goes to give it a little insight through the window into how much value Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people are bringing to Australia every day.
Speaker 3:Yeah, absolutely. And I think, as you sort of said in the report, that as well as that you know the $16.1 billion in revenue there's also benefits that are far greater than just the economic activities. So contributions, opportunities for Indigenous employment and self-determination, intergenerational wealth generation and sharing of Indigenous knowledge, provision of culturally sensitive services to communities and trust building within the community. So you know we talk about that $16.1 billion, but it's so much broader than that, isn't it?
Speaker 4:Exactly and really that broader list of things that you just said, that we wrote about, and we should probably, you know, unpack that a little bit. That's really so much more valuable in so many ways. I mean, I think I'm excited this, this next snapshot that we'll we'll put out, um later this year, we're delving further into these numbers that we presented in snapshot three to, for the first time, be able to reveal how many of that 116,795 people are Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander, whilst we know from previous impact reports, like Sleeping Giant Report, supply Nation did around you know, the return on investment of Indigenous firms or the work that Professor Boyd-Hunter from the Australian National University has done on Indigenous businesses being 100 times more likely to employ Indigenous people. We don't know the number yet and we're gonna, we're gonna share that number this year and I think this, this kind of game-changing conversation, whilst Indigenous business is about, you know, bringing services and goods of value to markets and creating real generational change in families.
Speaker 4:So the employment story, as you say, and I do think it's important, and I know there's a tension where Aboriginal business and certainly Indigenous procurement policies have been talked about. You know they're not just about growing business, they're actually about an Indigenous employment strategy and that that can kind of get in the way or muddy the waters around the importance of growing businesses. Yes, we want to grow businesses because they will contribute over the long term, including employment. But the employment figures are so super exciting because they're not just individuals. As you know, however, many of that 116,000 are Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander. They're part of a family network that wage is going to support themselves, a family contributing all over that community and region and certainly being of critical value to those businesses they're employed with.
Speaker 2:I'm still looking at $16.1 billion. Sorry, I'm really blown away. Firstly, I think you're extraordinary, michelle, and then just looking at, I mean creating a data set. What is that? How do you think that will start to influence policymaking and support for Aboriginal business? Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander business and enterprise.
Speaker 4:Yeah, I do. I do think the way it is helpful in facilitating change. You can hear from policy makers in governments and the like, you know, intergovernmental organisations that it goes to tell a story about this growing success, which is important. But I'm really thinking, tessa and Narelle, it's about putting these numbers in the hands of Indigenous entrepreneurs like yourselves and hearing about how this, how you use it, uh, to tell the story.
Speaker 4:I've had some of our Murrah alumni say, you know, having the snapshot reports, um, kind Snapshot Reports kind of shaves 30 to 40 minutes off any conversation with a potential new, you know, customer or client and certainly under the procurement policies, they understand it helps build trust in Aboriginal business by having these numbers and that just makes me so proud that we can be a part of building this. But we can't do it alone. And I guess to the other part of your question, building this data set is a collaborative effort. We do it with Indigenous business data. Those organisations that you know hold these registries of indigenous businesses and we we work with them to collate the richest kind of group of of data as we can and then we integrate it into the abs's longitudinal business data set and then we we delete it because we say every time we do this and we do this every two years, these big integrations, that it is at the will and behest of the data custodians on behalf of the Indigenous business ecosystem, and so it's to be collaborative, and one of the reasons I've been really love the metaphors that we try and use with Dillendore, and the image on the front of the snapshot is of a spider's web, that idea that it is incredibly strong and it holds together, but it could be gone if the waters rush over it or if someone brushes it away in the snap of an eye.
Speaker 4:It is a snapshot in time, um, and, but it took a lot of work to build that snapshot in time, and we want to say that, um, the snapshot not only gives the outcome of of these numbers, but it is in the building of it that shows true Indigenous business leadership, by bringing all of these players together to create the data set. That's exciting and it can only get richer with time. Next time we are integrating, we'll be adding, you know, at least four or five new business data, cost data, so the data is going to be richer and more representative over time every time we do it, and I think that's a part of it too, and growing that spirit of collaboration in our ecosystem is really key to that.
Speaker 2:For you personally and professionally. Has there been a connection point or a person or an organisation that's been, I guess, a huge elevator for you in your career? Hmm, gosh, you seem to have been that person for a lot of people yeah, no, thank you, and I appreciate that.
Speaker 4:Um, yeah, definitely, um, I think for me, uh, professor ian williamson, who was on my doctoral um panel, buddy, he's also the co-founder of Murrah with me and continues to be a lifelong colleague, mentor and friend. He's the person who I go to every time I've got like a real conundrum or career dilemma and he's just and also questions sometimes about opportunities that come to me. I remember when Ian is an African-American professor of HR. He's very kind of opposite to me in so many ways, including the fact that he's very rational in ways, including the fact that he's very rational, logical approach to the world and to responding to you. It just everything makes sense when he says it and you just go.
Speaker 4:Well, I didn't think of that. I feel much more circular and different sort of go, much more approach the work I do in a very intuitive, relational way, not to say he isn't that, but just the way he talks is like that and I find it helpful because it really cuts out some of the noise that perhaps I can get, you know, hooked up on. But Ian's fantastic and you know he's a dean of a business school at the University of California in Irvine now and you know, he's just one of those incredibly talented people who I can have ceiling conversations with and he creates the time for me, even though we're on different continents. So he's been my elevator and strong, strong um supporter, I would say so good and, uh, somebody who's gone back to the US.
Speaker 2:So that's um different to that moment. Um, what, uh, just I'm so interested in? Um, I mean, your career has been extraordinary. I'm so interested in the inner workings of um, your, your brain as well, like even just the times that you feel immense frustration and I mean what, what things? Is there anything that frustrates the absolute hell out of you?
Speaker 4:it's. It's probably not good to say on a podcast, but I just really I work really well in a team environment. I know what I'm good at and what I'm not good at. And I'm not good at how do you say the particulars of things, details, that's just not my strong point. I can do it. It just takes me a lot of time, uh, to do it.
Speaker 4:And because I'm across so many different things now, and all for Dylan Durer and my associate dean role, um, and all the research projects that I've got on, I just feel like a mad hatter most days of moving from one thing to the next. So I have to really pay attention. And I have a very troubled team of people, in particular my executive officer, lan Huang, who's, to me, the queen of the Dillendoor Centre. I've worked with Lan since pretty much the beginning of the Murrah programs well over 12, 13 years now and and I couldn't do this without her, I couldn't do what I do without her. It's not possible, um, and so together we create this and now, together with all of our team, um, I I really do lean on the team I love.
Speaker 4:I mean, I'm a theatre maker, I'm an improviser, I like to work and trust that different people have different parts of what we're building together and that they trust me that I can make things out of nothing. You know, a real bricoleur, if you will, I'll pull a bit from here and a bit from there and we'll we'll create something together, um, and that that's what I love. Um, so that I'm very comfortable with that sort of ambiguity and that sort of high level of tension. Um then I need the, the other side um people to help me with the more um legalistic and contractual and programmatic details I can, absolutely, I can absolutely.
Speaker 2:Tess is looking at me going. That sounds familiar, doesn't?
Speaker 3:it the detail part. There's somebody else.
Speaker 2:They're amazing. I know that time's running out, but what kind of legacy do you want to leave? I mean, it's such a big question and maybe a cheesy question, but we'd love to ask it.
Speaker 4:Anyway, I guess I really in this space and, you know, never in my wildest dreams as a young person would I imagine that I'd be in the business space. But wherever it is that I am and my work across the arts and now into business, it is about creating or kicking the door open for our mob, and creating educational opportunities has really been a big part of what I do that are really specialised and for Indigenous cohorts. I think is really super important. I just want to share those sort of stories and and create stories through research for our communities and our entrepreneurs or whether it be our artists or you know, I'm working with politicians or whatever it is but use their stories to highlight and showcase um through through that back to our communities.
Speaker 4:You know, because our, our communities and our business entrepreneurs are so sophisticated because they have to work and adapt every single day, in every single thing that they do. It is an incredible high level skill and a leadership skill that, um, you know, top level leaders are always looking to hone and all doing that every day. And I just think, being that person who can reflect back how incredible, how sophisticated you all are and really how, that's what makes me very proud is to be the greatest cheerleader for all of our alumni and to also, you know, through the research, create that evidence that tips it away from being such a disadvantaged discourse. I mean, we're all so goddamn sick of it and even the the frame in closing the gap still continues to have a disadvantaged discourse and it's it's unfair, um, because it puts a neo-colonial managerial framework on our communities and our families and that's why it's unfair.
Speaker 4:I understand there's a gap. Of course we all do and we want to work on it. That's why we're all doing this work. But there are also many ways in which the value that Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people bring every day and through the generations and into the future is making a difference too. So I hope that the work that I do is able to help assist the reframing efforts as well, so that we are seen as not only an important part of the Australian society and economy, but actually a critical and unique part of it.
Speaker 2:Absolutely fantastic, you know, taking a closer look at your journey and then having a yarn with you and listening to your incredible depth of knowledge across a huge range of things. Michelle, thanks for joining us. I mean your passion, persistence and kicking through doors and bringing the data and research to people, illuminating that Indigenous ecosystem in terms of highlighting the value to everybody else out there. But for me, looking at it personally as a Black woman, I'm going gosh. This is really important for us to know and understand the impact that we have, the contribution we make, and that it's absolutely possible and normal to start doing this for yourself. If that's the direction that you want to choose, and if there is anybody out there, or if they're looking to take a different direction. If you wanted to leave our listeners with one message, what would you really want them to connect with?
Speaker 4:message uh, what would you really want them to connect with? I'd like them to to um believe not only are you enough, but you are incredible and please make that connection with someone to talk about what you want to do, how you want to do it, move it forward. That person who can actively listen and support and um, be that cheerleader for you, that that will change your world and you will change theirs. So continue to connect and and continue to share all that you are, because you are incredible michelle, thanks so much.
Speaker 2:Um. I can't wait to share this with everybody. I will edit out all my ums and ahs and stuttering and uh, which I usually do, uh, because I get so excited. Yeah, but again, thanks on behalf of um InverConnect for for popping in your busy schedule oh, thank you and thanks for the opportunity.
Speaker 4:I really appreciate it. It was great to have you on.
Speaker 3:Hey guys, thanks for listening. Wildfire is about sparking meaningful conversations that matter to Ember Connect's members and allies. This podcast creates a space to amplify voices, share stories and explore topics that drive change, connection and personal and professional growth. By bringing these conversations to life, we aim to inspire action, deepen understanding and strengthen the collective impact of the Ember Connect network. A huge thanks to our guests for sharing their knowledge, insights, time and passion with us, and to find out more about Ember Connect, visit emberconnectcomau.
