Samantha Martin-Bird (Peguis First Nation) on Compensation in Indigenous Evaluation

Sam: In Young People Know, the podcast series I created for funders, I think the parts of that episode where I talked with Riley Yesno about compensation were really interesting. She talked about when she’s speaking somewhere or hosting a workshop or whatever, it’s a more involved request how she articulates how much she should be paid. She thinks through the time that she’ll need to prepare and travel and be there and present, but then also the time that she’ll need to recuperate from the event and factors that in. Being compensated for the time that she’ll need to recharge and refill, after giving and giving in some of those situations. And then she talked about calculating it based on an hourly rate of what the living wage is in her city and having that as a baseline. I think sometimes the numbers for honorarium or speaking fees can feel maybe abstract or out of nowhere: Yeah, I have a sense that that’s enough, or I have a sense that that’s way too much, but I don’t really know why. So I thought Riley’s approach was compassionate and concrete.

Gladys: That just blew my mind to think about how to compensate for the emotional labor and then the resulting rebalancing that has to happen in many situations that Indigenous peoples are asked to sit in and to be representative and advising in, holding that kind of space and then making sure that you don’t burn out afterwards.

That was amazing to me, and I did a little like, What!? when I listened to that part of the episode.