Challenging assumptions.
building relationships.

ABM is a community of decision-makers who foster collaborations for a livable planet. Together, we cultivate opportunities for learning, business, dialogue, partnership, personal growth, and friendship.

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A Community for Prosperous People on a Livable Planet

We uphold the community we have created as a stronghold for honest and uncensored dialogue about the complex dynamics of business, money, and their effects on human relationships, culture, and the planet.
Through this dialogue, we evolve how we do business in service of a livable planet.
Our Vision:
Prosperous people on a livable planet.
This Is What Shapes Us

Everything we do is grounded in a shared purpose, vision, foundations, principles, actions, and commitment.
They shape how we build relationships, how we engage with one another, and how we understand our responsibility to the communities and territories in which we live and work.
Explore What Shapes Us
A Living Community

ABM is active throughout the year through experiences that strengthen relationships and deepen engagement.
Online Connectors
Weekly curated one-on-one conversations that cultivate opportunities for learning, business, dialogue, partnership, personal growth, and friendship.
ABM Spheres
Trusted circles where Members exchange insights, strengthen relationships, and create opportunities around shared areas of interest.
Uncensored Dialogue Forums
Hard Conversations. Rethinking Business. Honest dialogue that challenges assumptions, deepens understanding, and expands our collective capacity to respond thoughtfully to complexity.
Annual Community Gathering
Our flagship in-person event where the relationships, dialogue, and collaborations developed throughout the year come together in one place.
Learn How ABM Works

Participation of Indigenous Governments and Development Corporations

Indigenous governments and development corporations participate in ABM to achieve their priorities and engage as their availability allows. Whether through direct involvement or trusted relationships with ABM Members, their stewardship, governance, and economic priorities are understood and incorporated into the way we interact.

While the priorities of Indigenous governments and development corporations are integral to ABM, their representatives are not prospective clients or procurement opportunities. Meetings with their decision-makers cannot be a key motivator to join ABM.

Reciprocity and opportunity emerge from the strength of the entire community rather than from pursuing any specific type of relationship. Every participant contributes to that living network, and every relationship strengthens it.

ABM is not the right place for organizations seeking access to Indigenous governments or development corporations as business development targets. Instead, ABM offers the opportunity to develop increasingly sophisticated business practices through genuine relationships, thoughtful dialogue, and a deeper understanding of the responsibilities that come with operating on traditional territories.

Representatives of Indigenous governments, development corporations, tribal councils, and Indigenous non-profit organizations participate in ABM at no cost.

Rooted in Indigenous sophistication, ABM brings non-Indigenous people together to develop critical perspectives and create opportunities.

ABM is rooted in Indigenous sophistication because we recognize that the original relationships with land, governance, stewardship, and community are Indigenous wherever we find ourselves in Canada.

ABM is not about an "us and them" narrative. It recognizes that colonialism has inflicted its greatest harm on Indigenous people, but it has also denied non-Indigenous people the opportunity to benefit from the sophisticated Indigenous knowledge that has evolved on these territories over thousands of years. We all live the consequences of colonialism.

Indigenous people make up approximately five per cent of Canada's population, while governments claim authority over roughly 89 per cent of the land. That imbalance is a problem. Indigenous people do the work of reconnecting with their living and, in many cases, with barely or no longer accessible knowledge systems. It is a responsibility that often comes at great personal cost. We cannot expect them to also educate the other 95 per cent.

For that reason, ABM seeks to be a bulwark of critically informed non-Indigenous people who accept that their responsibility is to ensure that their own decisions, businesses, institutions, relationships, and influence do not cause further harm to all people, land, and communities.

Our community is built for decision-makers who understand that if revenue is the reason to focus on Indigenous governments and development corporations as the representatives of Indigenous communities, the proposition has already failed. Learning undertaken in this way is little more than assimilation and coercion disguised as economic development.

Our purpose is to strengthen the conditions in which Indigenous knowledge systems can flourish because we believe they are essential to achieving our vision of prosperous people on a livable planet. Many of the Indigenous people who carry the deepest cultural knowledge are also those whose responsibilities require them to remain closely connected to their territories, communities, and traditions. Their work is not always visible within the institutions where governments and businesses typically look for leadership, yet it is indispensable to the continuity of Indigenous ways of being.

Every person whose roots do not extend into these territories for thousands of years has a responsibility to examine assumptions, understand history, challenge one another, and make decisions grounded in a genuine understanding of the historical and contemporary realities that shape these territories.

Being critically informed is not optional. It is the responsibility of every person who lives on these lands.

ABM exists for those who recognize that the consequences of leaving colonialism behind cannot be understood or navigated alone. We are a supportive community committed to thoughtful dialogue and intentional action, expressed not only in what we discuss, but also in how we conduct business, generate prosperity, and make decisions considering the interests of Indigenous people who are not at the table.

Community Recognition

Some organizations choose to play a deeper role in strengthening the ABM Community. We recognize these contributions by identifying them as ABM Community Builders or ABM Community Leaders. These recognitions are not purchased. They reflect a sustained commitment to the community, its purpose, and the relationships that make ABM possible.

ABM Community Leaders: ABM Community Leaders are Community Builders who leverage their capacity to strengthen the participation of Indigenous governments and development corporations within ABM, helping create conditions for meaningful collaboration and long-term impact.

ABM Community Builders: ABM Community Builders are highly engaged Members who invest their time, knowledge, and relationships in the continued growth of the ABM Community.