Manitoba Institute of Management
Member Emeritus
Ossawanimikee - Kenneth George Dillen
Ossawanimikee was born on the Serpent River First Nation, respectfully referred to as Kenabutch in the Ojibway language, on the north shore of Georgian Bay of Lake Huron, near the outlet of the Spanish River.
He was the first Treaty Indian elected to the Legislative Assembly of Manitoba where he was appointed the Legislative Secretary to the Premier, and to the Labour and Economic Committees of Cabinet. In his early adult life, he served for five years with the Canadian Armed Forces as a Paratrooper and Air Supply Instructor before joining the labour movement where he subsequently became President of Local 6166 of the United Steel Workers of America, serving two full terms.
Fully conversant with the cultural and economic paradigm, Ossawanimikee is competent in all management disciplines. Specifically, cross-cultural communications, logistics, the management of change, and mediation are areas of strength.
His work experience has been gained in Australia, Canada, Finland, Namibia, Russia, South Africa, Sweden, Switzerland, United Kingdom, the United States of America, and Zambia.
Ossawanimikee's commercial and professional career encompasses more than three decades in managing economic development projects in the energy, food, forestry and mineral sectors. He served as the Field Staff Co-ordinator for the Saskatchewan Key Lake Board of Inquiry and was the Managing Director of the Saskatchewan Metis Society Economic Development Program. For twenty-six years, he was the President and Chief Executive Officer of his own companies, Yellow Thunder Holdings Ltd. and JLM Foods Ltd.
In 1999, Ossawanimikee was appointed as Management Counsel in the Manitoba Institute of Management. Six years later, he was granted the honorary designation of Management Counsel Emeritus, the only person in fifty-one years to have been awarded this honour.