Cherokee entrepreneur reflects on 25 years of turning dreams into goals

TULSA, Okla. – If he’s suffering from jetlag, it’s not obvious. He’s pulled together in a crisp pink oxford, relaxed jeans and leather loafers as he orders coffee from The Perfect Cup inside the Hard Rock Hotel & Casino Tulsa.

It’s May 5 and Gary Davis is fresh in Tulsa, having returned stateside from Germany the day before. It’s only 3 p.m. but near on bedtime in Germany and he’s been going since the sun came up.

He hasn’t left the hotel. He’s been fielding emails, returning calls, organizing future meetings and consulting with hotel event staff in preparation for his organization’s July 11-14 event, the National Center for American Indian Enterprise Development’s Reservation Economic Summit, or RES.

Davis, Cherokee, is president and CEO of NCAIED and has worked non-stop since stepping into the role. NCAIED is a nonprofit organization with more than 40 years of assisting American Indian tribes and their respective enterprises with business and economic development, and it’s a perfect fit for Davis, who began his professional career as an entrepreneur by establishing Red Vinyl Records in 1992 to record and distribute his music.

He used his music to reach Native youth and racked up thousands of miles touring reservations across the United States, spreading a message of hope and perseverance.

“I feel very attached to making a difference. I feel very passionate about what I do,” he says. “I [grew up seeing] my dad working his businesses at 9 o’clock at night, 10 o’clock at night, coming in at 11 o’clock…. He had TV shows he wanted to watch and things he wanted to do, but he knew he had to take care of all the little things to take care of the big things. He did that to take care of us. I saw him working the dream. That is priceless to me – to do the dream.”

He parlayed his music career into an acting career and is known for portraying Little Bear in the 1995 film “Indian in the Cupboard.” To date, he’s released more than 15 records and starred in several more films and television series. He’s also published a book, “The Medicine of Prayer,” which was released in 2010.

But Davis is more than successful in the creative arts. After Red Vinyl Records, he founded other enterprises to reflect his evolving dreams – including a consulting service; a clothing line; and an entertainment booking, marketing and merchandise service.

His entrepreneurial spirit landed him on the NCAIED board of directors in 2011, and he was asked to step in as president and CEO less than a year later in January of 2012.

He brought big goals to the table and big plans for economic development in Indian Country.

“I think  with  the sheer ingenuity, relentlessness, perseverance and spirit of the people, we’ve been able to survive and we’ve done amazing things. But I think there is so much more to do. I think if we can congregate and convene around a plan and understand that it is not just about one tribe, one state, one region, one area – that is about all of us, that we’ll realize that we could be doing so much more – more efficiently, more effectively and more powerfully,” he says.

One of the first things he advanced as president was the Native American Global Trade Center, a vehicle for advancing global business development and building multinational relationships for Indian Country.

Since then, he’s been at the U.S. Senate floor, testifying at Indian Affairs Committee hearings to encourage economic development and establish priorities for Indian Country.

And now, back from attending the Hannover Messe in Germany as part of a delegation from the U.S. Department of Commerce’s Minority Business Development Agency, he’s more energized than ever to continue advocating for economic development in Indian Country.

“It was a very powerful experience being in Germany and an eye-opening wonderful opportunity to see people working at such a high level of technology and innovation,” he said. “It was just a really invigorating experience.”

The Hannover Messe is the world’s leading industrial trade fair. It was attended by President Obama and attracted visitors from 75 countries. The fair focused on global markets and opportunity in the fields of industrial automation, digital technology, energy, industrial supply and research and development technologies.

“It makes it a little more interesting point of view that I can have now, having just come from a place where they destroyed a wall,” he says of his time in Germany. “We have to realize, much like the people of Germany had to realize, that… together they could do more. And they fought for that.”

Davis points out the Germans had a plan. The Marshall Plan – a plan to rehabilitate the economies of 17 western and southern European countries after World War II to create stable conditions in which democratic institutions could survive.

“It’s amazing what you can do when you put a plan together and you work the plan. There’s never been an overarching plan for rebuiliding Indian Country and there still isn’t,” Davis says.

But he believes it can be done.

“If we understand where we are at, where we come from, we can start to formulate where we need to go and what the ultimately means to future generations of Indian people,” he says.

“Do you have a plan? Not a dream, but a goal? Have you taken your dream and put a timeline to it to make it a goal? Or is it still just a dream?” he asks. “It’s not impossible. It’s not unattainable or unachievable. If you’re not getting to where you need to be, you need to reevaluate your approach.”

He says he saw limitless opportunity for Indian Country in Hannover, opportunities he can incorporate into his plan.

“I spend a whole lot of time off the battlefield planning. The war is won before you step foot on the battlefield. Don’t go to war if you’re not ready to go to war,” Davis says.

He admits he uses a lot of war strategy and football analogies to describe his thinking. He says it’s because they are pretty easy to understand.

He chuckles.

“Don’t plant your garden unless you have all the seeds and all the fertilizer and everything else you need to make sure the garden grows. Maybe that tones it down a little bit?”

Joking aside, the planning is serious business. Davis says he works the plan as hard as he works the execution of it.

“You have to be prepared. The definition of success is where opportunity meets preparation. If you’re not prepared and opportunity comes, you won’t be successful,” he says. “You have to anticipate that opportunity is going to come and you have to do the work. If you don’t do the work, it doesn’t matter how much opportunity comes your way.”

RES Oklahoma is July 11-14 at Hard Rock Hotel & Casino, Tulsa. Register online at http://res.ncaied.org/