[citation needed] He co-authored two award-winning books with the late Arthur Manuel: Unsettling Canada: A National Wake-up Call and Reconciliation Manifesto.
As a young man, he worked as a fruit picker and a welder and rancher before he was elected Westbank band chief in 1976.
Over the next ten years he led his band in a period of rapid economic development, taking it from one of the poorest in British Columbia to one of the wealthiest.
[4] In 1986, the federal government launched an enquiry into Derrickson's tenure as chief in the form of the Hall Commission.
[7] His most recent book, Fight or Submit: Standing Tall in Two Worlds, is a finalist for the Indies Award in the Autobiography and Memoir category.