Day 1 of Hispanic Leadership Summit, 2024

Yesterday, The Hispanic Star kicked off our 7th Annual #HispanicStarSummit, which took place yesterday at IBM Headquarters in #NewYork and will continue the following two days at the United Nations . This year, we'll host 650 Latino leaders. Thousands more applied to fill the available slots. The response encourages us that we have real traction.

Yesterday, we brought together people from some of the 350 companies who have signed the #HispanicPromise — the first-of-its-kind corporate pledge to prepare, hire, promote, retain, and celebrate Latinos, as well as promote buying from Latino vendors and suppliers. A cohesive approach that aims to increase Latino representation and help companies as they necessarily step up their Hispanic strategy for growth. We have a true cross-section of people from strategic industries, Hispanic organizations, academics and other people with subject expertise. People came from major corporations, creative companies, media organizations, local and national community organizations, public officials and other leaders. We have corporate executives, creatives, media professionals, local leaders, community allies and international leaders.

Yesterday, we ran a large-scale workshop session where we could hear from experts, share best practices, and determine the areas of focus that will help move the needle for Hispanics across the six pillars of the Hispanic Promise.

Day Two has a different lens. Here we will scrutinize all the current data, the trends, the issues, and the issues of Hispanic consumers. Critically, this day is about perceptions of Latinos, still steeped in stereotypes and misinformation because perception drives reality. Any company wishing to genuinely connect with Latinos must understand the landscape and what it takes to build authentic relationships. As we know from our fielding of last year’s Hispanic Sentiment Study, Latinos do not see themselves or their values reflected in major brands or the media.

On the last day, we focus on community engagement. This session is about sparking dialogue and driving local action — insights and grassroots understanding of the Latino community. As an advocacy organization, we are committed to changing negative perceptions of the community that belie our true status as the population that is driving the prosperity, power, and progress of the United States. We must drive awareness in every aspect of our work because changing perceptions will change lives.

When we began this summit seven years ago, our primary purpose was to set a shared agenda for the Latino community. Back then, so many Latinos did not see themselves as part of the larger Latino population in the United States. Because of the extraordinary diversity within our group on almost every demographic data point, it was difficult to align. But the data pointed to one thing that all Latinos felt in common — the desire for progress. It was also important for us not to just talk among ourselves, so from the beginning, we have found our allies in all sectors and brought them on board. And so we began. Every year we have had more and more people come to hear the latest data on Latinos, understand our position in the context of national trends, to observe and participate in panels that touch on critical issues affecting our progress. But most of all, each year, after thoughtful discussions, we leave with a shared set of goals that we can work on individually and collectively.

Holding this summit every year informs, equips and galvanizes the participants to take their learnings back to their roles and be part of the change. I look forward to sharing the progress we make over these three days.