This emotional connection is especially true of Latino talent. My doctorate work focused on the emotional intelligence attributes of Latino professionals and showed that Latinos are highly influenced by emotional intelligence when making decisions. As a result, when Latino job seekers make decisions about which organizations to join, they will often follow their emotional instincts.

I came across this great study by the consulting firm Garcia Trujillo and Newslink (video below) which highlights the emotional connection organizations have with Latinos, or lack thereof. Unfortunately, many organizations still fail in doing so. According to the results:

About one-in-three Hispanics (35%) believe they get a fair shake in the workplace, but nearly two-thirds (65%) report that Hispanic workers face serious obstacles to advancement….

 60% [of Latinos] believe U.S. companies are committed to their Hispanic employees; however, when asked to estimate how many Hispanics are currently in management or in leadership roles in companies in the U.S., most Hispanics thought it was 10% or less.  Still, more than nine of ten respondents said that it is “very important” (63%) or “important” (34%) for U.S. companies to hire Hispanics in management positions.

My research and this study clearly show that it takes more than branding to recruit and retain Latino talent. Organizations need to “emotionally connect” with Latino talent to effectively recruit them. Organizations not only have to present a compelling reason to attract Latino talent, but provide a better reason to keep them.

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Diversity Inc

• Their workforces are on par with U.S. census percentage of Latinos (about 13 percent), but they have 7.5 percent of managers who are Latino, compared with 6.8 percent nationally. Even more important, 9 percent of management promotions on average went to Latinos at these companies
• Their boards of directors are 10.3 percent Latino, compared with 3.1 percent nationally (Hispanic Association on Corporate Responsibility)
• On average, 9.4 percent of their employees are members of their Latino or Hispanic employee-resource groups

…Instead we intend to portray the content in CAP en Español in way that demonstrates how a particular issue or set of issues are important for the Latino community and communities of color. This is easier to do for some issues than it is for others.

Now, there’s something to be said for treating people as individuals and not “members of groups” in terms of formulating public policy. But group-based discrimination requires group-based remedies, and anything less risks avoiding the inequalities and power differentials that actually hinder marginalized groups.

The challenge they are having is that by connecting faster, more lightly and more frequently, most are simply creating a faster, lighter and pervasive BLACK HOLE 3.0.  Following companies on Twitter, Liking them on Facebook or joining their Company Page on LinkedIn do nothing to alleviate the frustration that job seekers feel, in fact, it has great potential to make it worse..

While aimed at recruiting students to college, much of what Dr. Romero discusses in his Four Part series is appplicable to recruiting Hispanic college graduates.

In fact, Part Four of the series focuses on  professional transition.  Enjoy!

This article in the Washington Post provides an overview of the growing number of firms charging students thousands of dollars for an internship opportunity (the cost might also cover housing, meals, career advice, etc.). Ironically, some of these internships are unpaid. You can probably imagine the debate over such pursuits. Many on the career center side suggest this undermines a student’s capacity to develop strong career search skills – the very kind they’ll need later in their careers. Not to mention, career centers already offer these services to students, paid usually through student service fees.  

I’ve been following this trend for a while now. Browsing through a few students’ Facebook pages recently, I found they were very satisfied with the services, especially at a time when organizations are cutting back on their internship opportunities. Others comment that these firms are undermining equal opportunity, especially for students that can’t afford to pay for these services. Are we creating a new class of leaders  – or elites?

 You be the judge.

Rankings are not evil. Students and families need information. Four years of undergraduate education is not a trivial commitment. But the rankings game is on the verge of parodying itself. Worse, it threatens to drive strategic decisions on campuses in ways that have little to do with what should be important.

Update

The Chronicle of Higher Education comes out with a similar article on rankings -  along with a detailed graphic. The article’s money line is here and well said:

Much of the emphasis is on “input measures” such as student selectivity, faculty-student ratio, and retention of freshmen. Except for graduation rates, almost no “outcome measures,” such as whether a student comes out prepared to succeed in the work force, are used.