Cambridge Business Association
HR and the New Hispanic Workforce
Book

HR and the New Hispanic Workforce

A Comprehensive Guide to Cultivating and Leveraging Employee Success

Louis E. V. Nevaer and Vaso Perimenis Ekstein
Davies-Black Publishing, 2007
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Editorial Rating

7

Qualities

  • Innovative
  • Well Structured
  • Overview

Recommendation

Louis Nevaer and Vaso Perimenis Ekstein advocate accommodating Hispanic culture and workers in your workplace. They argue that you should make changes in that direction and explain how to make them. While the authors sometimes blur the difficult line between separating out a group as “minorities” or, instead, being culturally sensitive, their advice makes sense to the extent that your company has Hispanic employees and job applicants. The authors’ counsel on how to check for hidden bias in your workplace is quite good, although their mandate for bilingualism may apply only in places where that is already an expected element of the local culture. Employers will benefit from the book’s discussion of the cultural significance of work and extended family for Hispanics. getAbstract recommends this book to human resource managers working with Hispanic employees, with the note that the applicability and practicality of some of its suggestions may depend on the individual needs of your particular company.

Summary

Selecting Great Hispanic Employees

You want a diverse workplace and you want to hire Hispanic workers in a proportion that reflects their population in your community. However, traditional recruiting methods aren’t working because the Hispanic population is more educationally and occupationally diverse than other ethnic groups. For example, if you are looking for Hispanic workers with college degrees, you will find most of them in and around Miami, Florida. If your community has Hispanic workers from Mexico, you will find generally low educational attainment among them, not because they aren’t hungry to learn, but because they suffer from Mexico’s pitiful education system. Another problem is the subtle, almost unconscious, forms of bias most native English speakers have toward English spoken with a strong Spanish accent. In many cases, the English speakers need to make extra efforts to learn from and relate to their Hispanic co-workers, who were born and raised in Latin countries, and have had far different life experiences.

When you interview Hispanic candidates, take the time to understand their cultural norms. For example, Hispanics show respect in ways that many...

About the Authors

Louis E.V. Nevaer has written 10 books. He speaks often on Hispanic issues and consults with corporations about the Hispanic marketplace. Vaso Perminis Ekstein owns a consulting service and has worked as a corporate human resources vice president.

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