LatinoLEAD is a cross-sector consortium of Latinos working together to advance our collective influence, success and power. Our members include corporate, civic, non-profit, business and academic leaders. We strive to increase our knowledge on pressing issues facing Latinos in Minnesota, spotlight successes and cultivate LatinoLEAD as a respected force of influence.
Our mission
Latino leaders across all sectors join together to create innovative strategies to drive and define policies and perceptions that advance Latino collective influence, success and power.
Guiding principles
Our actions, interactions, and reactions within the context of this consortium will reflect and demonstrate our core values — both as outward facing values to the greater communities we serve as well as inward facing in the manner in which we collaborate with each other so as to innovate solutions for the most pressing challenges before us.
History & background
In February of 2013, Luz Maria Frias, Vice President, Community Impact at The Minneapolis Foundation and Mike Fernandez, Corporate Vice President at Cargill, initiated dialogue around joining forces in the forming of a Latino leadership group.
Over the course of the next several months, Latino leaders and professionals came together to begin defining the group’s organizational framework. Informal meetings and discussions began to move the group towards a more formal structure. Surveys and questionnaires were initiated, input was solicited from would-be “members,” and other national organizations looked to as potential models.