Things to Remember When Hiring Hispanic Talent for Business

Hiring Hispanic talent for business has now become a necessity, whether it’s due to the rise in the Hispanic population, the need for diversity in the workplace, or a way of targeting the Hispanic population for brand growth.

Most businesses in the USA understand that including Latino talent is the only way to reach the Hispanic population. This is the reason they actively seek people from the Latino community.

While this is an excellent way to involve minorities and help them feel valued, most brands lack cultural awareness. Consequently, they either end up recruiting people based on their resumes, or fail to make the environment inclusive.

If you are a business owner trying to expand your team by adding Hispanic talent, here are some of the things that you need to keep in mind during the hiring process and after hiring.

Understand Diversity

Most businesses are not familiar with the fact that the Hispanic population is more diverse than they think. A common misconception in the USA is that Hispanics mainly come from Mexico. While the majority of the Latinos in the USA can be traced back to Mexico due to the high number of Mexican immigrants, limiting them to just one country is just insensitive.

While hiring your Hispanic team members, make sure to learn about their culture, social values, and their preferred way of communication. While most Hispanics share common customs, some of the festivals and public holidays are specific to the countries as well.

Moreover, it is always better to hire people from different backgrounds, races, and origins, as it will eventually help with marketing. Study reveals that diverse teams bring a wide range of perceptive, experiences, and cultural knowledge, which eventually helps with creative marketing. Apart from this, it helps in reaching a wider audience without offending people or receiving backlash.

Focus On Language

When hiring Hispanic team members, make sure they are bilingual. Most of the Hispanics living in the USA today are second-generation immigrants. They were born and raised in the US, so they lack proficiency in Spanish.

On the contrary, new immigrants coming from other countries might be good at work and can speak Spanish, but they lack fluency in English.

While hiring a Latino team member, the recruiter needs to ensure that the candidate is bilingual. There are language proficiency tests that can be conducted while hiring to make sure that the candidate can seamlessly converse in both languages.

Hiring a bilingual employee is not just good for team communication, but will eventually help in customer support and avoiding marketing blunders.

A brand like Spectrum offering internet services in the USA is already using this strategy to reach out wider audience. They have a dedicated numero de Spectrum where Spanish-speaking users can reach out and inquire about packages and other details in Spanish.

Prioritize Skills

When hiring Hispanic employees, the company needs to focus on skills more than background and social skills. One of the biggest mistakes that most employees make while hiring Hispanic talent is to consider it as a diversity hire. While hiring just for the sake of diversity is good, in the long run, the company might have to face financial consequences.

A good way to interview a Hispanic candidate is by focusing on the technical test without considering their ethnicity. For the sake of transparency, it is preferred that the person handling the technical test is issued a number per candidate. This will remove biases like gender; ethnicity, race, religion, etc.

Most companies prefer taking technical tests online, which also helps in reducing the chance of bias. Apart from hiring, prioritizing skills will also help the company reduce the turnover rate and boost the rate of retention for each employee.

Ask For Portfolio

Apart from technical skills, the portfolio is a very good way to assess the overall performance of the candidate. It will also help the employer to understand if the candidate has an understanding of a related field and has handled projects within a similar niche.

While most candidates overstate their experience, a glance at their portfolio might prove otherwise. This is the reason companies ensure that candidate within certain fields i.e. designing, development, and project management bring their portfolio along.

This also helps in improving overall work transparency so the employee can perform the tasks that are required. However, make sure that the employee has room for learning, as this will eventually help with the overall retention period of the candidate as well.

Simply put, the hiring process can be lengthy, but each step can contribute to the overall outcome.

From screening skills to ensuring communication, every test is important. However, most of the brands overlook team building and networking skills. Make sure you focus on these details to create a more harmonious office environment.