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Library of Congress Cataloging‐in‐Publication Data
Names: Carbajal, Frank, author. | Morey, José, author. Title: Latinx business success : how Latinx ingenuity, innovation, and tenacity are driving some of the world’s biggest companies / Frank Carbajal, José Morey.
Description: Hoboken, New Jersey : Wiley, [2022] | Includes index. Identifiers: LCCN 2021045300 (print) | LCCN 2021045301 (ebook) | ISBN 9781119840817 (hardback) | ISBN 9781119840831 (adobe pdf) | ISBN 9781119840800 (epub)
Subjects: LCSH: Hispanic American businesspeople. | Leadership. Classification: LCC HD2358.5.U6 C38 2022 (print) | LCC HD2358.5.U6 (ebook) | DDC 658.4/0908968073—dc23 LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2021045300LC ebook record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2021045301
Cover Design: Paul McCarthy
Cover Art: Getty Images Tape: © Emilija Manevska Globe: © Chad Baker
Dedicate my book to my parents Regino and Hermelinda Carbajal My wife Molly, and children Alia, Myla and Bria
—Frank Carbajal
To my son, José, mis padres, Juan y Ivonne, mi hermano, Juancy, mi hermana, Carmen, mis abeulos, todos mi sobrinos y sobrinas y Puerto Rico. You are always in my heart.
—José Morey
FOREWORD
This is an important book at this moment in time as the U.S. Latino population becomes increasingly accountable for the economic well‐being of our country. Frank Carbajal learned about economic accountability early in his life while helping his parents make ends meet. His experiences as the son of migrant agricultural workers provides the foundation for this book, which begins with his own story of his journey from a one‐bedroom home for his family of seven in El Centro, California, to his successful career in the Silicon Valley.
Carbajal then does the same for many successful Latino and Latina individuals who also came from humble beginnings, faced economic and racist hardships, but found the inner strength to persevere and achieve their dreams. The reader is taken on personal journeys of exemplary leaders in a broad spectrum of sectors of our society.
The author attempts to weave a thread through all of the stories regarding the qualities these role models possess that can be an inspiration to young Latinos and Latinas seeking to find their own way to success. He also calls out his own perspectives, as well as those of his subjects in this book, on what is needed in America to foster the success of this cohort, and to realize the full potential of U.S. Latinos across the country in every sector of our economy.
I believe Frank Carbajal's hope in compiling these inspiring stories is for you, the reader, to find the whole of this book to be greater than the sum of its parts.
—Sol Trujillo Chairman of Trujillo Group LLC
PREFACE
FROM IMPERIAL VALLEY TO THE SILICON VALLEY
My parents' journey started on an adverse path from Mexico to the Imperial Valley of California, in the 1960s during the Bracero Program, which allowed Mexicans to work on their journey toward American citizenship. The youngest of five children, I was born in El Centro, California, on June 19, 1969. My mother shared with me that she worked “like a burro” up until her third trimester, spending 10 to 12 hours a day in the fields. Sometimes she worked in the blistering heat of 110 degrees, often feeling like she wasn't going to make it. Pure determination pushed my mother through these conditions. My father also worked these long hours; however, he was treated with more fairness as a male migrant worker at the time. My parents simply taught us about a good work ethic, but more importantly to take that hard work into the classroom. My father knew how to communicate his thoughts and express his frustration with my mother working these long hours and having to begin work again only a few days after I was born.
My dad at that point began to realize the importance of being a father, a man of the household. We did not have much of a house with seven of us in a one‐bedroom home in El Centro, California.
After I was two years old, my father had the ambition to move us to the Santa Clara Valley, today known as the Silicon Valley. In 1973 my parents were fortunate to find positions in canneries, which was an industry that was considered better than working in the fields.
However, my parents could afford to live in only one place: an area known as Meadowfair, which was based in East San José, California, and known as a barrio (Spanish‐speaking neighborhood).
This was a great success for my father because we moved into a four‐bedroom home. Everything my parents needed was within a two‐mile radius, such as the well‐known Mexican shopping center known as Tropicana, which had everything from clothes to food.
From a bird's‐eye view, in the early 1970s the Silicon Valley resembled a salad bowl. About three miles east from my childhood home were orchards for picking seasonal fruit. However, to the west and north of my neighborhood the Silicon Valley companies, such as Apple, were beginning to take shape.
I didn't learn English until the second grade. Being integrated into a mainstream school, I realized at a young age that we were at a disadvantage compared with the kids who were White and Asian and who lived in the middle‐class neighborhoods known as Evergreen and Creekside. Many of the White kids were from families of the Mormon faith, and their parents worked in the electronics industry. This neighborhood was about three miles from my neighborhood. They appeared to have everything we did not in terms of connectivity to the school, and the inequity was realized early on. However, what we had in my home was an unconditional love that felt so warm and reassuring. For example, my father was determined to instill confidence in me and protect me from any negative influences.
My working life started when I was eight years old, just about to turn nine.
Every summer, my parents showed my four siblings and me the value of the work ethic by taking us to pick cherries, apricots, and at times strawberries in the Silicon Valley. The most difficult part was waking up between
