Understanding Latinx culture
The ILCA recently sponsored a webinar, presented by Bernie Carranza, called “Lost in Translation: The Five Things Businesses Must Understand About the Latinx Culture”. We were excited for the opportunity to learn from this discussion that focused on bridging the gap between cultures. Latinx and Spanish-speaking employees are integral to the success of the landscape and nursery industry, making up over 50% of the workforce. Quite simply, without our Latinx managers, supervisors, crew members, office associates, and teammates, Mariani Plants, and many other companies like ours, wouldn’t be able to operate.
In the webinar, Mr. Carranza talks about fundamental aspects of Latinx culture that may be misunderstood by those of us who are not part of the Latino community. He discusses how this can be as simple as the differences in our handshakes, to the varying ways that we show respect for one another, to the complexities regarding how our Latinx team members may demonstrate ambition or their desire to advance within the company, and how those differences can be misinterpreted. After the webinar concluded, it was clear that this discussion could have gone on for hours. While one hour is clearly not enough to fully explore the many intricacies of our cultural differences, I think it served as a great starting point for future conversations.
For some of us, this type of conversation may be long overdue. It can be difficult to know where to begin when it comes to bridging the divide between cultures, especially when there is a language barrier. During his discussion, Mr. Carranza mentioned how seemingly simple acts like sharing a meal together or putting in the effort to speak to our Latino and Latina team members in Spanish when possible (regardless of how good or bad our pronunciation may be) can open to door to better dialogue. We hope to be part of more industry-wide conversations like this one, since we all know that any workplace is stronger when we respect one another and understand not just what makes us different, but what we have in common.
