THINK AND GROW RICH: A Latino Choice
Lionel Sosa was a 23-year-old, minimum-wage worker when he was inspired by Napoleon Hill's best-selling motivational book. Now the author and founder of the largest Hispanic advertising agency in the country seeks to improve the lives of others in his community with Think & Grow Rich: A Latino Choice, a special version of the literature that transformed his life.
Mr. Sosa, the author of The Americano Dream: How Latinos Can Achieve Success in Business and Life, digs into his past and pulls from an inspirational piece he read before jumpstarting his career, which led to media consultant positions in six presidential campaigns since 1980. He cites Mr. Hill's "17 Principles of Success" from Think & Grow Rich, and shows how other prominent Hispanics have applied the methods along their paths to achievement.
Mr. Hill's Think & Grow Rich has inspired people to achieve the American Dream since it was published in 1937. The Napoleon Hill Foundation says the book has sold "in excess of 25 million copies."
"Some have asked, 'Why do Latinos need a special version of the book?'" Mr. Sosa says. "It is because there is a cultural difference in the way we were taught and the country we came from. It adds to our richness, but it also detracts from our ability to get ahead.
"I've found in my research that Latinos tend to have lower expectations. Unconsciously, Latinos just feel happy to be here and lucky to just do 'blank.' But their intelligence and their talent are greater than the goal they've set for themselves. This book can get Latinos thinking a different way, showing them, 'I can do a lot more than I'm doing now.'"
Mr. Sosa designed the book to cover each of the 17 principles and show how they apply to members of the Hispanic community.
But he said the methods are based on the belief that "you can achieve whatever your mind believes you can achieve."
"This book gets you to believe that you can achieve higher than you thought you could," Mr. Sosa says.
The author founded Sosa, Bromley, Aguilar & Associates, which is now Bromley Communications, the largest Hispanic advertising agency in the nation. Mr. Sosa has also served as a media consultant in six presidential elections since 1980.
LEVERAGING DIVERSITY AT WORK
Understanding the power of diversity and using key methods to maintain a harmonious workforce are the subjects of a new book from the "Inside Out Empowering Series."
Authors Kim Olver and Sylvester Baugh boast that Leveraging Diversity at Work can show companies, "How to hire, retain and inspire a diverse workforce for peak performance and profit." The book details the kind of value a diverse workforce brings to a company, and offers instruction for creating a comfortable environment through methods that go beyond the common one-day diversity-training session.
"And this is more than management implementing training and expecting people to follow it," Ms. Olver says. "It's about giving people a reason for why they should care. We want to try to develop an understanding for the majority about what it might be like to be the minority, and help the minority understand what it's like to be the majority."
