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You open your computer and ding! -- another invitation for a networking cocktail enters your inbox. This is the season for professional reunions and get togethers.

How do you feel?

You rub your hands together, excited at the thought of meeting lots of new potential customers?

Or frankly, you'd like to tell me that you are not comfortable attending these events. You hesitate to register even if it's time to grow your network. As you know, being in business is much more than doing what you do well

Latinos and immigrants fueled an uptick in new business creation nationally, reversing a four-year downward cycle, according to the 2015 Kauffman Index: Startup Activity released on Thursday.

The entrepreneurial activity increase in the 2015 Index – which reversed the downward trend since 2010 – was the largest year-over-year increase in two decades, according to the research. Yet the rebound remains well below historical trends, Kauffman researchers said. In the 2015 Index, 310 out of 100,000 a

As the 2016 election season begins, it's clear the growing demographic of Latino voters is highly coveted by candidates from both political parties. Amid the national conversation about the US Latino community, the Aspen Institute Latinos and Society Program recently hosted a Latinos and Society Inaugural Summit featuring conversations with Latino leaders on innovation, entrepreneurship, inclusion, and leadership (watch our Summit video playlist featuring each panel).

"America's future and growt

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Done right, networking can be the silver bullet for building your profile, gaining new business opportunities and building your career. But what happens when you show up to an event and just can't find ways to engage with others?

The secret to successful, strategic networking is to go alone.

For those who are hesitant to approach people on their own and strike up a conversation, taking someone along for support can in fact be a hindrance as you will likely use the event as a catch up. READ MORE

As more companies reach out to Latinas, one of the top online destinations for millennial women is launching a section that it hopes will resonate with the demographic.

"In our conversations with brands and advertisers, it is almost universally recognized that the Latina market is the fastest-growing market in the U.S., and it has great spending power and influence," said Anna Fieler, executive vice president of marketing at Popsugar. "It's a market that all brands want to reach."

Popsugar offic

The Hispanic market is growing at a fast pace, and marketing effectively to this group is quickly becoming a necessity rather than an option.

To make the biggest impact on your business right now, you need to re-evaluate your current marketing plans and strategies in order to respond to this dramatic consumer demographic shift.

According to a new report from the Association of Hispanics Advertising agencies, the top 500 U.S. marketers are currently allocating 8.4 percent of their overall ad spen

While there are some people who enjoy networking and get a lot of energy from interacting with a crowd, many find it intimidating and draining. Traditional networking is not for everyone.

However, networking is essential in today’s job market. Experts estimate that well over half of jobs are found through networking and word of mouth. The old job search method of comfortably sitting at your computer sending off résumés and cover letters will no longer get you very far.

Luckily for introverts, th

Educational attainment among U.S. Latinos has been changing rapidly in recent years, reflecting the group’s growth in the nation’s public K-12 schools and colleges. Over the past decade, the Hispanic high school dropout rate has declined and college enrollment has increased, even as Hispanics trail other groups in earning a bachelor’s degree.

Hispanics cited education as a top issue in 2014, ranking alongside the economy and above health care and immigration in importance, a Pew Research Center

While social networking’s popularity extends across ethnicities, conventional wisdom is correct in saying it is particularly important for US Hispanics. It’s not that they overindex as users of social networks across the board, but rather that social networking plays a distinct role in their digital activity, according to a new eMarketer report, “US Hispanics: What’s True, What’s Not True and What’s Sort of True in 2015.”

eMarketer estimates that 76.6% of US Hispanic internet users will access s

Note to job seekers (especially younger ones, perhaps): If you're weighing competing job offers from fast-growing start-ups, you might not want to post your thought process in a public forum, especially in language a company CEO might find insulting.

An anonymous job seeker took to the question-and-answer site Quora and asked for advice on whether he (presumably a he) should take a job with the $40 billion ride-sharing company Uber or the $4.5 billion automated human resources company Zenefits—b

Twelve years ago, Claudia Mirza walked into the Greater Dallas Hispanic Chamber of Commerce as a job applicant.

She walked out as her own boss — or, at least, with the idea of how she could create a business. But her company has far exceeded her original vision.

Akorbi started out doing translations. However, Mirza’s firm has evolved into more than just translating documents.

The Plano-based company regularly works with global corporations looking for ways to perform international transactions. 

According to the Pew Research Center, Latinos in the 18 to 24 year-old-age group have tripled their enrollment in college since 1993. The report says that while Hispanics are the largest minority group on college campuses, half of those who do go to college only earn a two-year degree.

“In 2013, among Hispanics ages 25 to 29, just 15 percent of Hispanics have a bachelor’s degree or higher,” the Pew Center reported. “By comparison, among the same age group, about 40 percent of whites have a bache

Relationships take time to grow. The Supremes understood this well when they sang, “You can’t hurry love / No, you just have to wait.” As with friendships, business relationships need time to flourish.

You have to attend more than one networking event to create the kind of rapport that will produce new business opportunities. A bond and trust must form before someone will feel comfortable enough to recommend you and your business to others.

Networking events provide an introduction to new profes

The Hispanic population is one of the most important demographic groups in the United States today. Among moms this is particularly true: 23 percent of all U.S. births are to Hispanic women. So any marketer looking to reach moms needs to understand Hispanic moms, and tailor their message accordingly, or they risk missing almost one in four of their target audience.

The Digital Toolbox is Key for Hispanic Moms
The data clearly indicate just how important digital media are for Hispanic moms lookin

The Teachers Insurance and Annuity Association - College Retirement Equities Fund (TIAA-CREF), a Fortune 100 investment company based in New York, released Monday a new study that focused on the personal finances of college-educated Latinos. They found that majority of Latinos are struggling to pay for their monthly expenses, and nearly 40 percent said they would have difficulty finding $2,000 in an emergency. 

The report collected data from the National Financial Capability Study in 2012, which

Despite numerous risk factors that should shorten their lives, Hispanics in the United States are generally healthier than non-Hispanic whites, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reported Tuesday in its first comprehensive report on the health of that large and growing ethnic group.

Despite being poorer and having less access to health insurance and health care, Hispanics suffer 35 percent less heart disease and 49 percent less cancer than whites, and according to another study cited

The face of the America's workforce is becoming increasingly more Hispanic, Robert Rodriguez, founder and president of Chicago-based DRR Advisors, told business leaders Thursday.

"Make no bones about it people, the workforce of the future is going to have an increasing Latino identity," he told about 60 corporate leaders at the National Hispanic Corporate Council's spring summit. The Washington-based nonprofit organization had its conference in Northwest Arkansas this week.

Hispanics account for

The longer you don't have a job, the harder it can be to find one.

It probably feels like you have been sidelined for an eternity and that your prospects of landing a job soon are slim to none. As skeptical as you have a right to be, that doesn't have to be the way it works out for you. You can and will get a new job.

The job market has heated up. The U.S. unemployment rate is at 5.5% right now, the lowest it's been since before the Great Recession, meaning that employers have fewer available wo

Entrepreneurial activity in the United States is in a historic slump, according to Gallup and the Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation for Entrepreneurship. But you’d never know it by looking at the data on Latina entrepreneurs. Latinas are the fastest growing cohort in the U.S. women’s entrepreneurial arena.

According to The State of Women-Owned Businesses 2014, a report commissioned by American Express OPEN, the number of Latina-owned firms has more than tripled since 1997 (up 206 percent), their