Hispanic Enterprise - December 2007/January 2008 - (Page 48) SUCCESS & MOTIVATION GMC lured a young Sally Garza Fernandez away from law school to help design a strategy for the Hispanic market. were off in California. Only one executive remained behind, and he was preparing to retire. Garza Fernandez knew she had her work cut out for her. First on her agenda was gaining the community’s trust and support by reversing the company’s highly secure closeddoor policy that up until then had created suspicion and uncertainty. “I started a community advisory council and ran an image campaign,” she says. Her very deliberate goal was “letting the world know who we are, what we do. My job was communications, public affairs, lobbying.” Garza Fernandez made sure the community understood Hughes’s significant place in aircraft history, that the company was vital to the nation’s security and that it was a huge local employ48 er that supported many local businesses. By providing some transparency, she hoped to help the community see it had a huge stake in the company. Within 10 weeks, the Tucson community’s view of the company “went from 100 percent negative to 99 percent positive,” she says proudly. “I’m a fixer. A problem solver.” Garza Fernandez was rewarded with further high-level positions at Hughes, and she stayed with the company for five more years before striking out on her own. First came The Fernandez Group, the consultancy she started while still at Hughes. People unsurprisingly brought her their problems—from environmental issues to crisis management to product launches—until she was serving some 60 clients. Big clients. “Our first contract was on behalf of the entire manufacturing sector in the state [of Arizona], which was a very big deal,” she says. Electricity was being deregulated and she led a massive coalition of manufacturers to stand up to the giant utilities. “We say we won,” she recalls. “They say they won. But the important thing is that we got people to cooperate. My strength is getting people to cooperate.” Before long The Fernandez Group began expanding into multiple manufacturing and technological endeavors. From 2002-2003 Garza Fernandez served on the executive committee of the Arizona’s Manufacturers Association, where she espoused a best-practices concept called “technology clustering.” HISPANIC ENTERPRISE December/January 2008
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