That’s why the Congressional Hispanic Caucus Institute (CHCI) focuses on cultivating and nurturing the next generation of Latino leaders who are committed to public service, from recruitment into Congressional internships to placement in select public policy fellowships. As they ensure this growing demographic is represented across organizational and political leadership at all levels, their needs are changing.

CHCI came to us with multiple ambitious messaging goals: reaching and engaging a wider Latinx audience, and shifting their messaging to present young Latinx leaders as agents and shapers of their own destinies, rather than simply as beneficiaries in need of help. They also wanted to let the outside world — not simply the Hill — know of the extraordinary talent within the Latinx community ready to bring honed skills and valuable perspective to organizations, campaigns, and companies across the country.

The built-in challenge here was the simple fact that the Latinx community is no monolith. DBTers’ own roots range from Puerto Rico, Nicaragua, and El Salvador to Chile, Argentina, and Mexico — we have lived firsthand the extraordinary diversity of this community. The lived experiences of our staff and our overall cultural competency guided our comprehensive discovery process with stakeholders across CHCI.

Over the course of a few weeks, DBT held conversations with various CHCI stakeholders, including staffers who’d been around the organization for more than a decade, students currently in CHCI programs, and alumni who are now top executives in their field. Together with stakeholders, we explored what CHCI was already doing well, as well as the challenges and opportunities the organization currently faced. 

Taking what we learned in discovery, DBT strategists then developed custom audience personas and outreach strategies, and a core message frame and tone of voice recommendations that provided a blueprint for how CHCI could communicate about the organization and its work to each of these audience personas.  

With the new audience personas and core message frame complete, CHCI—the only organization that focuses directly on cultivating and investing in Latinx leaders, at all levels, right now—is prepared to reach an audience outside of Capitol Hill and let the world know that the Latinx community is powerful, talented, and growing.