Diversity Best Practices Names Andrés Tapia New President

Diversity Best Practices (DBP) announced the appointment of Andrés Tapia to the new position of president, effective Jan. 10, 2011. Mr. Tapia will be responsible for the growth and direction of DBP, a membership organization for large U.S. and global companies. Diversity Best Practices is a part of Working Mother Media, a division of global media company Bonnier.

“I am thrilled to bring Andrés on board,” says Carol Evans, president of Working Mother Media. “His deep knowledge and strategic vision will take DBP to the next level of service for our fast-growing membership. In 2010, we launched our Assessment and Benchmarking Tool, expanded our CEO initiative, held our Global Best Practice Session in Beijing, China, and expanded our research capabilities. As president, Andrés will accelerate this strong momentum and lead DBP to new levels of thought leadership. Andrés is a rock star of diversity and inclusion work.”

Most recently, Tapia was chief diversity officer and emerging workforce solutions leader at Hewitt, one of the leading global human resources consulting and outsourcing companies. He was responsible for shaping and steering the company’s global diversity strategies with deep links to the business. While there, he led the effort to create innovative, high-impact diversity and intercultural learning and inspired his team to develop creative and effective enhancements to the full spectrum of best practices in diversity. As a direct result of making diversity business-relevant for Hewitt, Tapia also launched and led Hewitt’s Diversity and Emerging Workforce consulting practice and worked with Fortune 500 clients globally. He was also the catalyst for a groundbreaking Hewitt/Ariel study on the relationship between retirement savings and race/ethnicity.

“I believe that diversity is the mix; inclusion is making the mix work,” says Tapia. “As the world has been turned upside-down economically, politically and demographically, company leaders are looking for new solutions for never-before-seen problems — and effective diversity and inclusion management is at the heart of being able to do this. Con todo entusiasmo — with much enthusiasm — I look forward to leading and partnering with the highly skilled and passionate professionals at Diversity Best Practices and to collaborating with our members in shaping the diversity field and its impact on companies, employees and society.”

Tapia grew up in Lima, Peru, in a bilingual, bicultural home with a Peruvian father and an American mother. He is the author of The Inclusion Paradox: The Obama Era and the Transformation of Global Diversity (2009). A sought-after keynote speaker, Tapia has been featured in media worldwide including the Wall Street Journal, The New York Times, CNN en Español, Fortune, La Nación, El Clarín, Forbes Asia, Chosun and many HR industry publications. Tapia has received numerous recognitions, including Hewitt Exemplary Leader Award, Chicago United’s Business Leader of Color Award, Hispanic Alliance for Career Enhancement Éxito Award, and the Diversity Ad Campaign of the Year, granted by the Minorities in Advertising Foundation. He is a Leadership Greater Chicago fellow and serves on the executive committee of the Board of Luna Negra Dance Theater. Tapia holds a B.A. in history with an emphasis on journalism and political science from Northwestern University. He is married to Lori, a musician; they have a 19-year-old daughter, Marisela, who is a flamenco dance student at the University of New Mexico in Albuquerque.

About Diversity Best Practices

Diversity Best Practices (DBP) (www.diversitybestpractices.com), based in New York, is the pre-eminent organization for diversity thought leaders to share best practices and develop innovative solutions for culture change. Through research, benchmarking, publications and events, DBP provides its corporate members with valued resources, information and strategies on how to implement, grow, measure and create best-in-class diversity programs. Diversity Best Practices is part of Working Mother Media, a division of Bonnier Corp.

About Bonnier Corp.

Bonnier Corp. (www.bonniercorp.com) is one of the largest consumer-publishing groups in America and is the leading media company serving passionate, highly engaged audiences, through 50 special-interest magazines and related multimedia projects and events. Bonnier Corp. is the U.S. division of the Bonnier Group (www.bonnier.com), a 200-year-old, family-owned media group based in Sweden with business operations in 25 countries.