Salsa, Soul, and Spirit
Leadership for a Multicultural Age
Our nation is quickly becoming a multicultural cornucopia. Tapping the potential of our changing demographics requires a leadership approach that resonates with our growing diversity. In Salsa, Soul, and Spirit, Juana Bordas shows how incorporating Latino, African-American, and American Indian approaches to leadership into the mainstream has the potential to strengthen leadership and inspire today’s ethnically rich workforce.
Bordas identifies nine leadership principles common to all three cultures. Principles deeply rooted in each culture’s values and developed under the most trying conditions. Using a lively blend of personal reflections, interviews with leaders, historical background, and insightful analysis, she shows how these principles were developed and illustrates the creative ways they’ve been put into practice. Bordas weaves these principles together into a multicultural model that offers a more flexible and inclusive way to lead.

Juana and Monica Perez celebrate the release of the 2nd edition of Salsa, Soul, and Spirit
Multicultural leadership resonates with many cultures and encourages diverse people to actively engage, contribute and tap their potential. In a globalized economy, success for leaders will rest on their ability to shift to a multicultural approach. Salsa, Soul, and Spirit provides conceptual and practical guidelines for beginning that process. The second edition speaks to how the Millennial generation value diversity and resonate with the leadership principles in communities of color.
“This wonderful book made me want to dance with joy. In Western society, we suffer from a loss of community and spirit because we’re so disconnected. American Indian, Latino and African American cultures have never forgotten that we need to be together, and that diversity is not a problem, but a blessing. May this book lead you to discover what we’ve been missing – each other.”
“Juana Bordas has broken new ground. She has documented and analyzed the effective and unique practices of Latino, Black, and American Indian leaders. Salsa, Soul and Spirit is a fascinating read that shows us the road to leadership for a multicultural America.”
“Salsa, Soul, and Spirit is a refreshing and inspiring vision of a new form of leadership for the 21st Century. Bordas captures the unique but successful models of leadership developed by racial and ethnic minorities. Our nation would greatly benefit from leaders who embody these traits.”
“A penetrating, highly personal study of American India, Black, and Latino leadership, presented in a manner that should attract a wide readership. A multicultural study at its best.”
*His book Leadership is consider seminal work in the field of leadership studies.
“Salsa, Soul, and Spirit fills a necessary void in the study of leadership with its integration of the common elements of spiritual and programmatic leadership that are typical of minority approaches to social problems and which also builds the basis for coalition politics…”
“Frequently, people say it is too hard to have both excellence and diversity. Salsa, Soul and Spirit show not only why it doesn’t have to be that hard, but also why it is critically important at this moment in history to develop organizational leadership that is both excellent and diverse. People need to read this book.”