“The accent also leads”: Citlalli’s roadmap

The first obstacle was not an algorithm or a technical interview, but a quieter discomfort: speaking in public in another language. For months, networking exhausted her. Her accent felt like a constant reminder that she was new. “It was difficult for me at the beginning,” she admits. Over time, however, Citlalli found another way to read that sound. The accent could be a calling card, proof that she spoke more than one language and had already learned to move between codes. “The accent is a symbol,” she now explains. That reframing, modest on the surface and decisive in practice, sets the tone of a journey that avoids shortcuts: learn, plan, insist.

Her story matters because it turns an often abstract vocabulary – diversity, equity, inclusion, intersectionality – into concrete career decisions. It also sheds light on a recurring reality in skilled migration: previous experience that “does not count,” degrees the market devalues, careers that must be restarted. Faced with that landscape, Citlalli has articulated a two-pronged response. On one side, she built a new career in technology – “today I work in software development,” she says. On the other, from the presidency of Hispanotech, she strengthens a network that helps other Hispanic professionals secure relevant roles with fair pay and respect for their skills. Her biography is less a sequence of happy twists than a field-tested manual.

Originally from Mexico City, she arrived in Canada with a solid foundation: a master’s degree in innovation and certificates in several fields. That base, she soon discovered, did not guarantee automatic entry. “When I emigrated, I understood that previous experience often does not count: the system pushes you to ‘start from scratch’,” she recalls. The phrase is not a complaint, but a diagnosis that guides her decisions. Before leaving, she had applied for permanent residence from Mexico, in a process that took “more than four years.” Arriving with status resolved spared her the uncertainty of temporary permits. She began working in logistics through her network back home, only to find a familiar pattern: a heavily male dominated industry, as it had been in Mexico.

That realization became a hinge. Rather than wait for recognition in a sector that felt too familiar, she tried another door: recruitment. The move made sense. Joining the “search side” expanded her contacts, taught her how resumes are filtered and exposed her to conversations about profiles, skills and salaries. Later, she gained experience at the Mexican Consulate and in other organizations. Looking back, she recognizes a blind spot: “For years I advanced without a clear strategy,” she says. What she learned is not minor. In Canada, the straight line is rarely the shortest. A career without a compass can wear itself out in loops.

That lesson became a guideline she now repeats as president of Hispanotech. The association, she explains, wants Hispanic professionals to avoid being trapped in “survival jobs” far below their level. The goal is to translate talent into real opportunities with fair salaries and recognition of skills. To get there, she insists on a missing piece from her early years: early strategy. “Define a plan from the beginning: build networks, set clear goals and do not settle for less than you deserve,” she summarizes. In that script, professional mobility becomes less random when it is designed with method.

Her own path into technology shows what that conversion looks like. Leaving logistics was not only changing fields. It meant accepting that she had to learn again, managing imposter syndrome, sitting through technical evaluations and tolerating the bias that sometimes blocks a first interview “because you have a last name or an ethnic name.” She lists these variables without drama, like someone solving a realistic equation. At the same time, she sharpened her reading of male dominated environments, inside and outside software engineering. “In logistics and technology, leadership is mostly male,” she notes. In that context, the word visibility takes on practical shape: inviting women to panels, handing over microphones, acknowledging work, opening doors. She frames it not as a gesture of political correctness, but as an efficiency measure: diverse teams take better decisions.

Being the first woman to serve as president of Hispanotech adds a symbolic layer to her leadership. “It is a great pride,” she says. The fact, as she recounts it, functions as a signal to those coming after her. The presidency is not an isolated goal. She reads it as a platform so that other women leaders do not have to navigate the same obstacles. “We have to work twice as hard to be seen,” she acknowledges. So when she describes her priorities, she emphasizes mentoring processes, inter-organizational alliances and an internal culture that celebrates achievements without pettiness. In her view, the equation has three elements: share opportunities and resources, raise hiring standards and communicate positive stories with pride.

The migration chapter anchors her story in facts. She secured permanent residence before arriving, avoiding status fragility. She took a first role in logistics through contacts, moved into recruitment to access information and networks, worked at the Mexican Consulate and in “different organizations,” and today works in software development. None of this is presented as a finish line. Her emphasis rests on method: diagnosing bias, turning accent into advantage, setting measurable goals, sustaining a learning curve and asking for the recognition that corresponds. “Do not settle for less,” she insists.

The obstacles she lists are familiar – and that familiarity should not normalize them. Industries dominated by men. Filters that exclude by name, accent or origin. The linguistic fatigue that makes professional socialization uphill. She adds a self critique that is rare in success profiles: for years she advanced “without a clear strategy.” Seeing that, she says, helped her correct it. The collateral benefit is clear. It gave her tools to accompany others through the same adjustment.

Verifiable milestones appear in sequence and without grandiosity: a master’s degree in innovation and multiple certificates; a professional transition from logistics to technology; current work in software development; the presidency of Hispanotech – “I am the first woman to preside over the association,” she notes – and the definition of a programmatic approach built on planning, networks and salary standards. There is no heroics; there is a web of actions sustained over time.

The community dimension occupies a central place in her agenda. Citlalli diagnoses an internal weakness: “We need to celebrate the successes of others more.” The phrase points to a cultural pivot. When individual achievements are read as collective victories, the community narrative grows stronger and its members accumulate symbolic and material capital. The other piece is organizational. “We need more collaboration between associations,” she argues. Her case is practical: there are valuable efforts in several provinces, but “little unity.” Sharing resources – from calls to mentors – multiplies impact. That is the method Hispanotech promotes: alliances so that “the work of our volunteers goes further.”

In perspective, her understanding of Latino identity is less about discursive celebration than about work discipline. In Canada, she says, she discovered a vocabulary for experiences she already intuited: diversity, equity, inclusion, intersectionality. Understanding those concepts did not send her to rhetoric; it led her to choose contexts where that grammar becomes procedure: fairer selection processes, transparent evaluation criteria, representation in decision making spaces. The link between theory and operation appears over and over in the way she argues.

Where does her compass point? To consolidating a technical trajectory – continuing to grow in software development – and, in parallel, institutionalizing what the community has learned: sustained mentoring, collaborative networks, public celebrations of professional milestones and, above all, a culture that pushes back against self limitation. There is no moral or promise of epic. There is a sober conviction: a plan beats improvisation.

The closing, like her leadership, is pragmatic. Citlalli does not hide fatigue or minimize bias; she names, measures and designs against it. In her voice, the accent stopped being a brake and became a credential. The presidency of Hispanotech stopped being a personal achievement and turned into an instrument. And “starting from scratch” – a phrase many hear when they migrate – became a roadmap: learning, planning, networking, demanding standards. “The key is to support each other,” she sums up. It does not sound like a slogan. It sounds like a method.