The Daily News Journal

Ed Gumucio of Hablemos teaches Spanish to Faye Porterfield, senior personal banker with Bank of America in Smyrna, left, and teller Pat McMurley. (DNJ photo by J. Intintoli)

The solution was Spanish lessons at Hablemos, an area business specializing in bringing customized Spanish classes to work. Hablemos is Spanish for "let's talk."

"There is a large Spanish presence in the Nashville area," said Eduardo Gumucio, president of Hablemos. "Learning some Spanish empowers employers and employees to better serve their customers. You'll find that the Hispanic market is a very loyal one. They appreciate people taking the effort to communicate with them."

Porterfield said the opportunity to take classes at Hablemos was a wonderful solution.

"We are always looking to diversify our customer base, and this really helps us reach out to a large - often untapped - customer base," she said.

Although other banks have since offered the opportunity for Spanish lessons through Hablemos, Gumucio said that Bank of America was the first.

"Bank of America has been very sensitive to the needs of the Hispanic market. Other banks have followed their lead, but Bank of America is very in tune with the Hispanic market."

Scott McCormick, Bank of America president for Rutherford County, agrees.

"We have always recognized the importance of the Hispanic market. We were the first commercial bank to introduce Spanish-language ATM machines, for instance," McCormick said.

Other Hablemos clients include HCA, Cintas, Phillips Builders, The Jones Company and Nissan.

"We have run a series four classes in conversational Spanish for 50 people," said Tom Groom, Nissan director of human resources. Employees taking the classes would be in line management, human resources and other professional positions who interact with employees on the shop floor.

Nissan began offering conversational Spanish courses because of the increasing number of Spanish-speaking people in the area which in turn means an increase in the number of Hispanic workers at Nissan, Groom said.

"Our goal has always been to mirror our community and have a diverse group in which we live," he said.

"As we've been in the interview process recently, we see a higher flow of Spanish-speaking individuals come in," Groom said. "We just started taking applications this past spring for the first time in several years."

Giving management and human resources employees training in conversational Spanish will make them more comfortable and the Spanish-speaking potential employees more comfortable, Groom said.

Nissan is in the process of hiring for its expansion at the Smyrna plant where about 1,000 new workers are expected to be hired in the next three years.

State Farm Insurance Companies here has also offered Spanish to its employees, said Mitch McCoy, State Farm public affairs specialist.

"State Farm through Motlow (State Community College) offered Spanish to employees who were interested or those currently seeking degrees," McCoy said.