With the 2021 AL DÍA Women of Merit being a celebration of trailblazing women, the Advisory Board named Kimberly Casiano the recipient of the Pinnacle Award.

Casiano is the first Hispanic woman to serve on the board of a top-five Fortune 100 corporate board. 

In 2003, she was elected to the Ford Motor Company board of directors, where she serves on the audit committee, nominating and governance committee and sustainability and innovation committee.

In 2010, Casiano established Kimberly Casiano & Associates, a firm that provides advisory services in marketing, recruiting, communications, advocacy and diversity, aimed specifically to target the U.S. Hispanic market, the Caribbean and Latin America.

In addition to her role on the board of Ford Motor Company, she has also served on the board for Mutual of America, a company that provides retirement products and insurance coverage to employees of nonprofit organizations and small- and medium-sized businesses, since 2006, and on the board for Mead Johnson Nutrition, a leading nutrition company for babies and children, since 2011, respectively.  

From 1981 to 1988, Casiano also managed her own company, Caribbean Marketing Overseas Corporation, where she fostered trade and investment in the Carribean and Latin America. The company served as Caribbean Basin Initiative consultant to the U.S. Agency for International Development in developing and executing public and private sector projects throughout the region. 

Casiano is also active on the board of several nonprofit organizations that support education, such as the Hispanic Scholarship Fund (HSF), a nonprofit organization that awards roughly $50 million in annual scholarships to Hispanic college students throughout the U.S.

Casiano was born in New York to Puerto Rican parents and moved to Puerto Rico when she was 12. She later earned a bachelor’s degree in politics and Latin American studies from Princeton University in 1979, graduating magna cum laude, and obtained her MBA from Harvard Business School in 1981. She is also married and has two children. 

AL DÍA is proud to award Kimberly Casiano with the Pinnacle Award during the 2021 AL DÍA Women of Merit on March 31. For tickets to the event, click here.