At SentinelOne, our ability to serve customers around the world depends on people who bring different experiences, perspectives, and ways of thinking to the work. Those perspectives influence how we understand those we serve, approach complex challenges, build strong partnerships, and collaborate across a global business.
For many Sentinels, the strengths they bring to their careers are rooted in the cultures, families, and communities that shaped them. Hispanic Heritage Month gives us an opportunity to explore that connection through four Sentinels whose roots span Mexico, Cuba, Puerto Rico, and Costa Rica.
Their stories show how heritage continues to influence the way they work today, from solving complex business challenges to building trusted partnerships and communicating across cultures. They also reflect the traditions, relationships, and lessons that continue to shape who they are beyond the workplace.
Xochitl Ledesma, Senior Director, Customer Strategy & Operations | New York, USA
Xochitl Ledesma traces one of her earliest lessons in problem-solving to a childhood moment of frustration over a game she couldn’t win. Growing up Mexican-American, she recalls her mother’s counsel for overcoming that game, and many other challenges as she grew up: observe what’s happening, consider it from another angle, and try a different approach.
Decades later, that same instinct paired with the relentlessness her mother instilled in her, is how Xochitl approaches her work at SentinelOne. That same instinct showed up recently, when she helped tackle a challenge involving legacy customers transitioning to new services. Instead of forcing a one-size-fits-all fix, Xochitl and her colleagues considered it from every angle, and built a tailored path forward that balanced customer needs with business requirements.
Growing up in a Mexican household and alongside families from across Latin America taught Xochitl that people can share aspects of an identity while bringing very different lived experiences. She sees a parallel in business: customers may share cybersecurity challenges, while their industries, size, regions, and constraints influence what they need and how a message or solution will resonate.
Xochitl continues to deepen her connection to Mexican culture through family, food, music, language, and travel. During a recent trip to Mexico City, songs she had heard at family celebrations years earlier came rushing back. Those moments reinforce her belief that culture continues to shape the perspectives and values people bring with them throughout their lives and careers.
It is a connection Xochitl hopes younger Hispanic and Latino professionals recognize in themselves. “They can bring their whole selves and be authentic and succeed within the workplace,” she said. “The values we grew up with always bring something meaningful to the professional workplace.”
Alex Cruz, Senior Director, Sales Enablement | Florida, USA
Alex Cruz carries the resourcefulness of previous generations into his work leading global sales enablement. His mother was born in Cuba and his father in Puerto Rico. His grandparents came to the United States in the 1960s, learned a new language, established themselves in a new community, and created opportunities that continue through their family today. “Here I am today, as a fruit of their sacrifice,” Alex said.
Their example taught Alex to adapt, work through unfamiliar situations, and find a path forward. Those qualities have followed him throughout his career and into his role at SentinelOne.
Leading global sales enablement means developing programs for teams working across countries, cultures, and markets. Alex and his team gather input from colleagues around the world to understand regional needs and shape training and messaging that helps sales teams engage effectively in their markets.
For Alex, adaptability also means staying curious about the people a program is designed to support. Regional perspectives give his team information they can use to make programs more relevant and useful across a global organization.
His family’s influence continues outside work, too. Sunday meals bring relatives together and give Alex’s children a connection to the close family environment he grew up with. As another generation grows up with opportunities created by those who came before them, preserving that history has become increasingly important to Alex.
“I want my kids to know the sacrifices that made their lives possible,” he said.
Passing along that story also gives Alex a way to pass along the qualities behind it: resilience, resourcefulness, hard work, and the confidence to find a way forward.
Andrea Mesen, Manager, FP&A | Costa Rica
For Andrea Mesen, Hispanic Heritage Month is an opportunity to recognize the values passed through generations of her family in Costa Rica and the ways they continue to shape her today. Her great-grandparents worked on coffee farms, and their example of hard work became part of the family legacy Andrea inherited. She also connects her upbringing to resilience, optimism, and a strong sense of community, qualities that influence both the relationships she builds and the way she approaches her career.
In FP&A, Andrea brings those values to a role that sits at the intersection of financial discipline and business partnership. Managing budgets requires rigor and accountability, and Andrea sees understanding the people, priorities, and expertise across the business as an important part of doing that work well. “We’re all people, and we have our lives,” she said. Taking time to know her colleagues, listen to what matters to them, and build genuine trust has helped her develop strong partnerships throughout her career.
For Andrea, that instinct to stay connected is deeply rooted in the culture and traditions she grew up with. During the Christmas season, roughly 15 members of her family gather to make tamales together, producing around 200 last year. On Costa Rica’s Independence Day, September 15, she watches the parades she participated in as a child and now sees younger relatives’ experiences. She also enjoys sharing Costa Rican culture with colleagues who visit, from traditional Gallo Pinto and Caribbean food to the energy and celebrations that are part of life there. “Community is taking care of people,” Andrea said. “It’s being there, being present.”
That sense of community also shapes Andrea’s experience at SentinelOne. Working in a global company gives her the opportunity to collaborate with colleagues across cultures and geographies around shared business priorities. She sees different backgrounds as a source of creativity, bringing new ideas and ways of thinking to how teams assess situations and approach their work. Andrea values being able to share what she brings from her own experiences while continuing to learn from the people around her.
For Andrea, those experiences have reinforced what she hopes younger Hispanic and Latino professionals see in their own heritage: qualities they can carry with them as they build relationships, grow, and lead. “You can stay true to yourself and still succeed,” she said.
Jesse Rodriguez, Team Lead, MDR Client Experience | Texas, USA
For Jesse Rodriguez, Hispanic Heritage Month is closely tied to his mother’s journey from Tanque de Los Angeles, a small village in Mexico, to the life their family has built in the United States. When Jesse visited the village last year, its dirt roads gave him a tangible sense of where her story began and how much changed within a generation. “There’s a straight line between where my mom started and where I am today,” Jesse said.
Her experience shaped Jesse’s understanding of hard work, community, and the responsibility to carry those opportunities forward. It also gave him a role in his family that would later influence how he communicates with others. “I grew up between two worlds. My mom’s Mexican world and me being in Texas,” Jesse said. As a child, he often served as his family’s translator, taking information written for an English-speaking audience and making it useful and understandable for his mother.
Translating for his family taught Jesse to pay attention to context and to think about what another person needs in order to understand. Those instincts continue to serve him at SentinelOne, where he collaborates with colleagues and supports customers across cultures and regions. Language, expectations, and context can vary, and Jesse has learned to adapt his communication so the information is useful to the person receiving it.
Jesse sees a similar dynamic in the technology and services built for a global customer base. “Technology built by people who all think alike works best for people that are just like the builders,” he said. Customers operate across countries, languages, regulatory environments, and threat landscapes, making a range of perspectives valuable throughout the work. For Jesse, those perspectives can surface questions and considerations that help teams serve a broader range of organizations around the world.
Jesse experienced the value of those different perspectives early in his time at SentinelOne. One month after joining the company, he attended an offsite with colleagues whose backgrounds spanned India, Poland, Egypt, Hawaii, and other places. Teammates traded stories, asked questions about one another’s cultures, and found points of connection across very different experiences. For Jesse, the openness in the room reinforced how much people can learn when curiosity is part of how a team works together.
Looking ahead, Jesse hopes younger Hispanic and Latino professionals recognize the role their own histories can play in the careers they build. His mother’s journey remains a source of perspective and motivation for him, and he wants others to see possibility in the experiences and values passed through their own families. “I hope that they see that there is a straight line from your heritage, your mom, your dad, coming from a small little town…to where you can be or where you are now,” he said.
Carrying It Forward
Heritage continues through the values we carry forward, the traditions we keep alive, and the ways our experiences shape how we connect with others. Across generations and geographies, those influences become part of how people build relationships, approach their work, and contribute to the teams and communities around them.
This Hispanic Heritage Month, we celebrate the Hispanic and Latino Sentinels around the world and the cultures, histories, and communities that continue to shape who they are and what they bring to SentinelOne every day.