Latondra Newton
Chief Corporate Social Responsibility Officer
Toyota Motor North America
From a young age, Latondra Newton was inspired to make a difference in her community. “My mother instilled in meperhaps without trying to do soa sense of responsibility for facing up to big issues,” Newton wrote on DiversityInc.com. “I went out of my way to influence the culture around me, to tilt it toward greater inclusiveness. I did this with the means available to me as a schoolgirl: pulling together groups of kids from different backgrounds and focusing them on the things we all shared, whether music, sports or academics. I didn’t know it at the time, but I was using strategy!”
In her role as Chief Corporate Social Responsibility Officer of Toyota Motor North America and Project General Manager, Corporate Citizenship Division of parent company Toyota Motor Corporation, Newton is responsible for diversity and philanthropy functions across all of Toyota’s North American affiliates.
Previously, she served as Toyota’s Group Vice President and Chief Diversity Officer, where she oversaw philanthropy, the Toyota U.S.A. Foundation and corporate D&I strategy. Since joining the company in 1991, she has held numerous leadership positions, including Assistant General Manager of the Human Resources, Management Development and Diversity Departmentwhere she started the corporate diversity function for North American manufacturingand Assistant General Manager of Corporate Affairs.
Newton is a member of the board of trustees of the Manufacturing Institute, where she chairs an initiative on increasing professional opportunities for women in the manufacturing industry.
She earned a bachelor’s degree in management systems from Kettering University in Michigan. She lives in Manhattan Beach, Calif., with her husband.
