Lili Gil Valletta

CULTURE + Group

Co-Founder and CEO

Lili is a former corporate executive turned entrepreneur, Cultural Intelligence® expert, and television business commentator known for her analysis of data and cultural trends impacting our economy and businesses. As an immigrant from Colombia, who came to the U.S. at the age of 17 without speaking English, she embodies the American Dream going from corporate executive turned entrepreneur. After a successful corporate career, including a 10-year tenure at Johnson & Johnson, where she pioneered multicultural marketing efforts for the Pharma sector and co-founded the Hispanic employee resource group “HOLA”, Lili co-founded the marketing agency CIEN+ and the A.I. market research tech firm CulturIntel. After over a decade of impacting the world’s most iconic brands and corporations, her firm has grown to become a first of its kind independent family of Cultural Intelligence® companies under the group name Culture+. Her firm has been listed by the Inc. 5000 as one of America’s Fastest Growing Independently-owned companies and is proudly a certified minority-owned and woman-owned firm.

With offices in the U.S. and Latin America, the group offers proprietary research, business strategy and inclusive marketing solutions for some of the world’s most iconic brands and Fortune 100’s that want to successfully understand how to tap into the full power of diverse market segments for greater impact and business growth. Some of their clients include Google, GlaxoSmithKline, Johnson & Johnson, Kellogg’s, Kroger, Merck/ MSD, Prudential, among other iconic Fortune 500’s.

Lili is one of less than 1% of Latinas serving on a Fortune 500+ public board, as an independent director for the global youth retailer Zumiez (NASDAQ: ZUMZ) and RCN Television (BVC: RCNTELEVI). She also serves as Chairwoman of the FRIENDS of the National American Latino Museum and is an investor and operating executive board member for AUA Private Equity Partners, an investment firm that has deployed over $475 million in capital to scale family-owned and Hispanic-focused businesses. 

She is a sought after global speaker and academic lecturer, known for her TEDx talk called, “Diversity is Overrated” and is a regular independent television commentator to various national networks like Fox Business, CNN en Español, NTN24, among others. For her unique application of A.I. and Cultural Intelligence® shaping board rooms, she has been featured by Forbes, Bloomberg and Fortune Magazines and has received recognitions like, 2023 MM&M Agency 100, 2023 D Magazine Most Influential CEOs in Dallas, 2022 PRWeek Top 30 Most Influential in Healthcare, 2022/ 2021 Top 100 Most Influential Latinas by Latino Leaders Magazine, 2021 Top 10 Pioneering Women in Business, Pinnacle Award by Medical Media & Marketing (MM&M), Silicon Valley Visionary, U.S. Hispanic Businessperson of the Year by the U.S. Hispanic Chamber of Commerce, among others. She is an active voice supporting the economic power of diverse communities, particularly Hispanics, in support of initiatives at The United Nations, The World Economic Forum, The White House and as a mentor to the Stanford Latino Entrepreneur Leaders Program. Lili holds a degree in Business Administration from Southwestern Adventist University, where she serves today as a trustee, an M.B.A. from the University of Colorado and an executive degree in Global Leadership and Public Policy from the Harvard Kennedy School. She is married to entrepreneur and former football player Chris Valletta and has two sons.