Santiago Rodriguez Diversity and Inclusion Award

In his time at Lockheed Martin, Armando L. Castorena has earned a reputation as a forward- leaning executive able to deliver innovative people solutions aligned with the company’s business demands, goals and objectives.  His achievements have positioned him as one of the most talented HR leaders in the aerospace industry.

Mr. Castorena’s commitment to diversity and Inclusion is clear in his results. In his current role as Vice President of Human Resources at Lockheed Martin Space, he is responsible for leading all aspects of HR services for the company, including workforce planning, talent acquisition, talent management, leader development, training, compensation, rewards and recognition, labor relations, diversity, inclusion and equal employment opportunity programs.

Even more importantly, he has led significant year-over-year increases in Hispanic hires and representation within Lockheed Martin Space over the past five years. In fact, he is the first VP of HR to take 100+ Lockheed Martin job requisitions for same day offers to national diversity engineering conferences, including GMiS, SWE, and BEYA.

As impressive as these are, Mr. Castorena is ready to go further.  He’s currently piloting innovative strategies to identify and eliminate potential barriers to equal employment opportunities. This includes technology solutions for neutral job descriptions – which will increase the appeal to applicants who are women and people of color – and initiatives to test whether elimination of gender, race and ethnicity from resumes improves talent pools and selections.

Of course, the COVID-19 pandemic has had significant business impacts on Lockheed Martin and its employees. At the earliest warnings, Mr. Castorena formed response teams that worked closely with Operations, Information Technology, Communications, and Executive Leadership to ensure workplace safety, employee wellbeing, successful telecommuting initiatives, leader and employee communications and community outreach.

His ability to successfully lead under pressure contributed significantly to Space’s ability to remain fully operational during this crisis. Mr. Castorena’s focused on the well-being and safety of our employees, because he knows they are the drivers of business success.

He arrived at his current crucial position after 28 years of dedicated work in the human resources field at defense and aerospace companies, starting with Sandia National Laboratories, which he joined in 1990 shortly after he earned his MBA from the University of Texas at El Paso.

UTEP was also where Mr. Castorena earned his bachelors degree in Human Resources and demonstrated emerging leadership qualities and innovation in roles such as Human Resources Management President of Sigma Iota Epsilon and President of the UTEP Student Chapter of Society of Human Resources Management which he helped create.

He served for three years as co-chair of the Hispanic Organization for Leadership and Awareness council (HOLA) at Lockheed Martin, where he provided support and mentorship to Hispanic professionals, women and people of color in his division.