What are the most significant cases or transactions that your legal team has recently been involved in?

The most important case of which our legal department was a part of was the initial public offering (IPO), which was the crowning achievement of a work led by me, in the legal part. Until then, I had led the company’s legal department for 5 years, but this moment was clearly the high point of my career while at Rede D’Or, even though I recognise that I was just a small part of a massive corporation. Another thing I would like to highlight is the number of initiatives that our company undertook during the pandemic, particularly in a country like Brazil, where many have suffered. As a healthcare network, we assembled a series of social enterprises, including two field hospitals set up in the city of Rio de Janeiro, to support those in need. Our team worked tirelessly in solving every legal challenge that emerged during those procedures, which is something that I am very proud of.

As we live in a fast-paced world today, what skills will a corporate legal team need to succeed in the modern in-house industry?

I think it is fundamental for every member of a legal team to know exactly what their role is. Particularly in big companies, where legal departments have a considerable dimension, there is no time to keep coordinating and orientating every single member of the team. At the same time, I also think it is important that a general counsel or legal manager can pass on tasks and responsibilities, delegating work instead of focusing all the decision-making process on one person. Companies like Rede D’Or are too big for one person to have the power and the responsibility of entire legal procedures, so it is necessary to coordinate, trusting the people that work with you.

How important is choosing to work with external lawyers who align with your company’s values? Are you likely to reconsider what firms you work with based on this?

I think it is fundamental. A substantial part of our legal proceedings is set in motion through external lawyers and law firms, so we depend much on their work. As such, that dependance requires our values to align with those of external lawyers, so we can guarantee that they represent us according to our mandatory standards. Over time, we developed and nurtured relationships with external lawyers, giving them a feeling of belonging, and what proves that that method has worked is the longevity of the contracts we settle with external counsel. With many of them, we have been under contract for over 10 years, and an incredible example of these trusting relationships is that during the pandemic, every external lawyer and law firm that worked for us charged us only 11 invoices, instead of the regular 12. There is no bigger proof that our external counsels are our greatest external partners.