About

Over the course of his career, Matías E. Concha Vial has consistently demonstrated the attributes of a modern in-house lawyer that goes beyond his legal remit to add greater value to his organisation. He joined Compass Group, the multinational food and support services company, in 2009 and describes the various roles he has served the company in before and since being appointed to his current position in December 2012. ‘I first started as head of legal, afterwards general counsel and currently as director of legal. During my career at Compass, I have been asked to fill different positions [such as] HR director, finance director and sales and marketing director, all beside my regular obligations as director of legal. Recently I have been appointed in charge of all pricing strategy and to work with the operational and retention teams to review and provide the path to negotiate better pricing terms for each contract where the company provide services’. Concha is credited for not only being selected to take on these wider roles but also for excelling in them through his ability to understand and learn about the business and how to deal with high performance teams. ‘During every period I have been appointed on a different position than legal I have been able to comply with all obligations and conduct the teams to success helping the company obtain its goals’, he explains. The trust Compass places in Concha is partly a result of his overhaul of the in-house legal function whilst at the company. As there was no pre-existing in-house lawyer, no procedures, no authorisation processes, and critical disputes and conflicts with suppliers and employees when he joined, Concha had to convince the board of directors, managers and other officers that reviewing and supervising the business from a legal point of view was going to avoid future problems. He says that, ‘today we are able to track all contracts, have a digital depository and we created a process so that every area that is involved in a contract is aware and authorises the new client or supplier. Also in the HR department, we have been able to provide the proper advice in many labour conflicts before they reach court. Fines and claims are lowered every year. We are an active part of all collective bargaining negotiation process to ensure legal compliance and finally all legal procedures that have been implemented have been duly informed to the organisation providing awareness and avoiding future conflicts’. On some of his other achievements at Compass, Concha highlights a highly important litigation with the Ministerio de Obras Publicas, with whom Compass had a contract with to deliver services to prisons in Santiago, Valdivia and Puerto Montt. He created a strategy that led to claiming over-costs and Compass were able to obtain a large compensation because of this claim and this led to a long negotiation process to change the terms of Compass’ obligations including payments for all over-costs to make the contract profitable again. Afterwards another claim was submitted for a different reason, and Compass settled the dispute that has avoided future risks and losses. With such a diverse legal and business skillset and a long list of significant achievements, Concha rightly takes his place amongst the top-performing in-house lawyers in Chile.