Could you share an example of a time when you came up with an innovation that improved how your legal team works and did not come at a large expense?

The Bank’s legal teams had a mailbox for the assignment of consultations and a person assigned them individually to the lawyers in the area. This was extremely costly, because not only did it imply having a person to perform a task that could be automated, but also the operational risk was great. The latter considering that given the high volume of queries, some emails were lost, not assigned, or arrived without the necessary documentation. In addition, the answer to these queries remained only in the email of the lawyer who answered them, so that no one else could access them later.

With a simple form, we were able to have the queries automatically assigned to the lawyers in charge, with an informative email to the person who formulated the query with such information. The control panel can be accessed by the entire area, which allows not only provides evidence of what was answered, but also serves as input for subsequent queries by any of the lawyers in the area. In addition, the people previously in charge of the assignment can better invest their time in tasks that are more profitable for the area and less operative.

Can you foresee any key developments to the way general counsel work over the next five years?

The role of the general counsel in the coming years will be focused on being an ally to the different teams of the organisation, taking a more active role in the structuring of new products and services. This will require not only solid legal knowledge, but also a sound understanding of business, strategy, and technology. In addition, it will be essential for the general counsel to have well developed soft skills, since a strong sense of leadership, assertive communication and empathy will be necessary to interact in high-performance multidisciplinary teams.

What are some of the main trends impacting the industry sector you work in in Colombia?

The financial sector in Colombia is undergoing a major transformation, with the advent of open data and the potential creation of an immediate payment system. These two new trends, along with the search for greater financial inclusion that allows greater access to credit, is leading entities to consider the use of alternative data to produce credit scores and to create new business models to reach the less favoured sectors through personalised offerings. Moreover, banks are aiming to be part of people’s daily lives, not only with a financial offer, but by providing them with other products and services, through marketplaces (banking as a channel) or alliances with the retail sector.

What is a cause, business-related or otherwise, you are passionate about, and why?

I am tremendously passionate about the use of technologies such as blockchain in the financial sector. I firmly believe in the potential crypto assets have to make businesses such as remittances, securities issuances, and cross-border payments more efficient, in addition to providing them with a security and confidence that the financial system itself often lacks. I am convinced that the bad reputation that the misuse of cryptocurrencies has created does not do justice to the multiple use cases and the advantages that they could bring to the traditional financial system.