Team size: six 

How do you approach managing legal aspects during periods of instability or crises, and how does your legal strategy align with the broader business strategy to ensure the organisation’s resilience? 

In collaboration with other divisions of the Corporate Affairs Vice Presidency, we strive to identify potential legal risks and implement measures to mitigate their impact. Furthermore, the company engages in ongoing simulations of various types of crises that may affect its operations or reputation. 

These simulations, which involve critical areas of the company such as Quality, Manufacturing, Regulatory, and Legal, prepare us to effectively address a wide range of situations where risks materialise. Roles and responsibilities are clearly defined to ensure efficient crisis management. 

Furthermore, we maintain regular communication and are members of regulatory committees of business associations (such as ANDI and ANDA), enabling us to stay informed about changes in laws and regulations. This allows us to propose modifications to draft laws or regulations and anticipate necessary adjustments by the company to align its operations with such changes. 

The legal strategy is, and must be, focused on ensuring the continuity and quality of services provided to our internal clients. We conduct ongoing training sessions on critical issues affecting business and the company, including consumer rights, food regulation, information privacy, and fair competition. These training initiatives facilitate clear and direct communication of the values, principles, and rules that guide our functions. 

To make valuable information accessible to all company employees, we have created a legal services hub. This platform serves as a central repository for legal knowledge and facilitates the management of client requests. 

What emerging technologies do you see as having the most significant impact on the legal profession in the near future, and how do you stay updated on these developments?  

Without a doubt, artificial intelligence. Co-counsel models will be implemented in the very near future as standard for the industry, as well as for law firms. This will alter the way we work beyond our imagination, by impacting directly on efficiency. Material changes to lawyer work will lead us to retrain ourselves in the understanding of how we understand the application of law to our business. The role of in-house lawyers will have to transform to an expert operator of the co-counsel models to successfully transition to this new era. 

In your opinion, what are the main trends that are salient in your country currently (these can be legal, political, economy or business-based)? 

I think the current main trend for in-house legal departments is the transition to legal operations and the implementation of CLM’s, as well as matters related to legal design. At Alianza Team, we continue to build and improve our services, which were transformed in 2020 when we implemented a CLM and built +Legal, our legal services Hub. Moreover, in 2023 Webdox, our CLM supplier, awarded us as the most innovative CLM project in Colombia. 

In terms of investment and business developments, we continue to see opportunities to develop our business and supply our products to clients and consumers in Colombia, despite some difficulties related to the price of raw materials and illegality.