Having been legal and tax director of Grupo Lactalis Iberia since 2012, David López Medína knows the operations of leading dairy company from top to bottom, and takes on secretarial roles for the company’s board of directors in addition to his other responsibilities. Formerly with Ebra Foods – where he was legal and tax director for the dairy products division – and head of planning and tax management with Puleva, López is a tax legal specialist who also relishes his role in corporate governance at Grupo Lactalis.

Indeed, he lists the first time he became a corporate secretary as one of his career highlights: ‘As a secretary of a listed company I learned to act as an effective board advisor – advising not only on directors’ statutory duties under the law, ensuring compliance with regulatory requirements – and also in respect of the organisation’s corporate governance and good practices’.

With Lactalis, he has had a major impact on the development of the legal function, and is proud of having created such a ‘dynamic’ in-house team. He goes into some of the techniques he has used to achieve this: ‘Along with introducing the use of technology to transform both the legal department and how lawyers are seen within the company, I have developed, together with my team, an innovative and flexible structure to ensure that the in-house function is driving the business forward’. As well as this, López has cultivated and encouraged the talents of the legal officers who report to him within the team. ‘I have reinforced a highly creative and commercial approach so that in-house lawyers can thrive in a sales-oriented environment.

I have done so by reinforcing the ability to take ownership of development, attending trainings and staying up to date with legal developments via working in cross-collaboration with other legal departments of the group around the world’. He has managed to hone the coordination between the legal function and the business to a fine art. ‘By changing the organisation of the legal department by units and projects’, he explains, ‘we have managed to reach legal alignment with the business’s strategy. As legal director, I have developed and implemented the company’s risk management model and the crime prevention plan across the associated and group companies of the multinational group’.