Team size: 30

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?

During periods of crisis, it is essential that the corporate legal management is aligned with the company’s commercial and financial strategy. In the last five years, our country has faced periods of severe crisis, as a result of the Covid-19 pandemic, as well as significant political instability, all of which have affected the productive units of businesses within the company.

The first action of the legal team was to hold periodic meetings with the CEO and CFO of the company, as well as with the board of directors, in order to work together to identify the main areas that may be affected by the crisis; determine the legal support required; and draw up an action plan where all the objectives of the company are aligned with the plan of action. In times of crisis, it is essential to be prepared for change and guide the company through it, if necessary.

For example, during the Covid-19 pandemic, we had to change our real estate marketing policies, which involved closing contracts virtually and adapting the entire sales process, including legal documents. The immediate implementation of technological platforms was also required, both for sales and for the service of our customers remotely. It was essential to get out of our comfort zone and be prepared to implement new practices and policies that will allow us to survive the crisis.

At the same time, we saw the need to implement appropriate social and labour policies to support the HR department and ensure that the company’s personnel suffered the least possible impact. It was also essential to assist the financial team in the review, analysis and eventual reprofiling of debt, with various banking and financial entities, as well as with suppliers of goods and services, in order to ensure the company’s financial stability. We paid special attention to any issues that could create adverse administrative or judicial processes for the company.

Finally, the tenure of professionals in the main positions in the legal team is between ten and 20 years. This enables us to thoroughly understand the strengths and weaknesses of the internal processes; the action plan to be followed; and the resilience of the organisation. Our role today is significantly more preventive than reactive because of this, thus managing to minimise legal contingencies and guarantee the organisation’s resilience.

How do you prioritise diversity and inclusion within your legal department, and what initiatives have you implemented to foster a more inclusive and equitable work environment?

The legal team is made up of 31 professionals from different specialties. In this regard, of this group, 20 are women and 11 men, with ages ranging from 25 to 51 years, with the highest concentration (55%) in the range between 30 and 35 years, followed by professionals between 41 and 45 years old (10%) and between 46 and 51 years old (10%).

Prioritising gender and age diversity among team members allows us to have a much broader vision when drawing up action plans and anticipating the company’s requirements.

The inclusion of women in the legal team (65%) allows us to break away from the traditional structure of local business teams, the vast majority of which are made up of men in the main positions.

The legal team comprises professionals from different specialties of law, as well as professionals from other areas. This diversity of professionals allows us to have different points of view in the analysis of strategies and solutions aimed at achieving the company’s objectives.

We have achieved this through the implementation of a transversal selection process in charge of the human capital area, where the search for talent does not obey gender issues or other variables, but rather an objective evaluation of the profiles and capabilities of each of the applicants; not restricting the search for personnel in order to incorporate professionals from different specialties, segments, ages and genders into the legal team. Our goal is to implement practices that ensure that any member of the Legal Team can have the same opportunities for growth and promotion in different positions, regardless of gender, orientation or other variables.

These practices have resulted in the Corporate Legal Area obtaining a work environment assessment of 91% in 2023, even higher than that of 88% in 2022.