Team size: Four

What has been the number one challenge that has impacted you over the past year?

The biggest challenge I had to face last year was a post-pandemic collective bargaining within an adverse political-social environment for the business sector. In that scenario, I had to select and manage an external team of expert lawyers in individual and collective relations to help me advise and assist the “Collective Bargaining Negotiation Team” with information, data and legal opinions to get ready for the negotiations rounds, such as: comparative analysis of collective agreements in the sector with statistics (benchmarks), recurrence and type of activities of unions during collective bargains, analysis of new labour regulations impacting collective relations, multiple defence strategies related to bad faith, labour discrimination and harassment actions alleged by the Union and workers during the negotiation process, draft of the new collective bargaining agreement, among others. It ended successfully with a collective bargaining agreement worth $2.3m.

Looking forward, what technological advancements do you feel will impact the role of in-house legal teams in the future the most?

I feel that artificial intelligence is coming fast and will challenge our current way of work! Soon it will be implemented in organisations and legal departments to serve as a powerful tool for managers and in-house legal teams to speed up key processes and facilitate decision making.

What is a cause, business related or otherwise, that you care about, and why?

Caring for the environment! It is something that, at a business and personal level, should become more relevant, because human negligence and lack of care for our planet, in general, is causing serious repercussions. This situation invites us to reflect and consider an ecological and sustainable vision from the business, and on a personal level, to be aware and take actions in our day-to-day routine to respect and preserve the place where we live.