Marisol González Ortega bucked the profession pattern established by her father and brother. When the 2 architects surveyed a room, they noticed fixtures, textures, and colours. They have been obsessive about each element of an area. González Ortega simply knew whether or not she thought it regarded good.
Although she might have bypassed her speedy household’s line of enterprise, there was no escaping the precedent set by her great-grandfather, Jesús González Ortega, a Mexican Supreme Court docket of Justice Chair with one of many extra dramatic Wikipedia entries on file.
González Ortega, present normal counsel, ethics correspondent, and knowledge safety officer for Journey Retail Americas at L’Oréal, additionally selected the law, however she elected to go away the intrigue and drama prior to now. She didn’t need to spend her life working in legal regulation, and albeit, working at a regulation agency is an expertise she’s grateful to by no means must repeat.
“I sat my boys down and we had a really lengthy dialog. I informed them that we had two choices: we may return to Mexico to the life that we knew, or we may keep right here and attempt to make a brand new life for ourselves.”
Marisol González Ortega
“What I really like concerning the regulation is the chance to work with folks from completely different backgrounds, not simply geographically or culturally, however completely different jobs and occupations,” González Ortega explains. “I didn’t like solely being round attorneys. It didn’t curiosity me all that a lot.”
However González Ortega discovered her candy spot. The lawyer has carved out a formidable company regulation profession with names immediately recognizable to any shopper: L’Oréal, Ford Motor Firm, Bayer, and Celanese.
Nonetheless, the final counsel’s promotion and relocation to Miami in 2022 has not been with out challenges. The truth is, González Ortega was unknowingly strolling into probably the most difficult private circumstances of her life when she, her husband, and her kids made the transfer to the US just some years in the past.
4 months after arriving within the US, González Ortega’s husband unexpectedly died. González Ortega, instantly a single mother or father of three boys, was heartbroken, shocked, and in a brand new place with out mates or family members to assist her and her household.
“I sat my boys down and we had a really lengthy dialog,” González Ortega remembers. “I informed them that we had two choices: we may return to Mexico to the life that we knew, or we may keep right here and attempt to make a brand new life for ourselves. I informed them that whereas I knew it might be harder, I believed we should always keep, however I wished them to make their needs identified. We did determine to remain, and I’m so glad we did. I feel the boys are too.”
González Ortega wasn’t simply going through the lack of a beloved associate. She had uprooted her household from her residence nation, a spot the place González Ortega’s title and popularity carried appreciable skilled weight. Within the US, she had no skilled community to depend on, no important connections apart from these constructed at her employer. She was additionally attempting to be taught all of the methods during which enterprise within the US is completely different from Mexico.
“Each state right here is sort of a small nation,” the GC explains. “It’s important to be sure that everytime you’re implementing a venture or initiative, you’re contemplating all relevant native and regional rules. I proceed to review the completely different geographies of the US and have been very supported by our exterior counsel.”
That exterior counsel has been extremely vital, as a result of González Ortega is, in most respects, a one-woman present. The GC nonetheless handles contracts, company regulation, and extra day-to-day authorized operations whereas additionally working to reinforce the authorized division’s impact on driving enterprise.
Coming to the US was an unbelievable step up for González Ortega, nevertheless it has meant she has much less time to formally mentor different ladies, a job she relished since chairing Ford Motor Firm’s ladies’s worker useful resource group in Mexico. González Ortega helped the corporate construct out “mentoring circles,” offering senior mentors for younger folks throughout Ford’s enterprise strains.
As González Ortega works to create extra connections throughout Miami and in her new residence, the GC says her household and work necessities inevitably push networking down a number of rungs on her record of priorities. Making connections and constructing a good friend group have been gradual going, as she continues to make sure her work is exemplary and her boys have her undivided consideration at residence.
The challenges González Ortega and her household have confronted are, in some ways, a testomony to the spirit that introduced them to the US within the first place. González Ortega may have performed it protected and relied on her popularity and her title in her residence nation. However that’s not the life she wished for herself or for her kids. She might not be a proper mentor at current, however there’s little question González Ortega is serving as an inspiration to anybody following her profession.
