Professional Experience
Rafael is the Head of Latin America Operations. He has over 25 years of experience as a senior business executive in industries including cement, steel, textiles and human development, and 10 years of experience of consulting global clients. Being a senior executive both at the front line and staff positions has influenced his thorough, pragmatic approach to creating lasting business solutions. As a consultant, he is an integrator of strategy, structure, culture and talent development, specializing in mergers and acquisitions integrations, strategy alignment due, cultural transformation and the institutionalization of family businesses, where business challenges and personal emotions and expectations are subtly intertwined. His passion for dealing with every challenge in a comprehensive and innovative way is grounded in discipline of testing and proving ideas by acting upon them.

The value Rafael brings to clients is mainly his ability to understand both business sides: the hard, quantitative issues and the soft, qualitative ones. He has been a translator of strategy into the implications for people issues in global firms. A passion for large-scale transformation projects has led him to work in a variety of topics, from the creation of a new police institution in the middle of a violence crisis to the implementation of new learning methods where nobody knew or believed in them. He has also played the role of a coach to personal transformation processes at high levels.

The clients he has worked with include Bayer AG, Alfa Group, Femsa, Allied Tube and Piping, Rotoplas and Nemak, Minera Autlan, Equimsa, InverCap, Kesos y Kosas, Beks, INSAR, Novem, Brunnen, Aceros Del Toro, The Government of the State of Nuevo Leon Mexico, PAGA Desarrollos, Impulsora de Inmuebles Villarreal, Promotora de Vivienda Villarreal and AVC Soluciones Inmobiliarias.

Background
Rafael holds a BS in Chemical Engineering from ITESM in Monterrey, Mexico, and an MS in Industrial Engineering from University of Wisconsin, U.S.A. He has attended leadership courses at International Management at Stanford, Wharton, Carnegie Mellon and Thunderbird; Japanese Management at Yokohama, Japan.

He was founder and Managing Director of VACCI Business Consulting. He has been a board member of or advisor to numerous enterprises and institutions within Mexico. He works and consults in Spanish and English.