Gabriela Guimarães | Partner | Fourethics
Gabriela Guimarães is a seasoned legal and business professional who has spent more than 14 years working at the intersection of law, technology, compliance, and human behavior. At her core, she sees herself as both a builder and a guardian of ethical business. Throughout her career, she has advised boards and senior executives across different regions of the world, helping organizations strengthen their integrity, manage risk, and operate with accountability. Her professional journey began in law, but it soon evolved into a broader mission focused on corporate governance, compliance, and ethical leadership. At EliteX, we are proud to have Gabriela Guimarães as part of the edition: Transatlantic Executive Leadership: Redefining the Business Landscape, 2025.
Early in her career, Gabriela was at the center of some of Brazil’s most significant corporate integrity milestones. She contributed to major investigations, including Operação Lava Jato, and played a key role in building and implementing full-scale compliance programs for multinational organizations in Brazil and abroad. Her work extended into ensuring adherence to strict U.S. monitorship requirements, developing technological solutions for compliance and data protection, and advising leadership teams on strategic and operational challenges. Alongside her advisory work, she has also remained deeply committed to education, serving as a professor and coordinator of Governance, Risk, and Compliance courses, where she helps shape the next generation of ethical leaders.
Trust is not built through policies alone – it is earned through consistent ethical action.
Gabriela’s interest in global leadership, particularly across the transatlantic region, grew naturally from the realities of modern business. She believes that leadership today must go beyond local markets and national borders. To advise companies that operate internationally, it is essential to understand different legal systems, business environments, and cultural dynamics. The transatlantic corridor, linking the Americas and Europe, represents a powerful axis of trade, regulation, and innovation. For her, mastering this space is not only intellectually important but also a practical requirement for building resilient and compliant organizations in a connected world.
Her leadership style is best described as transformational and situational. She seeks to inspire teams by connecting everyday work to a deeper purpose – the creation of ethical, sustainable, and successful companies. She believes strongly in empowering people and encouraging innovation. At the same time, she understands that different situations demand different approaches. During crises or high-stakes investigations, she adopts a more direct and decisive stance. In complex international negotiations, she shifts to a more collaborative and diplomatic style. While her methods adapt, her values remain constant.
Gabriela believes that several key qualities are essential for leaders working across transatlantic markets. Cultural curiosity and flexibility are necessary to navigate different communication styles and business customs. Integrity is non-negotiable, as trust is the true currency of leadership.
She also values resilient discipline, as leaders must continuously learn and remain steady in fast-changing regulatory and economic environments. Strategic empathy is another pillar of her approach, allowing her to understand not only the facts but also the motivations and concerns of diverse stakeholders.
Two defining moments shaped her leadership journey in profound ways. The first was when she stepped in as interim Latin America Compliance Officer for a global company just before a U.S. Deferred Prosecution Agreement and Corporate Integrity Agreement came into effect. She faced strong internal resistance while preparing the region for a demanding federal monitorship and was interviewed by representatives of the U.S. Department of Justice in Brazil. That experience strengthened her technical skills, emotional resilience, and courage to uphold standards under pressure. The second defining moment was a personal challenge when she became the target of unlawful competitive attacks and a smear campaign. Although difficult, the situation revealed the strength of the reputation she had built and reinforced her belief that real credibility offers lasting protection.
Technology can support leadership, but only people can truly inspire change.
Building trust across cultures is central to Gabriela’s work. She begins by listening carefully and without assumptions, seeking to understand the context, expectations, and concerns of others. She prioritizes relationships before agendas and introduces new ideas only after finding shared goals. In this way, she acts as a cultural translator, helping different sides move toward mutual benefit.
Looking ahead, Gabriela sees strong opportunities between South America and Europe, particularly in agriculture, energy, and workforce exchange. Brazil’s natural resource strength combined with European technology and investment creates space for sustainable partnerships. She also sees great potential in connecting Europe’s aging workforce challenges with South America’s young and skilled professionals. At the same time, she recognizes that leaders face ongoing challenges such as regulatory differences, geopolitical risks, and logistics. Her solution is to integrate compliance directly into strategy, supported by diverse teams and proactive planning.
Technology plays an important but supporting role in her view of leadership. While it offers powerful tools for efficiency and insight, she believes that empathy, judgment, and inspiration remain deeply human traits that technology cannot replace. She also promotes diversity, equality, and inclusion through long-term empowerment rather than simple policies. For her, true inclusion strengthens decision-making and protects organizations from bias.
Through loyalty, honesty, respect, and integrity, Gabriela continues to guide her work during uncertain times. Her vision for the future of transatlantic leadership centers on integration rather than division, where leaders act as bridges, combining different strengths to build ethical, connected, and resilient global businesses.
True leadership begins with integrity and grows through cultural understanding.
