Pub. 60 2019-2020 Issue 5

24 Jorge Gutierrez, 35 Corporate strategist, Bert Ogden Auto Group A ccording to Jorge Gutierrez, his role is to fill organizational voids and improve the culture at Bert Ogden Auto Group. The results improve every department within the organization. Gutierrez currently works for Natasha del Barrio, the CEO and, later, a 2019 recipient of the Under 40 designation. They met in 2013 when del Barrio was working for the McAllen, Texas deal- ership group as a corporate strategist, and Gutierrez was at the University of Texas-Pan American as the principal gifts officer. Gutierrez worked there with Bert Ogden, who was a donor. Del Barrio told him about a job as a finance manager at one of the dealer- ships and encouraged him to apply. He was hired, trained for two weeks, and asked to run a store as the sales manager. It went well. After nine months, he had been given responsi- bility for two more stores. Soon he was promoted to a position as a corporate strategist for the company and its 18 dealerships, essentially working as del Barrio’s chief of staff. The work required his involvement in everything that was going on within the company. He took dealership data and used his background in finance and accounting to make reports that created a map for achieving company goals. He relies on the reports to make fact-based decisions instead of emotional ones. For example, the reports have shown him which stores have the biggest returns. Those are the ones where investing makes the most sense. If a store is struggling, the reports help him use patterns to identify that fact early so those involved can find a way to solve the problem before it becomes worse. He says the process is similar to playing chess since it often involves moving people around. A recent campaign that was coor- dinated by Gutierrez focused on reducing vendor costs and saved the company $500,000. He consolidated Bert Ogden’s five accounting offices into one and set up human resources to identify and recognize top-performing employees, with an expectation that this program will boost morale. Thanks to Gutierrez, employees now have a 401(k) plan. He has also started systematically conducting perfor- mance evaluations, and he intends to develop a program that will pair employees with someone in upper management and provide them with a predictable career path.  under