“I keep the positive things. I always like to see the glass half full. These were the words of Rosario Navarro Betteley, the new president of the Sociedad de Fomento Fabril (Sofofa), one of Chile’s most important business associations, after ending the second president of public accounting, Gabriel Boric. It marked Navarro’s debut in the public debate as the new business leader, the first woman to head the powerful union in its 140-year history, where she also spelled out her differences through the government’s gaze. Faced with a speech by the President discussing the need to approve tax reform to meet Executive Branch commitments, he pointed out: “Unless we grow and bond future developments to a current reform that seeks collection , it is extremely dangerous.” So we will be vigilant and ready to contribute and collect the President’s Glove.”
Her speech, clear, frontal, but sensitive, is part of the style of the 48-year-old businesswoman. A way of saying things that in any case are already known to several members of the current government. For many ministers, Navarro is no stranger. They met with the Director of Public Works, Jessica López, in Sofafa when the current Secretary of State was acting as an adviser; with Maisa Rojas, the Minister for the Environment, they were on the council of the Comunidad Mujer, a civil society organization working for gender equality; Since becoming director of Sofafa, she has spoken to Finance Minister Mario Marcel on several occasions. And with the head of the economy, Nicolás Grau, they met at the beginning of the government along with a group of businesswomen to exchange ideas.
But Science Minister Aisén Etcheverry is by far the minister closest to the new business leader. They are friends and share a passion for innovation and how science and technology can help bridge the gaps. The two coincided at the National Council for Science, Technology, Knowledge and Innovation, a body Etcheverry chaired until March last year and which serves as an advisory body to the President of the Republic. Through her role as an adviser to this body, Rosario Navarro met the President, with whom close friends say she enjoys a warm, open and mutually trusting relationship.
For the same reason, they say that Navarro is a person who can build bridges for a fruitful dialogue with the Chilean government, with whom, despite having disagreements on several issues, it is willing to sit down at the table to settle points to find an agreement outside the Chilean government fall into trenches. . “One of Rosario’s strengths is that she has a natural talent for building relationships with different worlds, and she achieves this by making her statements or criticisms clear and open, but with an empathetic and constructive attitude,” says Bernardo Larraín, former president of Rosario. Sofafa in the period 2017-2021.
Though the businesswoman is more associated with the center-left movement — she said in a 2019 interview that she once voted for former President Michelle Bachelet and described herself as an “orphan of the centre-left’s Concertación.” Party referred – those who know it qualifies you this perception. “He’s not a person who aligns with any particular political sector, the Bachelet thing was a side issue. She firmly believes in the freedom to do business and do business and that the state does not suppress private activities,” a person she knows told EL PAÍS.
The humanistic view
The 48-year-old businesswoman’s education differs from that of her predecessors in leadership in the private world. After graduating in Aesthetics from the Catholic University of Chile, she started her career in A+D art gallery, worked in the social life team of Cosas Magazine and then went to Andrés Bello University in the field of communication and marketing. From there she became the director of Fundación Chile’s Center for Educational Innovation, from where she focused her work on how technology can help fill gaps.
She is the eldest of a family of seven siblings and the daughter of Andrés Navarro, founder of Sonda, one of the leading technology companies in Latin America. When his mother, Sonia Betteley, died of cancer, Ito, as his friends call him, began taking charge of the family business. Timidly at first, as principal of Dunalastair School, of which her father was a shareholder, and then as president of the family office. But it wasn’t until 2013 that he managed to break into the big leagues. Her father asked her to replace her on the board of Sonda, a challenge that led her to fully immerse herself in the business world and for which she took accounting and finance courses to contribute to numbers and strategy. Today she is Vice President of this company.
Rosario Navarro, first President of the Factory Development Society (SOFOFA) in Chile. Cristian Soto Quiroz
Her entry into the union world came in 2017 when Bernardo Larraín, then President of Sofafa and a member of the controlling family of CMPC, one of Latin America’s largest forestry companies, invited her to run for director. His contributions are recognized by his colleagues in the union: he was instrumental in the implementation of the Business Evolution Committee, a body that addresses the legitimacy issues of private companies in Chile and contributes to the country’s challenges.
The networks of the new union leader are far-reaching. Not only in the current government and in the private world, where she is director of the Lipigas gas company; Partner of the business transformation company Idemax and member of the ACTI union, which brings together technology companies in Chile, but also in civil society organizations. She is Director of Fundación 2020, which works to promote quality, equitable and inclusive education for children and youth in Chile, and Advisor at Comunidad Mujer, an organization working for gender equality. “Rosario will provide Sofafa with a network that nobody imagines exists in all political sectors and in different worlds,” explains a person who works with her.
She is the mother of four children between the ages of 26 and eight and is married to the writer and poet Sergio Coddou. On her Twitter profile, she describes herself as intense, active, extroverted and very curious: “Woman, mother, hobby gardener and company manager. Education and technological innovation fanatics #amoamifamilia”. A plant lover, she enjoys working in the greenhouse she has at home in her free time. She is a fan of audio books on innovation and technology topics, but also enjoys reading novels, meditating and enjoying music with her family.
The company in the public debate
The businesswoman made the decision to run for the Sofafa presidency at the end of last year. But she knew she couldn’t do it alone. For this reason, he invited two representatives of large business groups: Óscar Hasbún, general director of the Compañía Sudamericana de Vapores, linked to the powerful Luksic family – whose matriarch Iris Fontbona was classified by Forbes as the greatest fortune in Chile – and Gonzalo Said, director of Embotelladora Andina , the Coca-Cola Company’s third bottling plant in Latin America. With them, who became his vice-presidents, he devised a plan so that Sofafa would no longer be such a centralized union, both in its decisions and geographically. To this end, a person familiar with the ideas of the new board will create new committees and organize macro-zones in different sectors of Chile that will gather the concerns and knowledge of the companies operating there in order to have a representation that will represent the interests of the North united to the extreme south.
Navarro accepts the challenge of leading Sofafa and believes that more horizontal and less presidential leadership is needed in the union. For this reason, its Vice-Presidents will be active speakers, as will the members of the Executive Committee. However, the new President’s editorial is that businessmen must not withdraw from the country debate. The businesswoman belongs to a generation that believes the role of the private sector goes beyond creating jobs and maximizing shareholder value. Ideas that entered the Chilean business world with force after the social outburst of October 2019. He also believes that the private world cannot remain in defense of its own interests and that it must not be withdrawn from the public political debate, especially in at the present time when the country is experiencing a post-pandemic and there are significant gaps in various social issues, with stagnant growth for the past ten years.
Although her leadership style provoked some resistance from some entrepreneurs with a more traditional view of business, Sonda’s vice president won last Wednesday’s vote with 87% of the total vote, receiving just seven white votes. Doubts about his leadership, say his relatives, are dispelled: “La Rosario will surprise everyone,” says those around him.