Mari-Cruz is a Partner, Head of Client Management & Legal Innovation at Lexington Consultants, a global team of law firm consultants. A lawyer by training, she advises law firms as they modernise, seek growth, develop client relations and enter new markets through alliances and mergers.

She is passionate about innovation and change and have been an Associate Professor at IE Business School in Madrid for over a decade – teaching on the MBA and executive education programs and developing Harvard-style teaching on influencing and negotiations skills for lawyers and compliance officers at IE Law School.

Mari-Cruz is a member of the faculty at the Financial Times IE Corporate Learning Alliance( Headspring), contributing in programmes for clients such as Axa Insurance, BBVA, Santander, Mahou San Miguel, Mapfre, Melia Hotels and Pepsico.

She is qualified as a lawyer in Barcelona before training and accreditation as a mediator at the Centre for Effective Dispute Resolution (CEDR) in London – Europe´s largest centre for commercial dispute resolution – where she was recruited by their business development team. She was subsequently Head of Development at Southwark Mediation Centre, and then the employment dispute mediator for Brighton & Hove City Council.

Over the years, she has assisted parties in over 300 mediations across employment, civil and commercial disputes.

Returning to Spain in 2005, Mari-Cruz co-founded and managed Iberian Legal Group – the publishers of Iberian Lawyer and The Latin American Lawyer magazines, and events such as the Forty under40, The Gold Awards or InspiraLaw.