Spotlighting C 16 THE NEW FACE
OF ENERGY Alejandro Cestero BY PATRICK FOLLIARD
Whenever Alejandro “Alex” Cestero shows up to speak before groups of law students, he notices that some members of his audience look a little surprised. “I’m not the typical energy industry general counsel,” he says. “They’re expecting to see someone with a little more gray hair.”
DIVERSITY & THE BAR® JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2013
estero is reportedly the youngest executive officer in the history of Lufkin Industries, Inc., a multi-billion dollar oilfield equip- ment manufacturer and services company. Hired in May 2011 as vice president, general counsel, secretary and chief compliance
officer, Cestero is part of a leadership team that is mov- ing the more than 110-year-old company into the future. “Over the past 24 months we’ve experienced rapid change,” says Cestero. “It’s been the amazing evolution of an old-line manufacturing company into an interna- tional, multifaceted corporation.” Named for the small Texas town where it is based,
Lufkin began as a strictly local operation and remains that way in spirit. “Unlike other energy services compa- nies in our space, Lufkin has not moved its headquarters to Houston, the epicenter of the energy industry,” explains Cestero. “We’re largely homegrown with loyal union employees, many of whom have worked at Lufkin’s old-school foundry and other manufacturing centers operating heavy machinery for most of their lives. But we also have high-tech and international seg- ments that are important.” As general counsel, Cestero is in steel-toed boots at
one of the company’s Lufkin-based facilities one day, and at an informal meeting in one of the company’s three Houston offices the next. Frequently, he flies to Russia, Romania, or Canada on business. Te company has employees in approximately 17 countries and does business throughout the world. Since Cestero’s start at Lufkin, the company bought five additional companies in Canada and across Europe. In recent years, Cestero says, Lufkin has begun increasing its bench depth and range of multidisciplinary expertise to support this expansion. In large part, Cestero was brought on board to help
revamp Lufkin’s legal department for the road ahead, including new technologies, countries, and strategic transactions. His predecessor was a lawyer with a back- ground primarily in human resources who largely focused on labor and employment matters. When Lufkin went public in 1990 almost all commercial and other specialized legal matters were performed by outside counsel. Today, the company’s legal department has doubled in size to eight, including three lawyers handling litigation, contracts, strategic transactions, board governance, and compliance. Cestero considers himself “a more to the side of business guy who looks over the legal function, as opposed to the
MCCA.COM
Page 1 |
Page 2 |
Page 3 |
Page 4 |
Page 5 |
Page 6 |
Page 7 |
Page 8 |
Page 9 |
Page 10 |
Page 11 |
Page 12 |
Page 13 |
Page 14 |
Page 15 |
Page 16 |
Page 17 |
Page 18 |
Page 19 |
Page 20 |
Page 21 |
Page 22 |
Page 23 |
Page 24 |
Page 25 |
Page 26 |
Page 27 |
Page 28 |
Page 29 |
Page 30 |
Page 31 |
Page 32 |
Page 33 |
Page 34 |
Page 35 |
Page 36 |
Page 37 |
Page 38 |
Page 39 |
Page 40 |
Page 41 |
Page 42 |
Page 43 |
Page 44 |
Page 45 |
Page 46 |
Page 47 |
Page 48 |
Page 49 |
Page 50 |
Page 51 |
Page 52