Track record
Maria Suárez
from engineering to how work is organised, AI as a consequence
Fifteen years running operations, teams and transformation projects in banking, finance, technology and services, across Spain and the UK. Bestrateo is what I do with all of that.
Why operating models and not tools
What is changing is how work is understood, not the tools it is done with. And the times that has genuinely happened —the neolithic, the industrial revolution— what changed was not the instrument: it was the division of labour. Who does what, with whom, and what they stop doing.
Artificial intelligence is doing exactly that, and at a speed with no precedent. Which is why the work that really matters is not choosing the tool.
An operating model is that division set down in writing: what each person does, what each system does, in what order, and who answers for what. It is what decides whether a company takes advantage of the change or buys software and carries on working exactly as before.
What a senior profile brings you
My broad experience across small businesses and large corporations, both as a consultant and from inside the organisations themselves, lets me bring a wide and practical view of the business. I have learnt to connect strategy, operations, systems and AI from a perspective that combines strategic thinking with real knowledge of how organisations work day to day. That experience has let me develop the critical and analytical thinking to anticipate challenges, spot opportunities and design solutions that can actually be put into practice. A cross-cutting view that helps connect the pieces, bring perspective and turn decisions into results.
Operating model and organisation
Structures that hold when the company changes size
Designs and rollouts of complete organisational frameworks: roles, structure, operational indicators, on-site, hybrid and remote working models, and workforce planning.
Fintech · IT
Process analysis and improvement
Seeing where a process breaks before automating it
Stage-by-stage process maps, with owner, system and indicator for each, and the bottlenecks, duplication and overloads located on them. This is the part that comes from engineering and from the postgraduate work in project management and total quality, and the part that decides whether automating pays off or merely speeds up the mess.
Healthcare · Services
People and change management
Making sure the new thing gets used, not just bought
Performance review systems, salary bands, recruitment, onboarding, career paths and coaching programmes. Recruitment process redesigns that have improved the candidate ratio by as much as 75 %.
IT · Banking · Fintech
Automation and AI agents
Systems that live in the tools you already have
Flows for lead capture, sales follow-up and administrative processes, combining deterministic automation with agents where judgement over language is needed. With the level of human supervision decided in writing before anything is built.
Healthcare
Teaching
Two hundred SME managers asking what they do not understand
Accredited teacher for the Escuela de Organización Industrial, with teaching authorisation for grades A, B and C of the Catalan vocational training system. Over 218 hours delivered to more than 215 people, most of them running a small business, on applied AI, no-code automation and change management. It is the best test of whether an approach holds up: every technical decision has to be defended to someone who is not technical.
SMEs
In numbers
15years
running operations and people
+30organisations
advised
218hours
of training delivered
+215students
mostly SME managers
2countries
Spain and the UK
3languages
Spanish, Catalan and English
Qualifications and certifications
- BEng in Industrial Engineering
- Master’s in Human Resources
- Postgraduate diplomas in Project Management and in Total Quality Management
- PL-900 certification — Microsoft
- Teaching authorisation, grades A, B and C — Generalitat de Catalunya
- Agile and Lean
- Compensation and benefits
We start by understanding what you do
The AI operations review goes through how your processes work today and which tools you use, and ends with a concrete recommendation on where to start. Half an hour. No commitment.
Book the review