Leaders are made. People born with special conditions or “don”. However, day to day, leaders acquire knowledge and experience and through them, they construct the successful profile to maintain their leadership and their followers. Julián Jaramillo is charismatic, proactive, commitment, with vision, knowledge and experience. He was nominated as the “Entrepreneurship of the year in Colombia in 2011”.

1. Alpina’s CEO, Successful Case of an Effective Leader
- Final Assignment for Leadership-
Presented by:
Marley Serrano Estupiñán
Presented to:
Pablo de Diesbach
MBA, ESSEC, PhD
Teacher ISG
International Master Business Administration Program
Institut Supérieur de Gestion Paris
June 2015

2. Content
Introduction .............................................................................................................................................. 3
Alpina’s CEO, Successful Case of an Effective Leader.......................................................................... 5
The history of Julián Jaramillo Escobar............................................................................................... 6
The history of a Leader Company: Alpina ............................................................................................ 8
Why is Julián Jaramillo a Leader? ....................................................................................................... 9
Conclusions.............................................................................................................................................. 13
Bibliography............................................................................................................................................ 14

3. Introduction
Leadership is the condition of, the capacity of being a leader. And a leader has charisma,
authority, commitment & compliance between other characteristics. In many occasions people can
to ask if the leaders are born or are they made. Try to answer this question is not easy, but with
Julián Jaramillo, a leader in business in the actuality of Colombia is possible to observe that leaders
have the special condition (they are born) but the majority of the “leadership” is acquired through
the experience and today, preparation, as the studies.
Especially, when a leader is a “Business Leader”, experience and studies take a principal
paper. Knowledge is today the way to show to the followers that the leader has a clear vision and
also, the “how”, “when” and “where”. It is why Julián Jaramillo has the complete profile. Many
studies in Management, Finance, Marketing and Leadership are mixed with 15 years of experience
in Banking Sector, and 25 year in real sector or manufacturing.
Finally, the leader must show results. A leader without results is only “An Ineffective
Leader” and with the time, it means the lost of the followers. Also, in business it can mean the fall
of the company. Alpina, is a company of 70 years in Colombia, considered one of the most
important and successful business in the country. Show results in a company with “good results”
is most difficult and many managers can try only to maintain the good results. However, Julian
Jaramillo assumed the presidency of Alpina in 2002 and in average, the growth of sales of the
enterprise was of 16% during 11 years. Additional, he led the internationalization of Alpina, and
today the company has presence in more of 28 countries.

4. This is the complete profile of Julián Jaramillo, a leader in business and actually life in
Colombia. With this lecture, is possible to understand the effectiveness of a leader and his footprint
for companies and followers.

5. Alpina’s CEO, Successful Case of an Effective Leader
Every day, in all the organizations (families, towns, cities, and companies) the people need
and search a leader. The reason is very simple, the leader has special characteristics that can
promote a group or team to develop strategies and achieve the goals, or, however, that is the idea.
Literature about the leadership there are a lot, but, a clear definition of what is a leader is
not common. And, it is possible, because, to define activities or conditions is easy, but to define a
person has several implications, about the personality.
Susana Llosa, Manager of Management and Development of Interbank Peru (2012) has
defined the leader like the person that drives a team to achieve results, where the “main objective”
is that leader doesn’t get results only for a business, but that transcend.
And, it can be identified when Josep “Pep” Guardiola1
and Fernando Trueba2
speak about
“the leadership and the future” (Empoderando, 2013), with different features between them, but
with the same conclusion:
“A leader get the best of the people that they have. A bit psychologist, a bit manipulator,
but, with dialogue, understand that all the people are not equals and, all the people must
not be treated equal. Of course, that all people require respect, but the fascinating is to find
how to motivate, persuade, what to say them, and how put them in the desired territory.
There are people that prefer that leader says them the things in front of the group, but others,
1
Josep Guardiola i Sala is a Spanish former footballer. He was a prominent player. Now, is one of the technicians
more important in the world and an expert in leadership topics. He is characterized by prefer the “short-times”,
visualizing six months and one year his projects. He has the conference: “Passion, leadership and, teamwork”
(Biografías y vidas: La enciclopedia biográfica en línea, 2015).
2
Fernando Trueba is a Cinema Director from Spain. He has the recognition like a critic in the journal El País and,
multiples awards, through his career.

6. don’t like it, they feel insulted and prefer, that leader says them the things in other moment.
There are people that need that the leader speaks with them a lot, others no. Every person
is a different world”.
So, is clear that leadership is the condition of, the capacity of being a leader. And a leader
has charisma, authority, commitment & compliance between other characteristics.
Every day, many people do some questions about the leadership and leaders. A common
question is: “Are the leaders born or are they made? This question can appear as useless. However,
its importance is high because depending the answer, it often affects the way in which leaders are
perceived and view the followers. To try to clarify the idea a very good example of a leader is
Julián Jaramillo Escobar from Colombia.
The history of Julián Jaramillo Escobar
Julián Jaramillo Escobar is a “Paisa3
” born in Colombia 57 years ago (1.958). He studied
Business Administration in 1981, with many studies also in Finance, Management and Leadership
in Universities from Colombia and United States. He was a recognized student with high grades
and during all the bachelor he obtained the scholarship (Empreandinos, 2011). From 2002 until
2013 he was the CEO of Alpina. The company in 2002 sold US$ 211 million, and in 2012 this
figure was of US$ 935 million thanks to the operation in 5 countries as Colombia, Venezuela,
Peru, Ecuador and United States (Portafolio, 2013). Analyze this figures require to have in account
the economic crisis that the world lived in 2008 and 2009, additional the political crisis that
Colombia has lived with Venezuela since 2006 and Ecuador since 2008. Maintain an average
3
Name given to people from some Departments in Colombia as Antioquia, Caldas & Risaralda.

7. growth of 16% in 10 years in a company, with the factors mentioned before, is also the result of a
successful leadership inside de organization.
Table 1: Studies of Julián Jaramillo
University Program Year
Universidad Externado, Bogota-Colombia Business Management 1981
Universidad del Rosario, Bogota-Colombia Specialization in Finance 1983
New York University
Specialization in International
Finances
1987
Universidad del Rosario, Bogota-Colombia Commercial Management Training 2002
Universidad de los Andes, Bogota-Colombia CEO’s Management Program 2004
Northwestern University, Illinois-Chicago CEO’s Management Program 2005
Cámara de Comercio de Bogota, Colombia
“Programa Empresarial en
Trayectoria Mega”
2008
University of California, Berkely-California
The Executive Program for Strategic
IT Management
2008
Northwestern University, Illinois-Chicago
CEO II: The Next Step in Strategic
Management
2009
ADEN Alta Dirección Business School,
Bogota Colombia
CEO Management Program 2010
Massachusetts Institute of Technology,
ADEN School of Management
Program for Senior Latin American
Executives
2010
University of Pennsylvania
Transformative Business Leadership
Program
2010
Leonard N. Stern School of Business New
York City
CEO Marketing and Leadership
Program
2011
Source: Empreandinos-Own Creation
Julian Jaramillo is known as a man with high aspirations and goals. His career started with
his studies in administration 40 years ago. But this young believed that he had free time and entered

8. to a Bank working during the night. It was the beginning of his professional experience and
“banking world”. After 3 years, with a high expertise in figures, transaction and finances, he jump
to multinationals field, first with “Basf4
” and then with Kodak5
as Assistant of the Financial Vice-
Presidency, which allow him acquire 10 years of a mixed professional experience. After his
experience with multinationals, he came back to banking sector where he was working again
during 15 years as Financial & International Vice-president. In this moment, he was 29 years old.
Finally, was in 2000 when he was attracted by the manufacturing industry and started the career
in Alpina (Escobar, 2006).
Today, Julián Jaramillo is conducting as president of “Alfa6
”, a totally different company.
However, he continues in Board of Directors in Alpina and more companies from Colombia.
The history of a Leader Company: Alpina
“Two men from Switzerland, a futurist vision, love for the work, and a strange land that was nice
with them. There were the ingredients mixed for create Alpina in 1945”.
Alpina is a Colombian multinational with 70 years of history. The company was founded
by Walter Gogel & Max Singer in Sopó7
. At beginning in a horse-carriage they picked up around
4
Basf: German company with 150 years in the market as leader of chemistry industry.
5
Kodak: Company dedicated few years ago to “photos”. Kodak has transformed itself into a technology company
focused on imaging for business. Today's Kodak provides: a) World-class R&D, based on Kodak's unique strengths
in the materials, imaging and deposition sciences. b) Breakthrough products enabling customers to achieve
transformational improvements in quality, productivity and sustainability. c) A broad solution set across graphic
communications, product goods packaging, functional printing enabling. d) Software and professional services
businesses use to redefine information flow and security.
6
Alfa: Multinational Company dedicated to coating sector.
7
Sopó is a small ville near to Bogota, capital city from Colombia.

9. 500 cantinas or bottles every day for the manual manufacturing of the cheese. The quality of their
products was well known.
The business growth rapidly although the manufacturing was manually yet and the
transport was not do it in the better conditions, it also according to the stage of the country. But
then, with a loan, they acquired a land of 7 bushels where the first factory was opened. Also, they
bought a car to transport the products to Bogota.
In the 50’s in Alpina was processed around 3.000 liters of milk and minimum around 7
million of it were transformed in cheese or other finished products. Gradually the company was
growing, expanding its business around the country and also, Andean region. In 1994 Alpina
started the commercialization of its products to Venezuela and in a few months later, the company
bought its factory in Ecuador. With this two steps, Alpina began its industrial in the foreign market
(NullValue, 2000).
Today, Alpina is one of the biggest companies in Colombia and also, proud of the region.
With more of 7 lines of products, around 10.000 employees, presence in more of 28 countries, 14
cities in United States, and the idea of expand the production to Mexico and Brazil, Alpina
demonstrates that is the leader in the sector.
Why is Julián Jaramillo a Leader?
Principally, Julián Jaramillo is a leader because he is a visionary and it is not only for
business.
Each leader in the history is characterized by the charisma. Charisma is defined as the
natural power that a person has to attract the people by his personality, his word and his presence.

10. The charisma has an effect and it is named “The Charisma Effect” that is achievement with seven
essential behaviors: Fluency, Confidence, Presence, Authenticity, Courage, Passion & Demeanor
(Leigh, 2008). Some tips are necessary to develop this behaviors. Julián has three keys, “Family,
Exercise & Music”. He is a charismatic leader. In his opinion, is frustrating hear of leaders and
presidents that at 4 p.m. consider that it’s the time to go at home and they can’t do any more. A
leader in business needs to maintain in perfect conditions his body (with exercise) and his mind
(with study, music and good conditions in his personal life). A real leader demonstrates to his team
that he has the capacity to understand after 14 hours of work a meeting (Jaramillo, 2014). Julián
has the “Charisma Effect” and it is understood by his employees. But also his auditory in his
conferences and his students of MBA programs. His followers.
If Julián Jaramillo is put in a line-time, the second reason because he is a leader is because
he had a clear objective and with some obstacles, he achieved it. One example is that in 1976 he
didn’t have the enough money to start his studies. So, he decided study and work at same time to
finance his higher education. One of the principal capacities of a leader is “establish a vision and
goals”. When he received the presidency of Alpina, it was a great and big company in Colombia,
with sales around US$ 211 million per year (Jaramillo, 2014). A common manager tries to
maintain the business and also achieve a normal growth. But it was not enough for Julián, he
wanted to expand the company. He wanted that Alpina there was in the most important market,
United States and after, Europe. It is vision. It is “Setting Goals”. Setting Goals refers to capacity
to working with others to help ensure that goals are Specific & Strategic, Measurable, Attainable,
Result-Oriented, and Time-Bound. In other words, it means SMART (Ministry of Education of
Ontario, 2009).

11. As a leader in business the third characteristic that Julián Jaramillo has is the “Change of
Rhythm” and this is accompanied with “Proactivity”. When he was working in Banking Sector,
specifically in “Banco de Crédito”, today, “Helm Bank” in Colombia, he saw all the transformation
that the sector had and also, he anticipated a lot of ideas by this. In 1991 Colombia opened its doors
to the world and for the banking, this meant the “financial, foreign exchange and labor opening”.
With this changes, customers were more exigent and sector more competitive. In 14 years, the
technology also has implemented new ways to operate.
As Julián Jaramillo said: “At beginning customer wanted to know his balance in a paper
one day or more after a transaction. Today, the customer wants to see the balance 5 minutes after
doing the operation”. It is a new world with information” (Jaramillo, 2014).
In Alpina, the “Change of Rhythm & Proactivity” was key in his management. With his
vision, the idea was not only be reactive to the market. With teamwork as the key of the success,
he oriented all the collaborators to be excellent, and it promoted a high velocity to Alpina to
anticipate to needs of the customers. During his management Julián Jaramillo consolidated more
the high standard of quality in Alpina, with an interesting program for customer service, and a big
effort to offer products and services with high quality in all the supply chain (Jaramillo, 2014).
One habit of highly effective people is “Be Proactive” as Julián Jaramillo. Stephen Covey
(1989) put in the table an interesting definition of proactive people:
“You can tell proactive people by the language that they use. There are reactive language
and proactive language. That language comes from a basic paradigm of determinism. When
people say: “I’ll be happy when, if only I had”, etc, you can tell that they are in a reactive

12. mode. The proactive approach is to change from the inside out, to be different and by being
different to affect positive change in what’s out there” (Covey, 1989).
And this proactivity of Julián Jaramillo is very clear. Also, doing face to the mistakes. He
accepted that Alpina as any company can have problems and the best example for the moment was
the difficulty that the enterprise had with the product Inflaboggy. The solution was gave before a
big problem with the customers: “Stop the production of Inflaboggy, collect all the units that are
in the market and also, the units that customer have or ask for they destruction”. However, although
the reaction was ethical and in a “win-win” mode, it is not enough and some mistakes can kill.
The complete history with Inflaboggy shown a Julian Jaramillo with a “defect” as a leader.
He didn’t calculate the risk of the product created by a third part. Inflaboggy was a toy inside the
gelatin. The product was a globe of latex. The product needed to be inflated and with this, the
whistle inside will sound. A girl ate the whistle when she left the globe and she was operated
(Revista Semana, 2012). So, as the same Julián said, the reputation is not a shine award. He as a
leader was the responsible.
However, the mistake with the Inflaboggy shown also, a complete leader. And this is very
clear because the position “win to win” is not a simple formula. Win-win is a frame of mind and
heart that constantly seeks mutual benefit in all human interactions. Win-win means that
agreements and solutions are mutually beneficial and mutually satisfying. Julián Jaramillo shows
that all the business can be ethical and promote sustainability for stakeholders and principal,
customers.

13. Conclusions
Are the leaders born or are they made? What’s about the effective leadership?
Leaders are made. People born with special conditions or “don”. However, day to day,
leaders acquire knowledge and experience and through them, they construct the successful profile
to maintain their leadership and their followers.
Business leaders have the traditional characteristics of leadership that literature exposes.
Charisma, authority, commitment, proactivity, between others. But, additional, the figures and
growth of the business (sales, infrastructure, and presence in markets) are the real result of their
effective leadership.
Is Julián Jaramillo a leader?
Yes, he is. He is charismatic, proactive, commitment, with vision, knowledge and
experience. He was nominated as the “Entrepreneurship of the year in Colombia in 2011”.
Is Julián Jaramillo an effective leader?
Alpina went from US$ 211 million of sales in 2002 to US$ 935 million in 2012. Alpina
went from presence in Colombia, Venezuela & Ecuador, to presence in United States and more of
28 countries around the world.

14. Bibliography
Biografías y vidas: La enciclopedia biográfica en línea. (17 de March de 2015). Obtenido de
http://www.biografiasyvidas.com/biografia/g/guardiola_josep.htm
Covey, S. (1989). The 7 habits of Highly Effective People. New York: Simon & Schuster.
Effect, T. C. (2008). Leigh, Andrew. London: Pearson Education Limited .
Empoderando. (22 de May de 2013). Pep Guardiola y Fernando Trueba el Liderazgo y el Futuro.
Recuperado el 17 de March de 2015, de https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_LoDoTsCAS8
Empreandinos. (2011). Innovación, Confianza, Emprendimiento y Pasión en Alpina. Innovación,
Confianza, Emprendimiento y Pasión en Alpina. Bogotá: Empreandinos.
Escobar, J. J. (1 de Enero de 2006). Julián Jaramillo Escobar. Artífice de la Nueva Estrategia de Alpina. (I.
Alimenticia, Entrevistador)
Interbank Perú. (9 de Febrero de 2012). 10 tips para ser un buen líder. Lima, Perú. Recuperado el 17 de
March de 2015, de https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i37OWICqX4g
Jaramillo, J. (12 de May de 2014). Julián Jaramillo Presidente Alfa en Top Management Week 2014:
Universidad Javeriana. Bogotá, Cundinamarca, Colombia. Recuperado el 8 de April de 2015, de
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=URgJfVJsy7M
Ministry of Education of Ontario. (2009). Five Core Capacities of Effective Leaders. Ideas Into Action.
Recuperado el 8 de May de 2015, de
http://www.edu.gov.on.ca/eng/policyfunding/leadership/IdeasIntoAction09.pdf
NullValue. (24 de June de 2000). Historia de una Empresa Líder. El Tiempo. Recuperado el 25 de March
de 2015, de http://www.eltiempo.com/archivo/documento/MAM-1244258
Portafolio. (22 de April de 2013). Llega la hora del relevo en la presidencia de Alpina. Portafolio.
Recuperado el 15 de March de 2015, de http://www.portafolio.co/negocios/sucesion-la-
presidencia-alpina