Mercedes Gonzales-Gorbena
trailblazers
Chief product officer
Tes | Europe
Mercedes joined Tes as chief product officer in November 2020 and is responsible for all the product solutions that Tes offers to schools worldwide. Since joining, she has already made a real impact on the business and the people within it. “Mercedes has fundamentally changed the feel of Tes as a company. Her existence on the board and senior leadership team is helping to motivate senior women to stay in the business,” a colleague said.
“Mercedes has an energy and passion that radiates throughout the whole company. She has an incredible ability to bring people along with her from all across the business. She does this with conviction and energy, but also with compassion and understanding,” they added.
“In a business that in undergoing a lot of change and transformation, she has supported me and my colleagues in getting our voices heard when they wouldn’t have been. She champions good work and regularly calls out successes – where it was not the company culture to do so previously.”
Mercedes brings with her a wide range of experience and a proven track record of delivering and leading business transformation in different types of industries including telecom, mobile phones, luxury goods and fintech. She has worked in several countries and is passionate about creating a customer-centric culture.
A native of Spain, she started her career in product development in the mobile branch of Telefonica, before moving to California to work in product management at Nokia. After a few years she returned to Europe to lead the product management function and was part of the management team at Vertu, a subsidiary of Nokia in the UK.
