FGV and Rio de Janeiro federal judiciary complete leadership training program

On November 12, the closing event of the Training Program for New Directors of Secretariats was held. This program was the result of a partnership between FGV and the Rio de Janeiro federal judiciary. The meeting, held in FGV’s main building in Botafogo, was attended by the director of the Rio de Janeiro federal judiciary, Dr. Eduardo André Fernandes; federal judges Natália Tupper, Júlio Emílio Mansur and Hudson Targino; a representative of the Rio de Janeiro federal judiciary’s General Secretariat, Luciana Barão; the director of the Rio de Janeiro federal judiciary’s People Management Undersecretariat, Luciane Almada; and other representatives of the undersecretariat.

The opening remarks were delivered by Luciana Barão, who highlighted “the importance of the completion of this unparalleled initiative, reflecting everyone’s commitment to high-quality work.”

After that, the director of the Rio de Janeiro federal judiciary, federal judge Eduardo André Fernandes, stressed the excellent work done by the federal justice system. “We are recognized by society as an institution that does excellent work, and so I am very proud of this initiative, which shows our commitment to further enhancing our activities. It was extremely rewarding to carry out this training, given the caliber of the students and the quality of their deliveries. I think pride is really the word that sums up this initiative led by the federal justice system, carried out so competently by FGV. It’s a pleasure to participate in the conclusion of this program, which has been very well evaluated and will make a big difference to your everyday lives. We are very happy with all this success,” he said.

FGV’s deputy academic coordinator, Gustavo Queiroz, then made some general remarks on the challenges and solutions that arose during the training course and presided over a series of group presentations by the civil servants who took the course.

Improved services

Over the course of the day, the participants, divided into five groups, presented papers on the following topics: 

• Improvements to service channels: proposal for a new app;
• The federal justice system in your hands;
• The difficulties faced by less experienced litigants in understanding the progress of their cases and the resulting impact on the number of service requests handled by court institutions;
• The use of MS Office 365 and artificial intelligence tools in the Rio de Janeiro federal judiciary;
• Digital transformation as a driver of improvements in existing service channels aimed at external public satisfaction and operational efficiency and effectiveness; and
• Unfamiliarity with the functionalities of the Eproc procedural system and underutilization of the tools provided.

Based on the topics discussed, the groups described problematic situations and proposed solutions for improving the activities carried out by the Rio de Janeiro federal judiciary. The presented proposals included the creation of chatbots, an app and a virtual assistant with the aim of improving federal court services. These solutions were proposed on the basis of the students’ research and work experience.

Civil servant Laizza Cristina Vieira Lemes, who works at the 19th Federal Court, highlighted the exchange of ideas and the learning provided by the course. “It was a very enriching experience in terms of the content itself, as we discussed the latest in leadership with one of the most respected private sector institutions on the subject. In addition, there was a lot of exchange between colleagues from the judiciary and we did an exercise to apply what we learned during the course to our circumstances. The closing workshop got everyone thinking about new solutions to our institution’s long-standing problems. I believe that this initiative is part of a larger movement in the federal court system toward a modern leadership paradigm, focused on developing people, sharing ideas and respecting diversity. I hope that more classes will be offered, to train more multipliers of knowledge and best practices,” she said. 

About the course

For the first time, the Rio de Janeiro federal judiciary, in partnership with FGV, held a course to train new leaders for the position of judicial secretariat director. Enrollment took place in May. Civil servants from the Rio de Janeiro federal judiciary (except those on secondment or assignment) with a law degree and assigned to the judicial area were eligible to apply.

The training course, which was taught by FGV professors in hybrid format, consisted of 100 hours (80 hours of virtual classes, 8 hours of in-person classes and 12 hours of asynchronous virtual content). The training was divided into five modules and covered topics related to management, with an emphasis on issues linked to interpersonal relationships, such as leadership, people management, communication, conflict management, innovation and digital transformation.