On Friday mornings, Christian Sfeir tries to schedule an hour to study. Sometimes it is a new artificial intelligence functionality; others, a recent announcement from your company. He recently told his team that he was coordinating the date to take a global certification in artificial intelligence strategy, still in beta.
He doesn’t do it just for himself: he believes that a leader has to set an example. “I also get certified and I tell my team: look, I got this certification, who’s next?”
Father of two children, Christian describes himself as someone passionate about technology and, above all, everything that has an impact, which is why today he supports public sector organizations.
He likes to build everything: equipment, technology and also things at home. And behind that discipline there is an idea that he repeats in the interview: without trained people, technology changes nothing.
Building the public sector from scratch
His path starts through computing. At the university, after a common plan, he chose that line to develop the most technical part. After finishing his degree, he completed a master’s degree and, when he had been working for a couple of years, an MBA, to better understand experiences that when he was young, at university, he had not fully understood.
This is how he combined two tastes that drive him to this day: technology and business.
He went through Microsoft, one of AWS’s competitors, but says what he took away was not so much from the company, but from the bosses and leaders he worked with.
“Companies are important, but at the end of the day it is the people who make the company,” he says.
When AWS contacted him, a little over seven years ago, the offer was to build the public sector vertical in Chile. He took it immediately.
- Did you imagine leading a project like this?
“Imagine, yes. I’ve generally been intentional in my career development: I try to always think about what I want to do, be vocal with my leader about it, and look for those opportunities. I’m grateful that the opportunities were given to me, but it’s something I’ve sought out.”
In those years he has seen the type of projects change. Seven years ago, remember, you had to explain what the cloud was, and the projects were more like migrations of corporate websites.
Today other types of initiatives are observed. For example, last year, with BancoEstado, they launched a housing and financial education marketplace with an artificial intelligence assistant.
He also cites the work with more than 400 researchers from the Andrés Bello University on cloud platforms and support for the presidential elections.
Technology without talent
AWS announced an investment of $4 billion in Chile to build an infrastructure region, a set of data centers. For institutions, he explains, it means being able to keep data in the country and reduce application latency.
But the main barrier, he says, is not technological: according to data from the study “Unlocking the potential of AI in Chile – 2026”, prepared by Strand Partners for AWS, 48% of Chilean companies point to the lack of talent as the main brake on adopting or expanding.
- Why launch a training initiative now?
“We have been in Chile since 2017 and we have trained more than 200,000 people in different cloud technologies. But in the context of the region we are launching, it makes a lot of sense to continue with this commitment to increasingly reduce the digital talent gap: having technology without having the skills, without having the talent, does not transform a country.”
The initiative in Chile, with free access and with routes ranging from cloud fundamentals to certifications in artificial intelligence, aims to train 300,000 people by 2028.
It is part of a regional program with the goal of reaching two million. Ministries, municipalities and universities participate, because achieving impact, he says, goes beyond a single institution.
- What about the roles in front of artificial intelligence?
“They are enabling technologies. The tasks we do today will probably not be the same in five or ten years, but that does not mean that the role disappeared. I may have studied the same as my father and the tasks I do are not the same ones he did, but the role remains. That is why you have to be studying and attentive to capture opportunities.”
That wave, he admits, moves very quickly and can generate anxiety. That is why his advice to those who feel they have been left behind is that a three-month course is no longer enough: studying must be part of everyday life.
And he invites older people not to be afraid to enroll: these technologies, he says, reduce that barrier and there is no maximum age to reconvert.
Prioritize before wasting time
- How do you maintain customer focus as the company grows?
“We all have the same number of minutes in the day, and I am a true believer that we have to prioritize. I try to avoid the phrase ‘I didn’t have time’: I prefer to say ‘I couldn’t prioritize it’ or ‘I prioritized other things’. I start by prioritizing time with clients and partners, and I keep in my head that that is a priority.”
That logic also orders his family life. He leaves his children at school early, is in the office at 7:40 and, if possible, leaves at 6 in the afternoon, so that he can have two or three hours with them and help them with their homework.
In AWS, he says, everyone manages their agenda. He also prioritizes his team: one-on-one meetings and conversations, because the important thing, he says, is to be genuinely interested in people’s well-being.
Regarding education, he says that his daughter studies with artificial intelligence as a partner with whom she contrasts ideas, although he believes that children must be taught to review what the tool tells them.
“Between not having had artificial intelligence and having to go to the library to look for the book, I prefer where I am,” he jokes.
- What advice would you give to a Christian who was just starting out?
“Do not look down on the importance of soft skills for any career. I started out on a very hard, technical career, and along the way I realized how important it is to develop those skills, especially if you are interested in having a leadership role.”
Do you regret anything? No: you make mistakes, he says, but you are also where you are thanks to them. And next Friday, first thing in the morning, he will reschedule his study time.
