As VP for Sustainability, Marla heads the BDO Sustainability Office and drives the execution of the BDO Sustainability Framework and Strategies. She oversees policy formulation and programs reviews across the BDO Conglomerate, as well as monitoring, tracking, and reporting of the Bank’s environmental and social impact and initiatives, and produces the annual BDO Sustainability Report. She works closely with business groups, particularly with the Sustainable Finance Desk of the Institutional Banking Group, Investor Relations and Corporate Planning, Risk Management Group, and the BDO Foundation, as subject matter expert and advisor, to ensure the Bank’s alignment of its policies and practices with global standards, regulations, and laws on sustainability reporting. She is also responsible for communicating sustainability initiatives to internal and external stakeholders, and represents BDO in external speaking engagements and forums.

Before joining BDO, Marla was Diversity & Inclusion Lead for news and information services provider Thomson Reuters, where she spent 11 years leading the execution of global strategies in diversity and inclusion, social impact, corporate responsibility, and corporate communications, first in Asia, then globally. Previously, she held senior corporate communication roles at tech firm Intel Corporation for its Asia operations; food and beverage group San Miguel Corporation; architecture, engineering and construction company Environments Global. She started her career at public relations firm Orendain & Associates where she designed communication campaigns for multinational banks, pharmaceutical companies, and non-government organizations.

Marla is an experienced international speaker on gender, diversity and inclusion, and sustainability. She is a certified facilitator of the Google #IamRemarkable workshop for women, an Advisor of the Women Inter-industry Network (WIN), and former Board member of the International Association of Business Communicators (IABC) Philippines.