“I’ve always been a fighter,” says José Carlos Teixeira, 39, Industrial Manager of ETH Bioenergy’s Morro Vermelho Unit, and São Paulo’s five-time jiu-jitsu world champion and vice champion. He has been with the Group for a year and a half, and quickly identified with the principles and concepts of the Odebrecht Entrepreneurial Technology (TEO), such as discipline, confidence in people and Education through Work. Some people say he is full of energy; others describe him as a can-do kind of guy.

A native of the southeastern Brazilian state of Minas Gerais, Zé Teixeira has degrees in Biology and Chemical Engineering and believes in three things in life: “blood, sweat and toil.” Driven by adrenaline, he worked on his first plant construction project at the age of 29. He got a bachelor’s degree in Sugar-Ethanol Management and an MBA from the University of São Paulo (USP) but never gave up his athletic side. When he was living in Campo Florido, Minas Gerais, he started a social program to teach jiu-jitsu to local children. “It was a way of instilling values like respect, discipline and persistence.”

In 2009, he and his family moved to Presidente Prudente, São Paulo, where he helped build ETH’s Conquista do Pontal (UCP) Unit in the record time of 13 months. Just before the UCP was due to open, a powerful storm wrecked the tent where the ribbon-cutting ceremony was to be held. Zé Teixeira mobilized his team in the middle of the night, and during the next 24 hours he led the effort to move 40 tonnes (metric tons) of industrial equipment. “It was a memorable episode,” he says. “An example of full dedication, where everybody does his best.”

Then, when Zé Teixeira was invited to set up ETH’s new industrial units in the states of Goiás and Mato Grosso, he moved to the town of Mineiros, 420 km from Goiás’s state capital, Goiânia. He travels 730 km every two weeks to see his wife and children, and still finds time to practice jiu-jitsu on weekends. “You have to train and fight to be a winner. Results don’t just fall in your lap,” he says.