You miss every chance that you don’t take. Turning the impossible into possible; takes trust within one’s inherent potential. Having the capability of making a difference, fighting challenges, and emerging victorious above all odds is Aspasia Malliou.
Constantly developing her knowledge, skills, and efficient expertise Aspasia contributes her best to the cause that matters. Rising beyond all kinds of prejudices, empowering other women leaders to thrive, she exhibits confident leadership.
As the Tax Partner of POTAMITISVEKRIS and Editor of “Bulletin of Tax Legislation,” Aspasia utilizes her 30+ years of specialization in advising on Tax law and representing clients before the administrative courts and the council of state. She is LLM Lawyer and Economist. Her studies in Economics have afforded her a business-minded approach to the practice of law.
Facing Challenges with Hard work and Constant Training
Aspasia’s journey in law started 33 years ago, doing her practice alongside a lawyer – a legend in tax law, with whom she had a 50-year difference. In addition, especially now, the environment where a tax lawyer acts is male-dominated. Tax executives in the public and the private sector were and still are primarily men. This was the first serious challenge Aspasia faced, and looking back, she realized that she coped by just choosing to keep working and ignore it. For Aspasia, there is no distinction between men and women. All of them are persons with whom she must find ways of understanding, navigation, agreement, and a common language of communication.
The second serious challenge Aspasia faced concerned the very object of taxation, which requires specialized knowledge of its legal framework and good knowledge of economics and accounting. Tax lawyers cannot communicate with the accounting department and the financial sector of a business if they are not able to understand the mechanism of credit and debit. That’s the reason why she continued her studies even further to graduate in economics.
Aspasia has chosen to cope with the above challenges and every other challenge with hard work and constant training.
Contributing to Legal Innovation and Law Reforms
POTAMITISVEKRIS is one of Greece’s top full-service law firms, with a 130+ member staff including 11 partners, over 73 associates, 24 trainees, and business services professionals in specialized areas.
POTAMITISVEKRIS efficiently combines its respective experience, knowledge, and skills into a collective offering greater than the sum of its parts and represents its prime asset. It seeks and finds solutions for each case rather than relying only on past practices.
POTAMITISVEKRIS continuously contributes to legal innovation and law reforms. POTAMITISVEKRIS might be the only big Greek law firm in which equal relations between its partners are developed. All the decisions are taken unanimously, and nepotism is excluded. Aspasia says, “Every day, in our firm, we apply the rule of direct democracy with good faith between us.”
Being Committed to Betterment of Community in All Aspects
Aspasia joined as a Partner in POTAMITISVEKRIS because she was convinced that the company treats law as a social function, having as its basic aim not only resolving disputes but also intensifying entrepreneurship within a social-ethical framework. PV aims and strives daily to upgrade the business environment, support legislators’ efforts to improve the country’s competitiveness and lead to social connections. The firm is committed to the betterment of its community in all aspects. Toward this goal, many of its lawyers work pro bono in immigration, education, cultural heritage, environmental protection, promotion of democracy, and regional integration.
Becoming Cosmopolitan and Introspective
Every person, book, and factor of life that has helped Aspasia and continues to help her open her horizons and understand the world’s workings fascinates her. Aspasia is interested in philosophy, history, geography, other cultures, the structure of languages and the images they capture. Along with the becoming of the human being through prehistory and history, gemmology, the evolution of the applied arts, the texture of fabrics, connections between civilization hidden behind works of art, and much more. Everything that helps her to become a cosmopolitan and at the same time to introspect.
Serving Justice in Productive and Happy Environment
Aspasia would like to change people’s thinking regarding the essential rules and ethics of transactions and all aspects of human life and developments. She states, “Every act or omission must serve the rule of law. Every choice must strengthen social ties. Every contact, every action should be balanced between the private interests and the general interest of the state-organized society.” POTAMITISVEKRIS’s commitment is to promote the ethical and collegial practice of law and serve the interests of justice in a productive and happy to work environment.
Going Beyond Social Prejudices and Being Empowered
From adolescence until today, Aspasia strongly believed that women’s empowerment is possible, especially with their self-segregation.
She says, “If all of us women make it clear in our way of life and our choices that we do not tolerate adverse differentiation, it will gradually subside, and I hope it will disappear one day.”
Aspasia adds, “We must first believe, even against the social prejudice, that there is no separation between successful men and weak women. All of us, regardless of gender or identity choices, are human beings, and we should communicate as citizens, each of us contributing to the general good, with our special skills.”
Gaining Better Self-knowledge and Widening Limits
The journey of Aspasia has already been proved very valuable. Aspasia would like to continue and gain little by little a better level of self-knowledge. She is still trying to identify and widen her limits and understand and love those around her more and more. As for POTAMITISVEKRIS, Aspasia would like to continue trying to convey her vision to the younger ones so that, little by little, they would take the keys from her and continue further and better.
Justifying the Space, We Occupy
Aspasia says that, “Hard work, training, dedication, faith, empathy, sympathy, ethos, and vision are the primary raw materials for each of us to justify the space we occupy.”
