Head of Payment Operations, Pliant

• 8‑10 years’ progressive experience in payments, card issuing/acquiring or fintech, including 3+ years leading managers and larger teams
• Deep technical and commercial understanding of global card schemes (Visa, Mastercard), payment processors, tokenisation, 3D Secure and alternative payment methods
• Proven track record of designing strategies that reduced cost‑of‑payments and improved authorisation rates at scale
• Hands‑on expertise in data‑driven decision‑making; advanced SQL or Python a strong plus
• Strong stakeholder‑management skills with experience influencing C‑level execs and external partners
• Comfort working across time zones and in a fast‑moving, high‑ambiguity environment
• Excellent written & verbal English; additional European languages are advantageous

Desirable

• Set the vision & strategy
• Define and own the global payments‑operations strategy that supports the company’s growth, revenue and customer‑experience goals
• Translate strategic objectives into an annual operating plan with clear OKRs, budgets and head‑count needs
• Continuously assess the external payments landscape (schemes, processors, PSPs, regulations) to identify opportunities, efficiencies and risks
• Drive operational excellence at scale
• Build & evolve a resilient PayOps operating model covering card issuing, processing, alternative payment methods and treasury flows
• Maintain KPI tracking for cost‑of‑payments, success rates, dispute ratios and operational SLAs; drive root‑cause analysis and long‑term fixes
• Sponsor automation & tooling initiatives (incl. data pipelines, alerting and reconciliation) in partnership with Payments Program Management, Product & Engineering
• Lead & develop a high‑performing team
• Manage, mentor and inspire a multi‑disciplinary, geographically distributed Payments Operations organisation (managers, analysts and specialists)
• Create a culture of continuous improvement through structured quality programmes, career frameworks and proactive training paths
• Scale the function in line with transaction volume while maintaining best‑in‑class service levels
• Own risk, compliance & scheme relationships
• Serve as the executive point of contact for card schemes, processors and banking partners; negotiate commercials and influence roadmaps
• Oversee regulatory reporting, scheme audits and licence obligations, ensuring controls are documented, tested and continuously improved
• Collaborate with Risk, Compliance and Legal to anticipate regulatory change and embed new requirements with minimal friction
• Partner cross‑functionally
• Act as the voice of Payments Operations in product discovery, pricing and go‑to‑market conversations
• Work closely with Finance on forecasting, treasury optimisation and month‑end reconciliations
• Represent PayOps in incident management, post‑mortems and board‑level updates