Deputy Head of Financial Crime (1LOD)

Key ResponsibilitiesOperational Leadership & Delivery

• Provide day-to-day management and oversight of financial crime operations, including transaction monitoring, investigations, screening, CDD and EDD.
• Act as a point of escalation for complex cases, sensitive customer relationships, and operational bottlenecks, making timely, well-reasoned decisions.
• Manage approvals within delegated authority, ensuring decisions are proportionate, well-evidenced and consistent with policy and risk appetite.
• Deputise for the Head of Financial Crime Risk Services, including representing the function in their absence.

Data, Analytics & Automation

• Personally analyse operational and risk data to identify trends, control weaknesses, emerging typologies and opportunities for improvement.
• Champion the effective use of AI and automation across the function, identifying practical opportunities to streamline processes, reduce manual effort and improve detection quality.
• Work with data and technology partners to translate analytical insight into tangible process, control or system improvements.
• Support the build-out of MI and reporting capability as the function matures, ensuring outputs are accurate, timely and decision-useful.

Risk Assessment, Controls & Process Design

• Design, document and maintain robust financial crime procedures and process maps, ensuring they are practical, controlled and audit-ready.
• Complete risk assessments across products, customer types, and business processes, and translate findings into proportionate control design.
• Support the ongoing development and testing of the financial crime control library, ensuring controls remain fit for purpose as the business and its risks evolve.
• Identify control gaps and lead or support remediation activity through to closure, including responses to internal audit and second-line findings.

Governance, Reporting & Committee Engagement

• Produce high-quality reports and MI packs summarising financial crime performance, risk trends and control effectiveness.
• Present reports and MI packs to relevant governance forums and committees, articulating risk and performance clearly and credibly to senior stakeholders.
• Support preparation of materials for Executive Committee and Board-level risk reporting as required.

Stakeholder & Change Management

• Build and maintain effective working relationships with senior stakeholders across the business, second line, and internal audit.
• Balance the demands of operational business teams with the need to maintain robust, defensible financial crime controls.
• Act as a credible, confident advocate for the function's direction of travel, supporting colleagues through the transition to a more data- and automation-driven operating model.

People Development & Team Capability

• Support and guide the team through the broader transformation of the function, helping colleagues understand the case for change and building confidence in new ways of working.
• Identify cross-skilling and upskilling opportunities across investigations, controls, CDD/EDD and alert management, reducing single points of failure and building a more flexible, resilient team.
• Help unlock the team's full capability by identifying untapped potential, delegating meaningfully, and creating opportunities for colleagues to stretch into new areas of work.
• Actively support development and career progression across the team, including input into talent and succession planning.
• Act as a mentor and coach to team leads and senior team members, modelling the analytical and hands-on approach expected of the wider function.

Essential Experience

• Significant experience within a financial crime function (bank, specialist lender, or similar regulated financial services firm), covering transaction monitoring, investigations, screening, CDD and EDD.
• Proven experience managing and developing people, alongside a genuine willingness to remain hands-on with analytical and operational work.
• Experience designing, documenting and embedding financial crime policies, procedures and controls.
• Experience conducting or contributing to financial crime risk assessments (e.g. BWRA, RCSA, or equivalent).
• Experience producing and presenting MI and reports to senior stakeholders and governance committees.
• Practical experience or a strong working knowledge of how AI, automation or data analytics tools can be applied to financial crime processes.

Analytical & Technical Skills

• A logical, analytical mindset, comfortable working directly with data to identify patterns, trends and outliers.
• Strong working knowledge of financial crime typologies, regulatory obligations (e.g. MLRs, JMLSG, Proceeds of Crime Act, sanctions regimes) and industry good practice.
• Confidence with data and reporting tools (e.g. Excel, SQL, Power BI or equivalent) sufficient to interrogate MI and challenge findings, rather than relying solely on others to do so.
• Clear, precise written and verbal communication, with the ability to flex style between technical, operational and executive audiences.

Behavioural & Leadership Attributes

• Comfortable leading from the front - equally credible directing a team and rolling up their sleeves to do the underlying analysis or drafting themselves.
• Resilient and confident under scrutiny, able to manage senior stakeholders and hold a position on risk and control matters where necessary.
• Pragmatic and commercially aware, able to balance robust control with the practical needs of operational business teams.
• Change-oriented, with genuine enthusiasm for modernising and improving how a financial crime function operates.
• A genuine coaching and development mindset, invested in growing others rather than simply directing them.

Desirable

• Relevant professional qualification (e.g. ICA Diploma, ACAMS, or equivalent).
• Prior exposure to a data or automation transformation programme within a risk or compliance function.

Your Wellbeing - We take your health and well-being very seriously by providing a range of benefits to give you and your family peace of mind. These include: