Banking Operations Leader

Job Title:  Banking Operations Leader

Location - Lexington KY - Hybrid (2 - 3 Days in Office)

Job Summary:

The Banking Operations Manager is responsible for ensuring the smooth and efficient processing of money movement transactions, maintaining compliance with industry regulations and standards, and optimizing our banking operations to support the organization's financial goals. This role is also much more than a daily reporting task, we are looking for a leader to innovate and build internal best practices to meet our regulatory requirements and high internal standards. 

Who are we:  

Sky Systemz is a different kind of financial technology company at its core. We listen to our customers, we absorb feedback, and based on their wants we further develop our payment software and add new features. Currently, we are developing a next generation payment platform and neobanking service. Our mission is to build software solutions that solve big problems for business verticals that have been overlooked by out of the box business software products—helping our customers grow, save money, and operate more efficiently.

Who are you: 

You are a talented banking or payment individual, you have 5 years or more experience in payment processing, you have worked in complex banking or payment processing organizations that deal with high volume banking or payment transactions across multiple networks and various customer types. You look beyond how it works today and move to improve and drive scale in our banking and payment operations. You have a risk first view and can translate this into your day to day role. You are happy in fast paced environments and work collaboratively with a roll up your sleeves mentality. 

Key Responsibilities:

1. Payment Operations:

• Bring to the table new ways of thinking and set the process and procedures for how best to undertake money movement and  payment processing, you will look to change the status quo to achieve a better outcome. 
• Oversee the daily payment processing activities, including authorization, settlement, and reconciliation of transactions.
• Monitor all money movement and transaction processing systems and ensure seamless integration with merchant accounts, gateways, and other payment service providers.
• Troubleshoot and resolve processing issues, errors, or discrepancies.
• Look to scale and evolve with new technologies, vendors and innovation. 

1. Reconciliation and Reporting:

• Reporting and data are core to you, the reporting out across for multiple stakeholders is vital to your success. 
• Perform reconciliation of transactions, fees, and settlements across various platforms and systems.
• Analyze money movement data and generate reports on transaction volumes, chargeback rates, and other key performance indicators (KPIs).
• Identify and investigate discrepancies, implement corrective actions, and communicate findings to relevant stakeholders.

1. Vendor Management:

• Manage relationships with payment processors, acquiring banks, and other third-party service providers.
• Evaluate and negotiate contracts, service level agreements (SLAs), and pricing structures.
• Monitor vendor performance and ensure adherence to contractual obligations.

1. Process Improvement and Automation:

• Analyze money movement and banking operations and identify opportunities for optimization and automation.
• Collaborate with cross-functional teams, to move towards automation and scale payment-related workflows
• Implement those changes and process improvements, documentation, and training to enhance operational efficiency and reduce errors.

1. Project and Product Management:

• Participate in projects, such as system upgrades, integration of new money movement methods, or compliance initiatives.
• Set the features, requirements and needs of your team for delivery by technology, always looking to remove customer pain points and drive internal operational improvements with automation or best practices.
• Coordinate with internal and external stakeholders to ensure successful project execution and delivery.

1. Working knowledge of : 

• Data reporting tools and data reporting modeling in a banking environment
• Building and implementing new banking or money movement processes and procedures in a regulated space
• Daily working knowledge of all or some of the following - end to end payment processing including but not limited - Payment networks, ACH, ISO and PayFac models, FedWire and FedNow 
• Daily working knowledge of banking and compliance, payment practices, policies and procedures
• Understanding or have set the path for “Banking and Payment Data Architectures”, reporting tools, ideally setting automation standards and processes  

1. Qualifications:

• Bachelor's degree in finance, accounting, business administration, or a related field
• Extensive experience in banking or payment operations, 5 years minimum, preferably in banking or payment facilitation and payment processing
• Strong understanding of the regulatory banking environment specifically money movement, payment processing systems, regulations, and industry best practices
• Clear documentation and process creation experience, 
• You are/where the owner of the processes today in your current or past roles, setting the standard and acting as a counterbalance in your organization.
• Proficiency in data analysis, reconciliation, and reporting tools
• Excellent problem-solving, attention to detail, and organizational skills
• Strong communication and interpersonal abilities

Benefits:

• Competitive salary and performance-based incentives.
• Health, dental, and vision insurance plans.
• Corporate Gym Membership (On-Site).
• Collaborative and innovative work environment.
• Opportunity to work at the forefront of fintech and shape the future of the merchant processing industry.