Senior Country Operations Officer - Operations Head at Citi

Job Purpose:

• Setting the strategy and goals/priorities for SA O&T being aligned with franchise, cluster and regional functional strategies considering Performance Management Standards (What and How).
• Building up human resources & talent strategy for a strong and diverse O&T team across functions.
• Lead overall Operations and Technology in line with the business objectives and strategies for the entire SA O&T franchise.
• Manage and oversee of all core processes that are outsourced or offshored for SA O&T.
• Implement a proactive risk & control frame for SA O&T fields.
• Maintain close interaction with external auditors and regulators and be the main face to them for all O&T matters representing SA O&T and franchise when needed.
• Manage human, system and other resources to maximize quality and quantity of service.
• Represent SA O&T in relevant country and cluster committees and meetings.
• Interact and collaborate with business/product partners, geography partners and regional functions for improving operating frame, resolving issues, innovating new services and maximising the quality of service and client experience.
• Be the agent of transformation of existing structure into a more productive, efficiently controlled, more digitalized/less human dependent and metrically managed one.  

Job Background/context:

• The Job is a senior management role as the head of O&T for SA being a member of CCC, BRCC and various other management and oversight committees.
• The role is responsible for entire O&T functions of SA franchise which has been existing for more than 50 years. Currently the in country workforce is around 150 with an expense budget of $14mio. The franchise consists of all ICG business segments (TTS, Markets & Securities, Custody) with a growth strategy. Except some of the local Operational activities (like Exchange Control, Cheque clearing, etc.) all other operational activities are mainly outsourced to TCS and CSCs. There are two legal vehicles existing in SA as Citibank N.A. (onshore Legal vehicle) where all banking functions performed under and Citigroup Global Markets SA which is used for mainly Equities business. The SA O&T Head role will be covering all these legal vehicles to the extent of O&T areas need to involved in. The O&T Head will represent the O&T and Franchise within the SA Local Regulatory Bodies when needed such as SARB, JSE and Banks Federations.

Key Responsibilities:

• Developing, implementing and managing/monitoring the strategy across functions for SA O&T.
• Understanding and planning for the short and long term needs of the O&T organization related to human resources, working environment (including technology & premises), processes, risk and controls, client expectations. Developing a senior team of direct staff that is best-in-class in their respective key roles; and managing a diverse pool of O&T human resources including strict localization requirements.
• Implementing a strong risk and control culture and environment across O&T functions to proactively identify the risks, timely escalate and initiate/support implementation of addressing controls.
• Succession planning and strong back-ups for all key/critical roles across O&T functions.
• Establishing and maintaining best-practicing O&T functions learning from its mistakes and striving best output at the optimum efficiency. Lead & coordinate all O&T functions including oversight of outsourced / offshored processes, with a focus on improved efficiency and quality.
• Actively engaging with businesses and functions to provide strategic direction from an SA O&T perspective; prioritizing technology support for the franchise; maintaining strong focus on the delivery of high-quality customer services through O&T processes and platforms that are reflected in high degrees of customer satisfaction.
• Ensuring O&T resources are appropriately aligned with the requirements of the business by quantity and competency.
• Taking a leadership role in exploring and developing key themes within O&T such as regionalization,

Development Value:

• With primary responsibility and accountability for oversight of O&T landscape for SA franchise the job provides a significant potential to gain in-depth knowledge of products/processes, widen managerial breadth and interface with the senior management at country, cluster and regional level. Managing a country O&T role in this scale will provide immense executive management and leadership capabilities and learning opportunities with multi-geography/business tasking, team building, problem solving and in depth-understanding of franchise and multi-business dynamics as well. It will also give an opportunity to closely interact with local regulators as well as key market players in SA and manage regulatory requirements in a challenging environment and developing interpersonal skills in a culturally diverse setup.

Knowledge/Experience:

• In-depth knowledge of Operations and Products of especially the fields of Transaction Services (Cash, Trade, Account Services) Markets & Securities Services, Private Banking and Wealth Management as well as related banking practices, processes, and technology around them,
• Experience of similar O&T Head, or Leadership experience preferably in similar size/scale organizations.
• Superior skills to continually measure, enhance and optimize operations related functions
• Ability to fully comprehend and impact the ‘full picture’ along with other key players in other functional areas
• Excellent knowledge of internal Compliance requirements and MCA process along with all operations and technology policies and procedures
• Superior skills to continually measure, enhance and optimize operations related functions
• Ability to fully comprehend and impact the ‘full picture’ along with other key players in other functional areas and clusters
• Very good knowledge about core Citi Systems
• Experience in O&T budgeting and expense management
• Knowledge of Continuity of Business process

Skills:

• Excellent people management and leadership skills to manage diverse and remote teams with multi-cultural backgrounds
• Negotiation skills and strong influencing ability
• Excellent problem-solving skills
• Coaching, training, team building and motivation
• Strong risk and control awareness and knowledge of control practices`
• Excellent interpersonal and communication skills
• Analytic thinking and problem solving
• Fluency in English;

Qualifications:

• Bachelors degree in areas like management, banking, accounting, finance with 15 + years of banking experience, with minimum of 8-10 years in O&T
• Masters Degree advantageous;
• 15 years of leadership experience in similar scale/size roles;
• Banking/ Financial Services experience essential

Competencies:

• Leadership
• Organisation, planning and team building,
• Resilience and Problem Solving
• Execution and result oriented
• Self-Motivation,
• Verbal communication & influencing
• Project management
• Flexibility to adapt changing priorities