Aave

Non-custodial DeFi lending, borrowing, flash loans

Director of Operations

Business & StrategyConfirmed live in the last 24 hours

Full-timeDublin, IrelandNo salary listedHybrid

About the Job

Requirements

At least 8 years of experience in Operations, Customer Operations, Business Operations, or a related function, including meaningful experience in a senior leadership role.
Experience building or scaling operations within a high-growth consumer technology, fintech, or financial services business.
Experience operating across regulated and unregulated business activities, with an understanding of how operational requirements, governance, and controls differ based on the business activity.
Experience delivering customer experiences at scale and understanding how operations, technology, and support work together across the customer journey.
A track record of designing processes and operating models that scale with significant customer and transaction growth.
Understanding of how to use technology, automation, and artificial intelligence to improve operational efficiency and reduce manual work.
Ability to establish key performance indicators, analyze performance, and use data to prioritize improvements.
Experience working closely with Product, Engineering, Compliance, and other cross-functional teams.
Strong understanding of operational and governance requirements applicable to regulated financial services businesses, including customer complaints, operational risk management, and regulatory accountability.
Experience serving as a PCF-42 or in a similar regulated position.

Responsibilities

Develop and scale the operational strategy, structure, and processes needed to support a growing global business and customer base without compromising quality, controls, or customer experience.
Assume responsibility for operational management of Push Virtual Assets Ireland Ltd as PCF-42, overseeing its day-to-day operations, operational risks, controls, and regulatory obligations.
Identify bottlenecks, inefficiencies, and operational risks, and implement processes and systems that improve reliability, speed, and execution quality.
Ensure a consistently high-quality customer experience across operational touchpoints, from onboarding through ongoing support and issue resolution.
Own the Group's complaints management framework, ensuring complaints are identified, investigated, escalated, and resolved appropriately, and adjudicate complaints within the Irish regulated entity in accordance with regulatory requirements.
Identify opportunities to use tooling, automation, and artificial intelligence to reduce manual processes, improve efficiency, and create better experiences for customers and internal teams.
Define and monitor operational key performance indicators, identify trends, risks, and opportunities, and translate data into actions and priorities.
Bring operational and customer insights into product development, identify customer friction points, improve journeys, and ensure operational readiness for new products and launches.
Own relationships and performance across relevant operational vendors and service providers, ensuring they meet quality and reliability standards and customer needs.
Partner with Compliance and Legal to ensure operational processes and customer outcomes meet applicable regulatory requirements.
Work with ICT and Security to oversee operational resilience, incident management, and business continuity arrangements, ensuring operational risks and incidents are identified, managed, escalated, and remediated with relevant teams.
Hire, coach, and develop a high-performing Operations organization with a culture of ownership, accountability, and continuous improvement.
Provide operational reporting and management information to executive leadership and relevant Boards, including visibility into operational performance, customer outcomes, incidents, complaints, and material risks.

Desired Qualifications

Experience within crypto or Web3, particularly in consumer-facing products.

About us

Aave Labs began with a simple question: how do we make financial services like borrowing, saving, and earning more accessible globally?

We built the Aave Protocol, now the world’s largest and most trusted onchain lending market, connecting decentralized finance with individuals, traditional finance, and fintech.

Today, we build trusted, high-quality products that expand access to lending, credit, and savings globally

Our culture

We build trusted products that help people access and discover economic opportunities.

We hold a high bar for quality and craftsmanship. No detail is too small. Trust depends on it.

We’re a global team building products people can actually use, turning complex technology into something simple and reliable.

We stay aligned, move quickly, and think long term, while keeping teams lean and focused on impact.

About the role

We’re looking for a Director of Operations to lead the operational function supporting our growing global business.

This is a senior, hands-on leadership role responsible for building the processes, systems and operating infrastructure needed to deliver a seamless customer experience at scale. You’ll sit at the intersection of Product, Engineering, ICT & Security, Compliance, Support and the wider business, ensuring our day-to-day operations are efficient, resilient and ready to support continued growth.

The role combines Group-wide operational leadership with specific regulatory responsibilities within our Irish regulated entity, Push Virtual Assets Ireland Ltd. The successful candidate will be expected to obtain approval from the Central Bank of Ireland to perform the Pre-Approval Controlled Function of Chief Operating Officer (PCF-42) and undertake responsibilities associated with Controlled Function CF-8 (Complaints Adjudication).

You’ll be responsible for ensuring that our regulated operations meet applicable regulatory requirements, while developing proportionate and scalable operational frameworks for the wider business. This requires someone who understands how to balance operational efficiency, customer experience and innovation with the governance, accountability and controls expected of a regulated financial services business.

Given the nature of our products, you’ll help ensure we maintain a high bar for operational excellence while meeting the requirements expected of a regulated financial services business.

How you can make an impact:

Develop and scale the operational strategy, structure and processes required to support a growing global business and customer base without compromising quality, controls or customer experience
Assume responsibility for the operational management of Push Virtual Assets Ireland Ltd in the capacity of PCF-42, ensuring effective oversight of its day-to-day operations, operational risks, controls and regulatory obligations.
Identify bottlenecks, inefficiencies and operational risks, implementing processes and systems that improve reliability, speed and quality of execution
Ensure we deliver a consistently high-quality customer experience across key operational touchpoints, from onboarding through to ongoing support and issue resolution
Own the Group’s complaints management framework, ensuring complaints are appropriately identified, investigated, escalated and resolved, with specific responsibility for complaints adjudication within the Irish regulated entity in accordance with applicable regulatory requirements.
Identify opportunities to use tooling, automation and AI to reduce manual processes, improve efficiency and create better experiences for both customers and internal teams
Define and monitor operational KPIs, identifying trends, risks and opportunities and translating data into clear actions and priorities
Bring operational and customer insights into product development, helping identify friction points, improve customer journeys and ensure operational readiness for new products and launches
Own relationships and performance across relevant operational vendors and service providers, ensuring they meet our standards for quality, reliability and customer
Partner closely with Compliance and Legal to ensure operational processes and customer outcomes meet applicable regulatory requirements
Work with ICT & Security to oversee operational resilience, incident management and business continuity arrangements, working closely with relevant teams to ensure operational risks and incidents are appropriately identified, managed, escalated and remediated.
Hire, coach and develop a high-performing Operations organisation with a strong culture of ownership, accountability and continuous improvement.
Provide operational reporting and management information to executive leadership and relevant Boards, ensuring appropriate visibility of operational performance, customer outcomes, incidents, complaints and material risks.

Let’s connect if you have:

You have 8+ years of experience in Operations, Customer Operations, Business Operations or a related function, with meaningful experience in a senior leadership role
You’ve built or scaled operations within a high-growth consumer technology, fintech or financial services business
You have experience operating across regulated and unregulated business activities, with an understanding of how operational requirements, governance and controls differ depending on the nature of the business
You have experience delivering customer experiences at scale, with a strong understanding of how operations, technology and support come together across the customer journey
You have a track record of designing processes and operating models that can scale with significant customer and transaction growth
You understand how to use technology, automation and AI to improve operational efficiency and reduce unnecessary manual work
You’re highly data-driven and comfortable establishing KPIs, analysing performance and using data to prioritise improvements
You have experience working closely with Product, Engineering, Compliance and other cross-functional teams
You have a strong understanding of the operational and governance requirements applicable to regulated financial services businesses, including customer complaints, operational risk management and regulatory accountability.
You have experience being a PCF-42 or a similar regulated position
Experience within crypto or Web3 is strongly preferred, particularly within consumer-facing products, but isn’t essential

Haven’t quite met all the criteria? Let’s not miss out on the chance to speak. Whilst you might not meet every single requirement, you might bring other, more exciting skills to the companies!

Equal opportunities statement:

Aave Labs celebrates diversity and views each and every team member as a separate individual with their own unique identity. No matter your race, religion, gender, ethnicity, age, disability, sexual orientation or even the wallet you use, we welcome you at Aave Labs. As an equal opportunities employer, we take accountability and believe in everyone's potential to build, create and inspire changes. With a mission to build a diverse workforce, we are proud to foster a working environment in which everyone can feel safe and valued for who they are.

About the Company

Aave

Non-custodial DeFi lending, borrowing, flash loans

Aave is a decentralized finance protocol that lets people lend and borrow a wide range of cryptocurrencies without giving up custody of their funds. Depositors lock their crypto into liquidity pools managed by smart contracts on Ethereum and earn interest. Borrowers take loans against collateral that is overcollateralized, meaning the collateral value exceeds the loan value to reduce risk of default. The protocol also offers flash loans, which are uncollateralized and must be borrowed and repaid within the same blockchain transaction. Governance is handled by AAVE token holders who vote on proposals and updates. Compared with many competitors, Aave does not control user funds, supports multiple assets, and includes features like flash loans and on-chain governance, making it a non-custodial, community-driven liquidity protocol. The overall goal is to provide a transparent, programmable, permissionless way to manage crypto liquidity and borrowing across a wide set of assets.

Company size: 51-200
Company stage: Early VC
Total funding: $15M
Headquarters: London, United Kingdom
Founded: 2017

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