The Mission
Direct Lending is a fast-growing, award-winning lending fintech on a mission to empower people’s lives with simple and responsible financing. Having built a sustainable, profitable foundation, we are now entering a scaling-up phase. Our roadmap is clear: scale our needs based financing, grow our revenue 5X and become IPO-ready by 2030.
We are looking for a Chief Operating Officer to be the 'Integrator' who turns this multi-year vision into an operational reality. You will own the “Machine”, building the systems, processes and management team required to scale at speed without compromising our velocity or culture.
Why Join Direct Lending?
- A Career-Defining Journey: Lead the operational transformation of a profitable fintech as we scale toward a 2030 IPO. This is your legacy-building role.
- From Manager to Partner: We aren't looking for a "report." We are looking for a commercial partner. You will have the space to move from operational execution into shared P&L responsibility, with the autonomy to shape the company’s bottom line.
- Direct Influence & Impact: At our size (60+ people), your decisions move the needle immediately. You will see the direct results of your systems on our growth, our team’s maturity, and the lives of the customers we serve.
- Speed as a Competitive Advantage: If you are tired of "death by committee" and endless bureaucracy, you’ll find our pace refreshing. We are a lean team where decisions are made in hours, not months. You will have the direct mandate to experiment, iterate, and execute without the red tape of a traditional institution.
Your Core Responsibilities/ Pillars:
1. The "Defense" (Risk & Operational Excellence)
You own the core engine of our lending business. You are responsible for the integrity and scalability of:
- Credit & Collections: Hardening our risk pillars to ensure sustainable growth.
- Customer & Merchant Happiness: Ensuring every touchpoint reflects our brand promise.
- Legal & Compliance: Building an institutional-grade, audit-ready organisation.
- Process Automation: Identifying manual bottlenecks and turning them into automated, repeatable systems.
2. The "Bridge" (Execution & Alignment)
You are the "General" for project delivery, ensuring that strategy, technology and products are always in sync.
- Cross-Functional Alignment: Act as the bridge between Tech, Product, and Operations to ensure key initiatives are launched on time.
- The "How" & "When": While the founder sets the vision, you own the execution roadmap and remove the friction that slows the team down.
3. Leadership & Mentoring
We have a talented, high-potential team of functional leads. You will be a "Leader of Leaders," coaching our managers across diverse departments and backgrounds to level up their management capability and prepare them for the next stage of our journey.
4. Commercial Evolution & Shared P&L Responsibility
This role is designed to evolve alongside the company growth.
- Scaling New Business: Partner with the founder to take new, high-margin revenue streams from pilot to market leader.
- P&L Ownership: In the mid-to-long term, you will move into shared P&L responsibility with the Founder, co-owning the company’s commercial success.
Who You Are
- The Scale-up Specialist: You have played a key leadership role in a high-growth fintech or tech startup, having seen a company scale significantly in and know where the pitfalls are.
- A Proven People Developer: You have a track record of coaching talents from diverse background into high-performing managers. You understand that a company only scales as fast as its people.
- An "Integrator" by Nature: You are obsessed with systems, thrive in the details and get energy from turning a strategic "Why" into an operational "How."
- Decisive & Direct: You provide the "healthy challenge" to the CEO’s vision, ensuring every plan is operationally sound before we hit "go."
- Commercial Mindset: You don't just see "tasks"—you see how operational efficiency directly impacts the P&L.