FinCrime Operations Senior Lead - AML Investigations

Company Description

Wise is a global technology company, building the best way to move and manage the world’s money.
Min fees. Max ease. Full speed.

Whether people and businesses are sending money to another country, spending abroad, or making and receiving international payments, Wise is on a mission to make their lives easier and save them money.

As part of our team, you will be helping us create an entirely new network for the world's money.
For everyone, everywhere.

More about our mission and what we offer.

Job Description

We're looking for an experienced lead to join our growing AML Investigations team in Budapest, Hungary. 

As a FinCrime Operations Senior Lead your mission is to ensure the effective assessment and mitigation of financial crime risks across operations. You will act as a vital connector between operational teams and senior leadership, transforming strategic objectives into actionable directives. Your leadership will prioritize customer focus, regulatory compliance, and sustained operational excellence across multiple specialized teams.

Key Responsibilities

Executive Leadership & People Development:

• Lead by example, cultivating a high-performance, results-driven culture across multiple Team Leads and Specialists.
• Own the talent pipeline: hire, coach, mentor, and develop direct reports, driving career check-ins, skill enhancement, and making recommendations for promotions/salary progression.
• Implement strong performance frameworks to consistently meet and enhance individual and team KPIs/SLAs, promptly addressing and documenting underperformance.

Strategic Planning & Operational Governance:

• Own the strategic roadmap (spanning several quarters) for your operational area, transforming high-level plans into actionable change.
• Lead and manage projects from start to finish, driving momentum, delegating tasks, and articulating project impact and value to cross-functional stakeholders.
• Ensure highest quality standards and compliance are maintained across all tasks, leading root cause analysis and turning insights into improvements.

Risk Mitigation & Domain Expertise:

• Serve as the Subject Matter Expert (SME) in Financial Crime areas (AML/KYC/Fraud), training and coaching your leadership team.
• Be responsible for developing and driving action plans for operational incident management, detection, response, and remediation.
• Maintain accountability for escalating critical incidents, high-risk customers, and systemic control weaknesses to senior leadership in a timely and precise manner.

Stakeholder Management & Influence:

• Lead complex projects with multiple, diverse stakeholders (Product, Engineering, Compliance, Senior Management).
• Negotiate and influence cross-functional teams to drive momentum toward strategic goals.
• Communicate clearly and confidently, tailoring messages to the audience and using data to deliver impactful and concise updates.

Qualifications

We are seeking a seasoned leader who combines strategic people management with deep FinCrime expertise to ensure operational governance across our specialized teams.

• Experience: 3-4 years of experience in FinCrime, KYC/AML, or compliance, with at least 3 years leading small to medium-sized teams.
• Performance Development: Proven track record of delivering constructive, well-evidenced feedback that drives tangible behavioral change and performance improvement.
• Advanced Domain Knowledge: Strong understanding of the FinCrime regulatory framework (KYC, AML, FinCrime). Must be able to translate external industry insights and regulatory changes into robust strategies for Wise.
• Metric Ownership: Experience with forecasting and strategically moving team metrics, coupled with the ability to independently analyze and drive metric improvement.
• Process Efficiency: Highly process-oriented and efficiency-driven mindset; able to recognize and proactively resolve recurring issues and streamline processes.
• Resilience & Quality: Must be able to work with tight deadlines under pressure while