Manager, Operations Strategy (Data and AI Governance)

About this role

ABOUT AIRWALLEX

Airwallex is the only unified payments and financial platform for global businesses. Powered by our unique combination of proprietary infrastructure and software, we empower over 250,000 businesses worldwide – including Brex, Rippling, Navan, Qantas, SHEIN and many more – with fully integrated solutions to manage everything from business accounts, payments, spend management and treasury, to embedded finance at a global scale.

Proudly founded in Melbourne, we have a team of over 2,300 of the brightest and most innovative people in tech across 27 offices around the globe. Valued at US$11 billion and backed by world-leading investors including T. Rowe Price, Visa, Mastercard, Robinhood Ventures, Sequoia, Salesforce Ventures, DST Global, and Lone Pine Capital, Airwallex is leading the charge in building the global payments and financial platform of the future. If you’re ready to do the most ambitious work of your career, join us.

ATTRIBUTES WE VALUE

We hire successful builders with founder-like energy who want real impact, accelerated learning, and true ownership. You bring strong role-related expertise and sharp thinking, and you’re motivated by our mission and operating principles https://www.airwallex.com/us/operating-principles. You move fast with good judgment, dig deep with curiosity, and make decisions from first principles, balancing speed and rigor.

You're humble and collaborative; turn zero‑to‑one ideas into real products, and you “get stuff done” end-to-end. You use AI to work smarter and solve problems faster. Here, you’ll tackle complex, high‑visibility problems with exceptional teammates and grow your career as we build the future of global banking. If that sounds like you, let’s build what’s next.

ABOUT THE TEAM

The Operations team at Airwallex sits at the intersection of strategy, execution, and customer experience. The Operations Strategy function drives process optimization, strategic initiatives, and cross-functional program delivery across Airwallex's global operations. We partner closely with Engineering, Product, Legal, Security, and Data teams to solve complex problems at scale, ensuring that our operational infrastructure keeps pace with Airwallex's rapid growth. This is a team where you will have direct exposure to senior leadership, work on high-impact programs that shape how the company manages risk and data, and grow through ownership of ambiguous, cross-domain challenges.

WHAT YOU'LL DO

This role sits within the Operations Strategy team and is focused on driving our Data and AI Governance Program, a critical cross-functional initiative.

You will work at the intersection of program management and operations strategy, facilitating working groups across IT, Security, Engineering, Legal, and Data teams to design and operationalize data and AI governance frameworks that reduce data access and use risks while supporting business operations. This work requires someone who can run sprints, align stakeholders across domains, apply critical thinking to access control models and data classification frameworks, and measure success for the workstream.

This role is based in San Francisco, CA.

RESPONSIBILITIES:

- Own end-to-end program management for cross-functional data and AI governance initiatives: run sprints, track progress, and report to the steering committee via weekly updates and monthly calls.

- Map dependencies across domains and align stakeholders on data and AI governance strategy, priorities, and sequencing.

- Set the strategy for which data and AI governance frameworks get implemented, and assess whether they are proportionate to the risk they address.

- Define and track success metrics for the data and AI governance programs.

- Translate data and AI governance requirements into operational processes that reduce data access risk without blocking the business, including spearheading access management, review, and technical hardening processes.

- Run technical deep dives on access control implementation across existing systems like Okta, Databricks, and back office tools, and set the standard new systems must meet.

- Drive requirements and design documents through development, review, and approval by technical and non-technical stakeholders.

- Create a living AI model and use case inventory to enable us to track AI legal and governance risks.

- Partner with Legal to translate regulatory requirements into actionable policy and process.

WHO YOU ARE

We're looking for people who meet the minimum requirements for this role. The preferred qualifications are great to have, but are not mandatory.

MINIMUM QUALIFICATIONS:

- 5+ years of experience, preferably with a fast-growing tech startup, top-tier strategy/management consulting, or equivalent.

- Strong analytical and problem-solving skills are essential.

- Exceptional stakeholder management and influencing skills, especially with Engineering and Legal teams.

- Experience with data governance initiatives, including data tagging, classification, and ownership.

- Experience with access management: (1) coordinating cross-functional delivery of access management initiatives, and (2) reviewing access to sensitive data, identifying risks, and driving remediations.

- Demonstrated ability to run programs end-to-end: sprint facilitation, dependency mapping, progress reporting, and driving cross-functional alignment.

- Excellent written and verbal communication and presentation skills, with the ability to synthesize complex information and communicate it simply and effectively to both technical and executive audiences.

- Self-starter who can identify and prioritize opportunities to focus on.

- Bachelor’s degree or equivalent.

PREFERRED QUALIFICATIONS:

- Experience interpreting and operationalizing requirements from regulators in a financial services or payments environment.

- Experience with AI governance best…