Risk Operations Associate

Stitch Bank is a Utah state-chartered bank serving other financial institutions. Our customers are community banks and the community lenders: CDFIs, community development corporations and economic development corporations. These are the institutions that hold the personal relationships in their markets but that cannot, at their own scale, build the products those relationships have come to expect. So, we bring the products, take the regulatory weight onto our own charter instead of leaving it with the partner, and let each institution offer the result under its own brand. The customer stays the institution’s customer. This way, we drive more capital into communities through the institutions those communities already trust.

Our first and current focus is small business, starting with working-capital lending that is live now. Next, we will extend to additional credit products, then cards, payments and a business dashboard that the partner bank offers under its own brand. Because we are building a bank rather than a layer on top of one, the open questions are the interesting part of the job: designing fraud defense that puts a banker who knows the customer back in the loop, building an identity record a business earns once and carries across the whole network, choosing product by product between a fast integrated experience and a deliberately slower, human-touch one routed through a local relationship, and running programmable money and accounts for software agents inside a regulated bank rather than around one.

Mandate

One advantage Stitch has in building today is that it has no tech-debt, no system or process-debt. Compliance and risk management are the 90% of the banking iceberg below the surface. Traditionally these functions are human-first processes, with technology tools following behind to help keep compliance and risk management professionals on track.

At Stitch, we believe deeply in leveraging the insights and capabilities of human operators. We also believe that modern technology can empower and unleash these professionals, making compliance and risk programs stronger and smarter than any legacy approach.

The Risk Operations Associate will be a critical member of the team building the Enterprise Risk Management system (ERM) and Compliance Management System (CMS) infrastructure of the Bank. You will be the first non-executive full-time hire and will be the first with a primarily systems and data analytics background.

You will report to the Chief Risk and Compliance Officer who has a deep background building compliance and risk management functions in tech-forward banks and FinTechs. Your role will have components of being a systems designer, data analyst and chief of staff for the risk and compliance functions.

Duties

• Controls building. Taking a rule, law, or finding and building (not just documenting in Word) controls: data driven triggers (events/jobs), evidence that is captured automatically, signals when there is a failure, corrective processes, and audit trail.
• CMS and ERM development. Working with the CRCO, other risk and compliance subject matter experts, and technology design partners to design the CMS and ERM, including AI-forward capabilities. You will be hands-on-keyboard building the systems.
• Data usability. Monitoring (and administering systems to monitor) quality, alert behavior, control coverage, issue aging, and partner performance; and ensuring data is consumable by the rest of the team and Bank partners.
• First and Second line coordination. Interacting daily with Product, Ops and Third-Party Managers to ensure that the CMS and ERM is tailored to the activities and needs of the front-line functions.
• Project and process management. Running down requirements, ensuring CMS and ERM building initiatives remain on track.

Profile

You are eager to grow and want more scope than a typical role gives you.

You have product sense. You can look at a lending flow or a deposit program and see both the customer experience and the six ways it creates risk.

You have worked in banking, fintech, payments, audit, or data, and have a general understanding of how financial services businesses operate.

Your training is in systems, analytics, data management or similar fields. (You are an AI superuser.)

You think in systems. When something breaks, your instinct is to ask how to fix it, not who to email. You do not need to be an engineer, but need to be comfortable in data: SQL, Python, a BI tool, etc.

You lean second-line by temperament: you like independence, you like being the one who says what’s true, and you find control design genuinely interesting rather than a career detour.

And you’re impatient in the right way. You want scope faster than an org chart usually gives it, and you’re willing to earn it by taking on the work nobody has claimed yet.

What you don’t need: a compliance résumé. Management experience. You don’t need to know BSA/AML cold, or have run a CMS, or hold a CRCM; we will surround you with deep bench strength. We can teach a systems thinker bank compliance far more easily than we can teach a compliance specialist to build systems.

Who this isn’t for

Someone who wants a mature program with defined swim lanes. Someone whose answer to a new risk is a new policy document. Anyone who needs a big team to be effective: for a while, you are the team, with a lot of air cover.

Where this goes

Compliance and risk management are the immediate needs, but the skill set we are hiring will have other, broader application over time.

Stitch is a small company with a large plan: card programs, payments, a loan participation desk. Every one of those raises the risk surface, and the person who built the framework will have the opportunity to grow with it.

Compensation

The base salary range for this role is $65,000 to $125,000, ranging significantly depending on your background and fit. The role also includes equity participation in Stitch Bank. Actual compensation within the range depends on skills, experience, and work location.

Location

The bank is based in Salt Lake City, and Salt Lake City is preferred. Remote candidates will be considered and should expect substantial in-person time with the leadership team, particularly through the first year of the build.

Additional information

Equal opportunity. Stitch Bank is an equal opportunity employer. We consider all qualified applicants without regard to race, color, religion, sex, pregnancy, sexual orientation, gender identity, national origin, age, disability, genetic information, veteran status, or any other characteristic protected by applicable federal, state or local law.

Essential functions. This role is performed primarily at a computer and requires the ability to communicate in writing and in conversation, to read and produce written and numerical material, and to work with data and software systems for extended periods. Candidates based outside Salt Lake City should expect regular travel to Salt Lake City. Reasonable accommodations may be made to enable individuals with disabilities to perform the essential functions of the role.

Conditions of employment. Any offer is contingent on a background check satisfactory to the Bank and on verification of identity and authorization to work in the United States. As an FDIC-insured institution, Stitch Bank is subject to Section 19 of the Federal Deposit Insurance Act, which restricts the employment of individuals with certain criminal convictions absent the prior written consent of the FDIC. Employees must also be eligible for coverage under the Bank’s fidelity bond.

At-will employment. Employment with Stitch Bank is at will and may be terminated by either party at any time, with or without cause or notice.

How to apply

Send a note to [email protected] with your LinkedIn, what you have done and why this role. Mention “Careers” or “job” in your message so it lands with the right person.