Tech Risk and Operations Manager

Ozow is a leading fintech company redefining digital payments in South Africa and beyond. We’re dedicated to making payments more accessible, secure, and convenient for businesses and consumers alike. As a fast‑growing player in the financial technology sector, Ozow fosters a culture of innovation, diversity, and inclusivity. We believe in pushing the boundaries of what’s possible and are committed to making a positive impact on the world through cutting‑edge payment solutions.

The Tech Risk & Operations Manager is a critical leadership role within Ozow’s technology organisation, responsible for driving our technical risk posture, coordinating incident response, and serving as a key interface with merchants, banks, and partners on security and operational matters. This role sits at the intersection of engineering, security, risk, compliance, and operations. You will own the end‑to‑end lifecycle of technical risk — from identification and prioritisation to mitigation and reporting — and lead the organisation’s incident management processes to ensure rapid, effective resolution and continuous improvement.

As Ozow scales, this role will also become the external technical voice of trust — providing assurance to our clients and partners about the safety, resilience, and reliability of our systems.

• Lead the full lifecycle of incident management across Ozow’s platforms — from detection to resolution.
• Coordinate cross‑functional teams during Sev‑1 and Sev‑2 incidents, ensuring timely communication, mitigation, and recovery.
• Drive post‑incident reviews (RCA) and ensure that corrective actions are identified, prioritised, and delivered.
• Maintain a comprehensive incident knowledge base to capture lessons learned and drive proactive improvements.

• Own the technology risk register in collaboration with Security, Infrastructure, Engineering, and Compliance teams.
• Continuously assess and prioritise risks across the technology estate — including vulnerabilities, misconfigurations, architectural risks, and third‑party dependencies.
• Track risk treatment plans, monitor remediation progress, and report on status and trends to senior leadership and the Risk Committee.
• Align risk treatment plans with Ozow’s risk appetite and ensure traceability to controls and frameworks.

• Act as a technical liaison for merchants, banks, and partners on security, compliance, and risk matters.
• Develop and maintain customer‑ and partner‑facing documentation on Ozow’s security posture, incident management practices, and resilience capabilities.
• Support the sales and partnerships teams during due diligence and procurement processes, representing Ozow’s security and risk maturity.
• Collaborate with the Security Specialist and CTO to ensure Ozow’s external messaging on security and risk is consistent, credible, and audit‑ready.

• Produce regular reports on incidents, vulnerabilities, and risk metrics for executive leadership, the Risk Committee, and auditors.
• Ensure the organisation’s readiness for audits and certifications (e.g., PCI DSS, ISO 27001, SARB directives) by coordinating evidence gathering and remediation activities.
• Define and track key SLAs and KPIs for incident response, vulnerability closure, and risk mitigation.
• Contribute to governance forums and committees, bringing a data‑driven view of risk and operational performance.
• Work with engineering and infrastructure teams to address systemic causes of incidents and risk.
• Identify opportunities for automation and tooling to improve detection, response, and risk visibility.
• Contribute to disaster recovery, business continuity, and resilience planning initiatives.
• Proactively recommend changes to processes, systems, and architectures to reduce future risk exposure.

• Bachelor’s degree in Computer Science, Information Security, or a related field.
• 7+ years of experience in technology operations, incident management, or risk/security management roles.
• Proven experience managing large‑scale technical incidents and…