American Express India | Senior Manager - Risk Management (Merchant Operations)

Key responsibilities

• The role will identify opportunities to simplify and uplift hierarchy review processes using AI, automation, analytics, workflow solutions, and operating-model improvements.
• The successful candidate will combine operational experience, program leadership, analytical fluency, transformation thinking, stakeholder management and people leadership.
• The role will partner closely with teams responsible for ongoing Merchant Hierarchy governance and day-to-day hierarchy reviews.
• Accurate merchant data and effective operational processes are essential to pricing, servicing, risk management, reporting, and decision-making.
• Drive Merchant Hierarchy process transformation.
• Develop and execute a prioritized roadmap to simplify, standardize, automate, and modernize Merchant Hierarchy review processes in partnership with the teams responsible for governance and operational delivery.
• Coordinate cross-functional partners, dependencies, decisions, operating-model changes, and adoption activities required to deliver sustainable enterprise-wide process uplift.
• Identify and prioritize opportunities to use AI, automation, analytics, workflow tools, external data, and emerging technologies to improve operational processes and outcomes.
• Ensure new capabilities address clear business needs and are supported by appropriate data, controls, ownership, governance, and performance monitoring.
• Lead remediation and strategic program execution.
• Lead or provide PMO support for complex remediation, operational-risk, control-enhancement, and strategic-change initiatives across functions and markets.
• Establish effective program governance, including clear scope, milestones, ownership, decision rights, dependencies, risks, escalation paths, and success measures.
• Serve as a trusted stakeholder anchor across business, Operations, Servicing, Pricing, Client Management, Product, Technology, Analytics, Risk, Compliance, Policy, and Control Management.
• Lead and develop a high-performing team with strong capabilities across program governance, remediation, operational transformation, analytics, automation, and stakeholder management.
• Deliver measurable improvements in efficiency, data quality, controls, and operational outcomes.
• Build trusted partnerships and influence decisions without direct authority.
• Leading with a Digital and Improvement Mindset: Challenging how work is performed and identifying scalable opportunities to simplify, automate, and improve operational outcomes.
• Translate operational pain points into structured improvement opportunities that reduce manual effort, improve turnaround times and data quality, strengthen controls, and create scalable capabilities.
• Partner with Product, Technology, Analytics, and Operations teams to evaluate solutions and progress them from problem definition through implementation, adoption, and benefits measurement.
• Drive change management, operational readiness, and executive reporting while maintaining accountability through implementation, stabilization, and benefits realization.
• Seeking and Providing Coaching and Feedback: Strengthening team capability through regular, candid, and actionable development conversations.

Qualifications

• Experience leading complex, cross-functional programs in a global or highly matrixed organization.
• Strong program-governance capability across planning, ownership, dependencies, risk management, escalation, and outcome measurement.
• Experience within operations, servicing, risk, controls, remediation, transformation, or another operationally intensive environment.
• Demonstrated ability to identify and shape process improvements involving AI, automation, analytics, workflow redesign, simplification, or operational efficiencies.
• Strong analytical fluency and the ability to translate complex or ambiguous challenges into structured recommendations and executable plans.
• Strong executive presence, credibility, communication, and stakeholder-management skills.
• Demonstrated ability to collaborate and influence senior partners without direct authority.
• Proven people-leadership experience, including setting direction, coaching talent, and building team capability.
• Strong proficiency in Microsoft Excel and PowerPoint.
• Experience within merchant operations, onboarding, account maintenance, servicing, pricing, payments, or a related function.
• Knowledge of merchant account structures, hierarchy processes, data enrichment, or Know Your Customer processes.
• Experience delivering operational transformation, AI, automation, workflow, analytics, or technology-enabled process improvements.
• Experience supporting operational-risk events, corrective-action plans, remediation, or control-enhancement programs.
• Familiarity with analytical and visualization tools such as SQL, Python, Tableau, Power BI, or comparable platforms.
• Experience working across multiple markets or global teams.

American Express

American Express is a global payments company known for its card products, merchant network and travel services. It was founded in New York in 1850.

Its Indian teams work on finance, risk, analytics, operations and technology for markets around the world. Chartered accountants typically join financial analysis, controllership and reporting teams.

• Industry: Payments and financial services
• Headquarters: New York, USA
• In India: Large teams in Gurugram and Bengaluru