Director of Security Operations

Job Description

Job Description

Our mission

We're making Africa the first cashless continent.

In 2017, over half the population in Sub-Saharan Africa had no bank account. That's for good reason—the fees are too high, the closest branch can be miles away, and nobody takes cards. Without access to financial institutions, people are forced to keep their savings under the mattress. Small business owners rely on lenders who charge extortionate rates. Parents spend hours waiting in line to pay school fees in cash.

We're solving this by building financial services that just work: no account fees, instantly available, and accepted everywhere. In places where electricity, water and roads don't always work, you can still send money with Wave. In 2017, we launched a mobile app in Senegal for cash deposit, withdrawal, and peer-to-peer and business payments. Now, we have millions of users across 9 countries and are growing fast.

Our goal is to make Africa the first cashless continent and that's where you come in...

At Wave Mobile Money, the Director of Security Operations is both a strategic advisor and an operational leader responsible for safeguarding our people, operations, and assets across all markets where we operate. This role is mission-critical to Wave's ability to scale safely in challenging, high-risk environments across Africa.

You will lead security operations across 9+ markets including Mali, Burkina Faso, Niger, and the Democratic Republic of Congo. In this role, you will manage and train security leaders and consultants in each country while responding to diverse crisis scenarios—from civil unrest and terrorist activity to traffic accidents, theft, and armed violence. Your mandate is to translate Wave's risk appetite into practical security frameworks that protect our employees and enable rapid business growth, even in the most volatile contexts.

Success in this role depends on your ability to build deep, trust-based relationships with country teams, executive leadership, and external partners. You'll position security as an enabling function that supports growth, not a barrier that prevents it. This requires both strategic thinking and operational excellence: you'll design security systems and processes across Wave while remaining hands-on during critical incidents that demand immediate leadership and decision-making.

In this role, you'll be responsible for:

Strategic Security & Risk Translation

• Translate Wave's risk appetite and tolerance into clear, actionable security frameworks, standards, and operating models across all markets.
• Ensure that each of our operating markets has a clear Crisis Management plan that makes sense in the local context - along with the training, comms, and tooling needed to action these plans if and when necessary.

Crisis Management & Incident Response

• Together with your team, serve as Wave's primary crisis response leader for security incidents across all markets, providing 24/7 on-call support and rapid decision-making during emergencies.
• Lead response to critical incidents including terrorist activity, armed conflict, civil unrest, kidnapping threats, violent crime, and natural disasters.
• Establish and maintain crisis response protocols, evacuation procedures, and emergency communication systems across all operating countries.
• Build and maintain business continuity plans that ensure Wave can continue operating safely during periods of instability.

Security Leadership & Team Development

• Lead, mentor, and develop security managers and security staff in each of Wave's operating markets.
• Build strong, trust-based relationships with country leadership, local teams, and partners—positioning security as a collaborative and enabling function, not a barrier.
• Foster a security-conscious culture across Wave where security, integrity, and customer trust are embedded in everyday operations.

Operational Security Implementation

• Together with your team, ensure physical security measures are in place for offices, cash operations, and service points (CCTV, access control, secure storage).
• Ensure that we have global standards for secure cash handling, movement, and storage practices. Insist on consistent and audited security protocols for staff travel, field deployments, and high-risk activities. Together with our engineering Security team, develop tools and systems for tracking security incidents, analyzing patterns, and measuring effectiveness.
• Collaborate with our Engineering Security team to develop tools and systems
• Serve as Wave's primary point of contact with any security consultants.

Location:

• This role is remote/flexible across Wave's operating markets.
• You must be willing and able to travel extensively (30-50% travel) to markets across West and Central Africa.
• This is a permanent position.
• Our salaries are competitive and are calculated using a transparent formula. For this role, depending on your level and location, we offer a salary up to $190,900, plus a generous equity package.
• We offer generous health insurance for yourself and your dependents.
• We support working parents - we offer 26 weeks of parental leave for mothers and 4 weeks for fathers, in addition to subsidized child care when they return to work.

Requirements

• Experience: 8-12+ years in security, risk, or resilience leadership, with at least 5 years directly managing security operations across multiple high risk countries or regions.
• Experience in mobile money, fintech, international development, telecommunications, or financial services across Africa strongly preferred.
• Excellent written and verbal communications.
• High-Risk Context: Extensive experience operating in high-risk, volatile environments (conflict zones, post-conflict regions, areas with terrorism, organized crime, or civil unrest).
• Leadership: Proven track record leading, mentoring, and developing distributed security teams across geographically dispersed locations and diverse cultural contexts. Must be pragmatic, hands-on, and excellent at building trust.
• Crisis Management: Demonstrated experience leading crisis response efforts, including evacuations, hostage situations, armed conflict, or major security incidents.
• Regional Expertise: Strong knowledge of security landscapes across West and Central Africa, including local networks and relationships with authorities, regulators, and partners.

Languages: Fluent in English, French fluency preferred.

Our team

• We have a rapidly growing in-country team in Senegal, Côte d'Ivoire, Mali, Burkina Faso, The Gambia, Uganda, Niger, Sierra Leone, and Cameroon plus remote team members spread across the world.
• We're deeply passionate about our mission of bringing radically affordable financial services to the people who need them most.
• We foster autonomy for our employees. You'll own your projects at every stage, from understanding the problem to monitoring your solution in production.
• We raised the largest Series A in Africa in 2021. Our world-class investors, include Founders Fund, Sequoia Heritage, Stripe, Ribbit Capital, Y Combinator, and Partech Africa.
• We are on Y Combinator's top companies by revenue.

Fill out the form below, and upload a resume in English and a cover letter describing your interest in Wave and the role.

We review applications frequently and recommend that you apply to the role that most closely aligns with your skills, experience and career goals.

Wave is an equal-opportunity employer. We celebrate diversity and are committed to creating an inclusive environment for all employees.