Principal Associate, Risk Management - Hybrid

Principal Associate, Risk Management - Hybrid

The Enterprise Payments Governance and Oversight team is seeking a dynamic Principal Associate who will play a pivotal role defining and implementing the future of payments governance and oversight for the enterprise. The Enterprise Payments Governance and Oversight team sits within the Enterprise Payments organization in the Retail Bank. The team is responsible for the governance and oversight of end-to-end core payments functions for all payment types across the enterprise, including monitoring. In this role, you will be at the forefront of payments, developing solutions to remediate some of the biggest payments-related challenges while also seeking opportunities to further enhance existing business-as-usual practices.

In this exciting role, you will work closely with key stakeholders across the company to ensure we have a dynamic and well-managed payments ecosystem. This role has a high level of exposure across the lines of business and the opportunity to work with Executives to shape and deliver a payments governance strategy and implement critical initiatives tied to the priorities of the Enterprise Payments organization. You will work with smart, talented people who will challenge you to excel.

The Role

As the Principal Associate of Governance and Oversight (Monitoring & Infrastructure) , you will be an expert behind our enterprise-wide payment risk management. You will move beyond maintenance to design, implement, and manage cutting-edge structural frameworks that ensure robust, scalable, and compliant payment risk procedures across the enterprise. You are the essential bridge, translating top-tier enterprise strategies into immediate, high-impact monitoring and reporting capabilities. You will serve as the central liaison with 1st and 2nd Line of Defense teams to ensure our payment ecosystem—covering Real-Time Payments (RTP), ACH, and wire—is well governed for compliance and stability.

What You'll Do & Deliver

You will be instrumental in a transforming payments risk management that blends strategic oversight with hands-on technical execution:

• Revolutionize Oversight: Provide thought leadership and own the day-to-day risk procedure oversight to enable the shift from reactive to proactive risk identification and trends in alignment with Enterprise Risk Management (1st and 2nd line) teams.

• Drive Digital Transformation: Utilize Gen AI capabilities and automation tools to dramatically improve existing risk monitoring processes and drive operational efficiency.

• Be the Payments Expert: Define and oversee specialized risk management frameworks for cutting-edge payment rails, including Real-Time Payments (RTP), ACH, and wire .

• Lead Integration: Partner with 2nd Line of Defense teams to seamlessly operationalize high-impact risk mitigation activities within 1st Line workflows.

• Strategic Documentation: Establish and maintain the comprehensive inventory of business processes that serve as the foundation for the Enterprise Risk Management (ERM) framework.

• Process Uplift: Spearhead ad-hoc projects to enforce compliance and significantly upgrade processes to meet enterprise policy requirements.

We Want You If You Are:

• A Risk Visionary: You have a proven operational risk management background in financial services frameworks that include Issues & Event Management, Risk & Controls, and / or Cybersecurity/Technology Data.

• An AI Enthusiast and Innovator: You possess a deep analytical mindset and are driven by a passion to utilize Generative AI, agents, and automation to enhance risk monitoring efficiency and enable trend analysis.

• A Strategic Influencer: You enjoy navigating complex organizational structures, using exceptional communication and influencing skills to collaborate and drive change across diverse 1st and 2nd Line of Defense partners.

• The Payments Authority: You bring a solid understanding of global payment processes, networks, and the complex regulatory environments that govern them.

• A Results-Driven Problem Solver: You combine project management skills with a keen eye for detail to proactively deliver against critical goals, identify process gaps, and champion continuous improvements.

Location: West Creek 5 (Richmond, VA) or Center 2 (McLean, VA) , this role is Hybrid, where you will be expected spend about half of your working time in office and half working virtually

Basic Qualifications

• Associates Degree or Military Experience

• At least 3 years of experience in risk management, audit, or governance

• At least 2 years of compliance testing or monitoring

• At least 5 years of banking or financial services experience

• At least 5 years of experience supporting, partnering, and interacting with internal and external stakeholders

Preferred Qualifications

• Bachelor’s Degree

• At least 4 years of experience in risk management, audit, or governance

• At least 3 years of project management or process management experience

• At least 2 years of experience in data management or data analysis

• At least 6 years of experience supporting, partnering and interacting with internal and external stakeholders

• At least 3 years of experience working in payments

• Accredited ACH Professional (AAP) certification or Accredited Payments Risk Professional (APRP) certification

At this time, Capital One will not sponsor a new applicant for employment authorization for this position.

The minimum and maximum full-time annual salaries for this role are listed below, by location. Please note that this salary information is solely for candidates hired to perform work within one of these locations, and refers to the amount Capital One is willing to pay at the time of this posting. Salaries for part-time roles will be prorated based upon the agreed upon number of hours to be regularly worked.

McLean, VA: $120,800 - $137,900 for Principal Risk Specialist

Richmond, VA: $109,900 - $125,400 for Principal Risk Specialist

Candidates hired to work in other locations will be subject to the pay range associated with that location, and the actual annualized salary amount offered to any candidate at the time of hire will be reflected solely in the candidate’s offer letter.

This role is also eligible to earn performance based incentive compensation, which may include cash bonus(es) and/or long term incentives (LTI). Incentives could be discretionary or non discretionary depending on the plan.

Capital One offers a comprehensive, competitive, and inclusive set of health, financial and other benefits that support your total well-being. Learn more at the Capital One Careers website . Eligibility varies based on full or part-time status, exempt or non-exempt status, and management level.

This role is expected to accept applications for a minimum of 5 business days.No agencies please. Capital One is an equal opportunity employer (EOE, including disability/vet) committed to non-discrimination in compliance with applicable federal, state, and local laws. Capital One promotes a drug-free workplace. Capital One will consider for employment qualified applicants with a criminal history in a manner consistent with the requirements of applicable laws regarding criminal background inquiries, including, to the extent applicable, Article 23-A of the New York Correction Law; San Francisco, California Police Code Article 49, Sections 4901-4920; New York City’s Fair Chance Act; Philadelphia’s Fair Criminal Records Screening Act; and other applicable federal, state, and local laws and regulations regarding criminal background inquiries.

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