Third Party Assurance Manager - Financial Services

My client, a well known Financial Services organisation, is looking for an External Third Party Risk Assurance Manager AND a Customer Facing Assurance Manager - two head counts. This role can be based out of their London or Staines offices. You would be required to be in the office 2-3 times max per month.

About the role:

The purpose of this role is to assist in the operation of Technology External Assurance (TEA) function focused on supplier assurance by the execution and oversight of activities including risk assessments, contract reviews, due diligence, auditing, findings and reporting to manage the information security risks related to these areas for my client evolving supplier profile aligned to defined OLAs and deadlines.

The role holder will also identify and deliver enhancements to TEA operations and ensuring regulatory and policy requirements are maintained including partnering with other functions, both within Technology, Procurement, Legal, Data Privacy and the wider business.

Key Responsibilities:

• Execute and oversee the delivery of end to end customer IT assurance both as part of the onboarding and ongoing processes aligned to defined SLAs, including responding to questions, providing documentation and managing follow-up queries, aligned to both my client and customer expectations.
• Support Commercial and Tender teams with the IT component of my client's new business opportunities including questionnaires, presentations and customer calls.
• Execute and oversee the end to end delivery of the IT components of customers audits, including planning, scoping, preparation, documentation, delivery and follow-up; in direct partnership with customers and internal Commercial teams.
• Liaise with subject matter experts to ensure information is gathered in a timely manner to ensure customer requests are correctly responded to and protect my client.
• Reviewing and negotiating customer contractual IT agreements and clauses to ensure that customers expectations can be fully met and align to my client's services.
• Oversee the delivery of TEA function including delivery of metrics and reporting; execution of quality assurance to my client's standards; and effective work planning/allocation/prioritisation.
• Develop and maintain customer-based content to improve the ongoing operation and delivery of customer IT due diligence, including internal knowledge base, whitepapers and product sheets.
• Work with the Commercial, Technology and Legal functions to ensure appropriate clauses, controls and risk mitigations are in place to meet both customer's expectations and protect my client during contract negotiations, due diligence, and audits.
• Identify and ensure effective and timely delivery of enhancements to operations based on industry trends; evolving customer expectations; and experience, including the digitisation and automation of processes, documentation, and training & awareness.
• Attendance at required meetings representing the TEA function or in a delegated role set by the Head of External Assurance.
• Own the execution of other activities as directed by Head of External Assurance, including ad-hoc projects and Supplier assurance activities.

Key Skills/Qualifications needed for this role:

• Senior professional experience with direct management responsibilities in either a Big 8 external practice, Internal Audit, or supplier/customer assurance function for a financially regulated/FinTech entity.
• Certified in relevant audit, risk and security certifications preferably with one of the following: IIA, CISA, CISM, or CISSP.
• Strong information security/assurance, audit, compliance and risk knowledge, experience of IT risk and assurance frameworks, and control assurance assessments (eg ISO 27001, CIS 20, NIST, etc).
• Demonstrable experience in planning, executing and supervision of activities/deliverables such as controls assessments or audits.
• Demonstrable experience in review and assessment of contractual or regulatory artifacts/documentation.
• Effective critical thinking and problem solving to ensure that operations are delivered to expected standards and defined timelines while ensuring that stakeholder expectations are managed accordingly.
• Extremely good organisational, communication and administration skills with an exceptional eye for detail.
• Ability to continually prioritise and execute multiple activities at the same time with minimal supervision.
• Demonstrable strong written, interpersonal and verbal communication skills.
• Demonstrable ServiceNow and exceptional Microsoft Office 365 skills, including SharePoint.

If the above is of interest please apply to this role or call me to find out more. Alternatively you can email me your CV over to (see below)

Robert Walters Operations Limited is an employment business and employment agency and welcomes applications from all candidates