Director of Security Operations

About this role

Director of Security Operations

We're partnering with a blue chip, cutting edge firm in the financial industry to appoint a Director of Security Operations.

This newly created role comes with investment in the function and a mandate to shape its global detection, response and cyber resilience capability. It offers an experienced leader the opportunity to develop a specialist team, strengthen operational readiness and influence how security supports a highly technical business.

Technology is central to the organisation. We’re looking for someone who understands complex technical environments and combines strategic leadership with the credibility to lead specialists and make sound decisions under pressure.

The opportunity

You’ll own the global Security Operations strategy, operating model and delivery roadmap, combining leadership of the function with close involvement in technical decisions and major incident response.

Your remit will include

• Developing the internal team and establishing clear responsibilities across security, technology teams and managed providers.
• Strengthening detection engineering, threat hunting and monitoring across complex infrastructure, identity, cloud and application environments.
• Leading the response to material cyber incidents, coordinating technical specialists and senior business, legal and compliance stakeholders.
• Establishing and rehearsing incident response, containment and recovery procedures.
• Improving forensic readiness and ensuring incident learning translates into practical improvements.
• Driving risk-based vulnerability and exposure management alongside engineering and platform owners.
• Holding managed security partners accountable for service quality and measurable outcomes.
• Providing clear executive reporting on operational risk, readiness and priorities.

Your background

We’re looking for an established security operations leader who has built, developed or transformed capabilities within a complex, technology-first organisation.

You’ll bring

• Senior leadership experience across security operations, cyber defence, detection and response or incident response.
• A strong track record of leading serious cyber incidents and making proportionate, evidence-led decisions under pressure.
• Deep practical understanding of detection engineering, threat hunting, SIEM, endpoint security and SOC/MDR services.
• Experience developing and testing response playbooks, containment approaches and cyber recovery procedures.
• An understanding of digital forensics, evidence preservation and investigation requirements.
• The ability to develop technical specialists, challenge technical detail and deliver through influence across organisational boundaries.
• Confidence communicating with executive stakeholders, translating technical issues into business risk and decisions.

Financial services experience would be valuable. We’re also interested in leaders from other technology-first organisations who have operated in demanding, complex environments.

Experience across Linux, cloud platforms and modern engineering environments would be relevant.