Lead, Nextgen FinTech at Safaricom Kenya

The role holder will:

• Define the strategy and long term vision for next generation fintech solutions in line with Financial Services objectives
• Own end to end portfolio performance across digital savings, investments, and emerging fintech propositions
• Drive continuous product innovation and digital enablement through platform led and agile delivery models
• Champion customer centric experiences through personalization, analytics, and seamless digital journeys
• Leverage data and insights to optimize adoption, engagement, pricing, and customer lifetime value
• Ensure robust risk management, regulatory compliance, and governance across all fintech solutions
• Enable effective cross functional and ecosystem collaboration to deliver integrated outcomes
• Lead people and capability development to build high performing, future ready teams
• Anchored in Safaricom’s purpose of Transforming Lives, the role ensures next generation fintech solutions deliver inclusive growth, superior customer experiences, and sustainable long term value for customers and the broader ecosystem.

Responsibilities

• Key accountabilities and decision ownership:

Strategy & Vision Leadership

• Define the end-to-end strategy and long-term vision for next-generation fintech solutions and insurance, aligned to Financial Services objectives.
• Translate enterprise strategy into clear, executable roadmaps — identifying new growth opportunities across digital savings, insurance, investments, and emerging fintech.
• Prioritise investments based on value, risk, and scalability, driving market leadership through differentiated propositions.
• Fintech Portfolio Management
• Own end-to-end performance of the fintech portfolio — wealth (digital savings, investments, and digital assets), insurance  — including P&L, pricing, and value proposition design.
• Drive sustainable profitability and portfolio growth while monitoring adoption, usage, and customer lifetime value (CLV).
• Optimise product mix and bundling, taking corrective action on underperforming products decisively.

Product Innovation & Digital Enablement

• Lead development of next-generation, wealth, insurance and digital solutions; incubate new fintech models and platform-led propositions.
• Leverage emerging technologies to enhance customer experiences and drive rapid innovation through agile product development.
• Transition successful pilots into scalable, production-grade offerings within defined time-to-market targets.

Digital Products & Platforms Leadership

• Own the digital product roadmap and platform architecture, ensuring scalable, API-led capabilities underpin the fintech portfolio.
• Partner with Fintech Platforms Product & Innovation Lead to deliver reusable infrastructure that accelerates speed-to-market
• Embed UX excellence and reliability standards across all digital touchpoints.

Risk, Compliance & Governance

• Own the governance framework for all fintech innovations — ensuring regulatory compliance, risk controls, and audit readiness are embedded by design, not afterthought.
• Partner with the Risk, Compliance & Governance Lead to define risk appetite thresholds and manage operational, financial, and conduct risks.
• Engage proactively with regulators, balancing innovation speed with control and resilience.

Customer-Centricity & Data

• Champion customer-first design across all products; embed personalisation, segmentation, and contextual engagement.
• Leverage advanced analytics to drive decision-making — using data to optimise product performance, refine targeting, and enable predictive insights for growth.
• Partner with Data teams to scale analytical capabilities and improve customer lifetime value.

Ecosystem Partnerships

• Lead and manage the Ecosystem Partnerships function, building and governing strategic relationships with fintechs, platforms, and third-party providers.
• Enable integrated delivery across tribes and squads; resolve cross-functional dependencies.

People Leadership & Capability Development

• Lead and inspire high performing, multidisciplinary teams
• Build deep expertise in fintech, wealth, insurance and digital finance
• Develop future leaders through coaching and succession planning
• Foster a culture of innovation, agility, and ownership
• Drive performance management and accountability
• Support continuous learning and capability uplift

Agile Leadership & Delivery Governance

• Lead empowered cross-functional squads aligned to shared OKRs, with clearly defined decision rights, accountability structures, and escalation protocols.
• Champion iterative delivery and hypothesis-driven experimentation, balancing execution speed with regulatory, risk, and operational guardrails.
• Enable transparent progress tracking through sprint reviews and performance rituals, fostering a culture of ownership and outcome-based performance.

Key performance indicators:

Financial & Commercial

• Next Gen Fintech revenue growth: achieve >20% YoY growth
• Assets Under Management (AUM): grow by 15% YOY

Customer & Product

• Customer adoption and activation rate: achieve 30% monthly activation rate for digital savings and investment products, tracked by segment.
• Customer Lifetime Value (CLV): deliver 10% uplift in CLV for active next-gen fintech customers year-on-year.
• Product penetration rate: achieve 30% penetration of key next-gen fintech products within target segments.

Delivery & Operations

• Time-to-market: deliver new propositions from approved concept to MVP within 90 days; full production within 180 days.
• Digital engagement: achieve 20% monthly active usage across next-gen fintech products.

Governance & Compliance

• Zero critical regulatory or audit findings across the fintech portfolio in any review period
• Portfolio performance and risk governance: all material risks escalated and resolved within defined SLA.

Qualifications

• Must have technical / professional qualifications:
• Bachelor’s degree in Finance, Economics, Business Administration, Technology, or a closely related discipline from a recognized institution.
• Postgraduate qualification such as an MBA or Master’s degree in Finance, Strategy, Innovation, or Digital Transformation is strongly preferred.
• 12+ years of progressive experience in financial services, fintech, digital banking or investment products, with exposure to large scale portfolios.
• Demonstrated senior leadership experience managing multidisciplinary teams and leading managers within complex, fast paced environments.
• Proven track record of designing, launching, and scaling digital and platform led financial solutions, ideally within ecosystem or partnership driven models.
• Solid understanding of fintech innovation, emerging technologies, and digital platforms, with the ability to translate innovation into commercial value.
• Sound knowledge of regulatory, compliance, risk, and governance frameworks applicable to fintech solutions within regulated environments
• Strong commercial and financial acumen, with experience driving growth, profitability, pricing optimization, and customer lifetime value.
• Advanced analytical and strategic thinking capabilities, with the ability to leverage data, insights, and customer analytics to inform decision making and execution