Open Roles at Safaricom Kenya

Job Description

• We are Africa’s largest fintech providing financial services to more than 60 million customers and 5 million businesses, with transactions of over $1.2 billion a day across 8 countries. Driven by a strong passion in innovation, we provide Africa’s leading super app, the M-PESA Super App, pioneering a digital financial ecosystem that empowers customers and businesses to send and receive money and payments across the world, enables them with access to affordable credit and savings propositions, and provides them with best-in-class solutions to easily grow their wealth and businesses. United in our purpose to Transform Lives, we are determined and energetic in exploring and delivering solutions that consistently address our customers’ needs as we believe that we can only succeed if our customers and the community around us are succeeding.
• M-PESA Africa is looking for a Senior Data Architect to design, govern, and evolve our enterprise data landscape across our markets. Operating at the intersection of mobile money, payments infrastructure, AI, and analytics, you will set the architectural standards and strategic direction for how data flows, is governed, and generates value across M-PESA's platforms.
• This is a senior individual contributor role with broad influence across engineering, product, compliance, and group-level stakeholders. You will be expected to lead with vision, mentor others, and translate complex data challenges into scalable architectural solutions.

Responsibilities

Data Architecture & Strategy

• Own the enterprise data architecture across M-PESA Africa's multi-market environment, spanning transactional, operational, analytical, and AI/ML data domains.
• Define and enforce data modelling standards, data flow patterns, and integration architecture for real-time and batch processing pipelines.
• Lead architecture design for data platforms supporting payment rails, API analytics, fraud and AML detection, and regulatory reporting.
• Drive the transition to modern data architectures: data mesh, data lakehouse, event-driven patterns aligning to M-PESA's cloud and hybrid infrastructure strategy.

Data Governance & Standards

• Establish and champion enterprise-wide data governance frameworks, data quality standards, and master data management (MDM) policies across all six markets.
• Define data classification, lineage, and cataloguing standards, ensuring traceability from source systems (e.g., Fintech 2.0 Platform) through to consumption layers.
• Partner with Compliance, Legal, and Market teams to ensure data architectures meet local regulatory obligations and cross-border data sovereignty requirements.

Integration & Platform Architecture

• Architect data integration patterns between M-PESA core systems, third-party platforms and analytics/AI layers.
• Collaborate with API gateway teams to define event-driven, API-first data exchange patterns aligned with the integration layer strategy.
• Design and govern streaming and CDC pipelines using technologies such as Apache Kafka and Oracle GoldenGate across market-level deployments.

AI & Analytics Enablement

• Design data architectures that underpin AI/ML use cases including transaction monitoring, watchlist screening, customer intelligence, and predictive analytics.
•  Define feature store design, data pipeline standards, and model serving infrastructure patterns for production ML workflows.
• Partner with the AI/ML team to evaluate and onboard vector databases, embedding pipelines, and LLM-ready data infrastructure.

 Leadership & Stakeholder Engagement

• Serve as the senior data architecture voice in Architecture Review Boards, design forums, and group-level governance bodies.
• Mentor and coach mid-level data engineers and architects across markets, building data architecture capability within the team.
• Produce executive-ready architecture artefacts, including C4/Mermaid diagrams, ADRs, and data strategy presentations for CTO/CIO audiences.
• Lead vendor evaluations for data platform tools, cloud data services, and governance technologies.

Qualifications

Education:

• Bachelor's degree in Computer Science, Information Systems, Electrical/Computer Engineering, or a related field.

Experience:

• Experience in data architecture, data engineering, or closely related technical disciplines, with at least 3 years in a senior or lead capacity.
• Proven track record designing enterprise-scale data platforms in financial services, fintech, or telecommunications.
• Deep expertise in data modelling (conceptual, logical, physical) for both OLTP and OLAP systems.
• Hands-on experience with cloud data platforms (AWS, GCP, or Azure) and big data technologies (Spark, Databricks, BigQuery, Redshift, etc.).
• Proficiency in data integration patterns: ETL/ELT, Change Data Capture (CDC), event streaming, and API-driven data exchange.
• Strong understanding of data governance frameworks and tools (DAMA-DMBOK, Apache Atlas, Collibra, or equivalent).
• Experience with streaming platforms such as Apache Kafka in high-throughput transactional environments.

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Responsibilities

Health and Safety

• Uphold the company code of conduct, policies and procedures, ensuring integrity and accountability in every aspect of your work.
• All employees have a responsibility to adhere to safety, health, and wellbeing policies, guidelines and procedures in all actions and decisions.

Investor Engagement & Relationship Management

• Build and maintain relationships with institutional investors, analysts and capital market participants.
• Lead day-to-day engagement with institutional investors, equity analysts and capital market participants, serving as the primary technical point of contact for investor enquiries and information requests.
• Plan and execute investor engagement programmes including roadshows, analyst briefings, investor conferences, non-deal roadshows and one-on-one meetings. 
• Respond to investor and analyst queries in a timely and professional manner.
• Develop investor engagement plans aligned to strategic objectives.
• Support executive leadership during investor interactions and presentations.
• Maintain accurate investor intelligence databases, shareholder profiles and institutional engagement records to support strategic investor targeting.
• Monitor investor expectations and emerging concerns.
• Strengthen investor confidence through proactive communication and relationship management.
• Support investor targeting and shareholder diversification initiatives.

Capital Market Communications

• Develop investor presentations, earnings materials, fact books, investor FAQs and executive briefing packs communicating Safaricom's financial performance, strategy and long-term value proposition. 
• Coordinate dissemination of investor information through approved communication channels.
• Ensure consistency of messaging across investor communication activities.
• Support development of annual reports and shareholder communication materials.
• Develop and maintain investor-facing digital content ensuring consistency, relevance and alignment with the Company's disclosure framework.
• Coordinate disclosure activities in line with regulatory requirements.
• Support communication of strategic initiatives, business performance and growth opportunities.
• Review all investor communication materials to ensure technical accuracy, consistency and compliance with regulatory disclosure obligations. 
• Enhance effectiveness of capital market communication practices.

Investor Intelligence & Market Insights

• Develop comprehensive investor intelligence through analysis of analyst research, investor feedback, shareholder behaviour, macroeconomic developments and capital market trends. 
• Perform valuation benchmarking, peer analysis and competitive intelligence to support executive decision-making and investor positioning. 
• Assess market developments and emerging issues that may influence valuation, investor sentiment and shareholder expectations. 
• Develop investor intelligence reports for executive leadership.
• Analyze shareholder composition and ownership trends.
• Monitor analyst forecasts and consensus expectations.
• Identify emerging issues that may impact investor confidence.
• Develop strategic recommendations supporting investor targeting, shareholder engagement and market positioning initiatives. 
• Strengthen leadership understanding of capital market dynamics.

Earnings & Results Management

• Lead operational planning and delivery of the Group's earnings communication programme. 
• Develop results presentations, executive briefing packs, Q&A documents, speaking notes and investor communication materials supporting earnings announcements. 
• Develop briefing materials for investor and analyst engagements.
• Coordinate earnings calls, investor briefings and results presentations.
• Ensure alignment between financial reporting and investor messaging.
• Analyse investor and analyst feedback following earnings announcements and prepare post-results market intelligence reports highlighting emerging themes, risks and opportunities. 
• Support management in addressing investor questions and concerns.
• Monitor market reactions to earnings announcements.
• Continuously improve investor communication effectiveness.

Valuation, Investment Thesis & Shareholder Value

• Develop and continuously refine Safaricom's investment thesis, equity story and shareholder value proposition.
• Translate strategic initiatives into investor-relevant narratives.
• Communicate business growth opportunities and long-term value drivers.
• Support development of equity story materials and investment propositions.
• Assess factors influencing shareholder value creation.
• Collaborate with Strategy and Finance teams on value creation initiatives.
• Maintain valuation models for Safaricom and peer organisations to support investor engagement, market positioning and strategic analysis.
• Generate analytical insights supporting shareholder value creation, capital allocation discussions and long-term strategic communication.
• Strengthen alignment between business strategy and investor expectations.

Governance, Compliance & Stakeholder Management

• Ensure compliance with CMA, NSE and other disclosure requirements.
• Support governance processes relating to investor communications.
• Maintain confidentiality and integrity of market-sensitive information.
• Coordinate approvals for investor communication materials.
• Build relationships with regulators, advisors and market stakeholders.
• Support Board and executive reporting relating to investor matters.
• Maintain awareness of evolving capital market regulations and recommend improvements to Investor Relations policies and practices.
• Maintain investor relations governance documentation and records.
• Monitor compliance with investor relations policies and standards.
• Promote transparency, accountability and market credibility.

Financial & Strategic Analysis

• Maintain financial models supporting valuation, consensus analysis and investor engagement. 
• Analyse analyst forecasts and consensus estimates against internal expectations. 
• Evaluate macroeconomic developments, industry trends and competitor performance. 
• Prepare strategic reports supporting Executive Management and Board discussions. 
• Develop shareholder ownership analysis and investor targeting recommendations.

Core competencies, knowledge and experience:

Customer Obsession

• Deepen team connection to our customers and communities.
• Foster authentic relationships with customers and partners that build trust.
• Explicitly take customer-centric decisions and take personal ownership to achieve results.
• Simplify processes through digitalization and promote a digital mindset and digital first customer experience.
• Stay focused on the big priorities, know when to make meaningful trade-offs and demonstrate brilliant execution.

Purpose

• Create an inspiring vision for your team to drive strategy and performance.
• Show ambition and courage, empowering others to go beyond the plan.
• Bold and challenge teams to reimagine how things are done.
• Prompt new thinking and ideas by asking “what if” questions.
• Use knowledge of the external environment (customers, partners, competition, external bodies) to identify and act on opportunities for growth at pace.

Innovation

• Create psychological safety so everyone can have an impact.
• Fuel innovative ideas from others and test them to enable growth.
• Explore successes and failures with curiosity and resilience; fearlessly recognizing lessons learned.
• Share your ongoing learning and personal purpose with others.
• Learn fast from digital adoption, using learnings to drive simplicity, scale and efficiency.

Collaboration

• Articulate your team’s role in making our strategy happen, prioritizing and aligning resources with current and future needs.
• Actively collaborate to break silos and hold your team accountable to do the same.
• Develop others to make the most of their talents and coach them to take ownership to get things done.
• Create an inclusive environment ensuring the safety and wellbeing of others.
• Live our Purpose and demonstrate the highest Standard of integrity.

Qualifications

• Bachelor’s Degree in Finance, Economics, Accounting, Business Administration or related field.
• CPA(K), CFA, ACCA or equivalent professional qualification preferred.
• Master’s Degree in Finance, Economics, MBA or related discipline is an added advantage.
• Minimum 5–7 years’ experience in Investor Relations, Corporate Finance, Equity Research, Financial Communications or Capital Markets.
• Strong understanding of financial statements, valuation methodologies and capital market dynamics.
• Experience engaging institutional investors, analysts and market stakeholders.
• Knowledge of listed company reporting obligations and disclosure requirements.
• Strong presentation, communication and stakeholder management capabilities.
• Demonstrated experience using Bloomberg, S&P Capital IQ, FactSet or similar market intelligence platforms.
• Strong financial modelling, valuation and equity research capability.
• Experience supporting listed company reporting, investor engagement and capital market communications.
• Ability to translate complex financial and strategic information into compelling investment narratives.

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Responsibilities

Health and Safety

• Uphold the company code of conduct, policies and procedures, ensuring integrity and accountability in every aspect of your work.
•  All employees have a responsibility to adhere to safety, health, and wellbeing policies, guidelines and procedures in all actions and decisions.

AI Capability Strategy & Workforce Readiness

• Develop and implement the enterprise AI capability and skills development strategy.
• Define AI competency frameworks for technical and non-technical employee segments.
• Assess AI capability maturity across business functions and identify development priorities.
• Build workforce readiness programs supporting AI adoption at scale.
• Establish capability roadmaps aligned to business and technology strategies.
• Identify future AI skill requirements and emerging capability needs.
• Support workforce planning initiatives for AI and data talent.
• Develop capability measurement frameworks and maturity assessments.
• Ensure AI capability initiatives support enterprise transformation priorities.

AI Learning & Development

• Design enterprise-wide AI learning pathways for leaders, managers and employees.
• Develop AI onboarding, certification and accreditation programs.
• Curate learning content covering AI, analytics, automation and emerging technologies.
• Partner with HR and Learning teams to embed AI learning into talent development frameworks.
• Deliver workshops, masterclasses and capability-building interventions.
• Support development of technical upskilling programs for AI practitioners.
• Establish mechanisms for continuous learning and knowledge sharing.
• Measure effectiveness and impact of learning interventions.
• Promote adoption of self-service AI learning platforms and resources.

AI Evangelist Network

• Design and implement the Group AI Evangelist Program.
• Recruit, develop and support AI champions across business units.
• Create communities of practice focused on AI adoption and innovation.
• Facilitate knowledge-sharing forums and capability events.
• Equip AI evangelists with tools, resources and learning content.
• Track adoption and effectiveness of AI ambassador initiatives.
• Foster collaboration between technical and business communities.
• Promote successful AI use cases and innovation stories.
• Build a sustainable internal network of AI advocates and change agents.

Academic & Ecosystem Partnerships

• Establish partnerships with universities and higher learning institutions.
• Collaborate on AI research, innovation and talent development initiatives.
• Build internship, graduate and AI fellowship programs.
• Engage with technology vendors and innovation partners.
• Participate in industry forums and AI ecosystem initiatives.
• Identify opportunities for joint research and capability-building activities.
• Support development of local AI talent pipelines.
• Drive collaboration with regional and global AI communities.
• Strengthen Safaricom’s role in shaping national AI capability agendas.

AI Change Adoption & Culture

• Develop AI awareness and adoption campaigns across the Group.
• Promote responsible AI usage and AI literacy among employees.
• Drive behavioral change initiatives supporting AI transformation.
• Support business teams in embedding AI into day-to-day operations.
• Measure AI adoption and capability outcomes across functions.
• Develop communication strategies that promote AI success stories.
• Foster a culture of experimentation and innovation.
• Address barriers to AI adoption and capability development.
• Support organizational readiness for emerging AI technologies.

AI Thought Leadership & External Engagement

• Represent Safaricom in AI conferences, forums and industry engagements.
• Develop thought leadership content on AI innovation and capability development.
• Promote Safaricom’s AI achievements through external channels.
• Support publication of research, case studies and innovation insights.
• Engage with regulators, academia and industry stakeholders on AI matters.
• Position Safaricom as a leading AI capability-building organization.
• Contribute to national and regional AI development conversations.
• Support executive engagement on AI thought leadership initiatives.
• Build Safaricom’s reputation as a destination for AI talent and innovation.

Core competencies, knowledge and experience:

Customer Obsession

• Deepen team connection to our customers and communities.
• Foster authentic relationships with customers and partners that build trust.
• Explicitly take customer-centric decisions and take personal ownership to achieve results.
• Simplify processes through digitalization and promote a digital mindset and digital first customer experience.
• Stay focused on the big priorities, know when to make meaningful trade-offs and demonstrate brilliant execution.

Purpose

• Create an inspiring vision for your team to drive strategy and performance.
• Show ambition and courage, empowering others to go beyond the plan.
• Bold and challenge teams to reimagine how things are done.
• Prompt new thinking and ideas by asking “what if” questions.
• Use knowledge of the external environment (customers, partners, competition, external bodies) to identify and act on opportunities for growth at pace.

Innovation

• Create psychological safety so everyone can have an impact.
• Fuel innovative ideas from others and test them to enable growth.
• Explore successes and failures with curiosity and resilience; fearlessly recognizing lessons learned.
• Share your ongoing learning and personal purpose with others.
• Learn fast from digital adoption, using learnings to drive simplicity, scale and efficiency.

Collaboration

• Articulate your team’s role in making our strategy happen, prioritizing and aligning resources with current and future needs.
• Actively collaborate to break silos and hold your team accountable to do the same.
• Develop others to make the most of their talents and coach them to take ownership to get things done.
• Create an inclusive environment ensuring the safety and wellbeing of others.
• Live our Purpose and demonstrate the highest Standard of integrity.

Qualifications

• Bachelor’s Degree in Data Science, Artificial Intelligence, Computer Science, Education, Organizational Development, Business, Technology or related field.
• Master’s Degree in Artificial Intelligence, Learning & Development, Organizational Development, Business Administration or related discipline is an added advantage.
• Minimum 5–7 years’ experience in capability development, learning, technology transformation, AI adoption or digital transformation roles.
• Experience designing and implementing enterprise capability-building programs.
• Strong understanding of Artificial Intelligence, Analytics, Machine Learning and emerging technologies.
• Experience driving large-scale change management and adoption initiatives.
• Knowledge of adult learning methodologies and capability frameworks.
• Experience managing stakeholder engagement across diverse business functions.
• Experience working with academic institutions and external partners.
• Strong facilitation, coaching and presentation skills.
• Excellent communication and influencing capabilities.
• Knowledge of organizational capability assessment and workforce readiness frameworks.
• Experience working within agile and transformation environments.
• Professional certifications in Change Management, Learning & Development, AI or Digital Transformation are an added advantage.

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Responsibilities

Health and Safety

• Uphold the company code of conduct, policies and procedures, ensuring integrity and accountability in every aspect of your work.
• All employees have a responsibility to adhere to safety, health, and wellbeing policies, guidelines and procedures in all actions and decisions. 

Digital Internal Audit Strategy & Transformation

• Design and execute continuous evolution of the Group Internal Audit Digital Transformation Strategy and roadmap, aligning digital capabilities with the Internal Audit Strategy and Safaricom Group's technology vision.
• Drive the digitalization of the end-to-end audit lifecycle by embedding intelligent technologies, automation, analytics and AI-enabled solutions across audit planning, execution, reporting, quality management and stakeholder engagement.
• Identify, assess and adopt emerging technologies that enhance audit effectiveness, operational efficiency and stakeholder experience.
• Evaluate digital trends and leading practices to continuously modernize Internal Audit operating models, methodologies and service delivery.
• Champion digital-first ways of working and foster a culture of innovation, experimentation and continuous improvement across the Internal Audit function.
• Develop business cases for digital investments and measure the value realized from audit technology initiatives.

Intelligent Automation & Process Optimization 

• Identification, prioritization and delivery of intelligent automation opportunities across Internal Audit operations. 
• Design and implement automated audit workflows, digital process orchestration and workflow optimisation to improve audit productivity and quality. 
• Develop and manage Robotic Process Automation (RPA), low-code/no-code solutions and intelligent workflow automation supporting audit activities. 
• Streamline repetitive and manual audit activities through automation while improving consistency, scalability and audit quality. 
• Continuously optimize audit processes through process mining, workflow analytics and automation performance monitoring. 
• Establish and enforce compliance with automation standards, governance and controls to ensure sustainable and secure digital operations.

AI-enabled Internal Audit 

• Implementation of the Group Internal Audit Artificial Intelligence strategy and AI-enabled assurance capabilities.
• Evaluate, implement and optimize Generative AI, Agentic AI and intelligent assistants to enhance audit planning, risk assessment, testing, reporting, knowledge management and stakeholder engagement.
• Establish governance frameworks for the responsible, secure and ethical use of Artificial Intelligence within Internal Audit.
• Identify and develop AI use cases that improve audit productivity, decision support, predictive risk identification and assurance quality.
• Monitor emerging AI technologies and assess their applicability to Internal Audit.
• Build organizational capability in AI-enabled auditing through training, experimentation and knowledge sharing. 
• Implement the application of advanced analytics, statistical modelling, machine learning and AI techniques across the audit lifecycle to improve audit quality and risk coverage.
• Design and develop reusable audit algorithms, anomaly detection models, predictive risk models and advanced visualizations that enhance assurance outcomes.

Audit Technology Ecosystem Management

• Own and continuously enhance the Group Internal Audit technology ecosystem, ensuring audit platforms effectively support the audit methodology, operational processes and the Global Internal Audit Standards.
• Serve as Product Owner for audit technologies, managing the technology roadmap, platform enhancements, integrations and user adoption.
  Lead implementation, configuration and optimization of audit management systems, GRC platforms, workflow solutions and collaboration technologies.
  Ensure seamless integration of audit technologies with enterprise data sources, analytics platforms and automation capabilities.
  Manage relationships with technology vendors and oversee platform performance, service levels, licensing and technology lifecycle management.
  Evaluate new audit technologies that enhance audit efficiency, collaboration and assurance effectiveness.

Digital Innovation & Capability Development

• Establish and lead a culture of digital innovation across the Internal Audit function by identifying, evaluating and piloting emerging technologies that improve assurance delivery.
• Develop the digital capability roadmap for Internal Audit, ensuring auditors possess the skills required to leverage AI, automation, analytics and modern audit technologies.
• Design and coordinate technology enablement programmes, digital learning initiatives and innovation workshops.
• Promote collaboration with Technology, Data & AI teams to leverage enterprise capabilities and accelerate innovation.
• Drive continuous improvement through adoption of digital tools, agile delivery practices and technology-enabled operating models.
• Monitor digital maturity and recommend initiatives that position Internal Audit as a leading technology-enabled assurance function.

Core competencies, knowledge and experience:

Customer Obsession

• Deepen team connection to our customers and communities. 
• Foster authentic relationships with customers and partners build trust.
• Explicitly take customer-centric decisions and take personal ownership to achieve results.
• Simplify processes through digitalization and promote a digital mindset and digital first customer experience.
• Stay focused on the big priorities, know when to make meaningful trade-offs and demonstrate brilliant execution.

Purpose

• Create an inspiring vision for your team to drive strategy and performance.
• Show ambition and courage, empowering others to go beyond the plan.
• Bold and challenge teams to reimagine how things are done.
• Prompt new thinking and ideas by asking “what if” questions.
• Use knowledge of the external environment (customers, partners, competition, external bodies) to identify and act on opportunities for growth at pace.

Innovation

• Create psychological safety so everyone can have an impact.
• Fuel innovative ideas from others and test them to enable growth.
• Explore successes and failures with curiosity and resilience; fearlessly recognizing lessons learned.
• Share your ongoing learning and personal purpose with others.
• Learn fast from digital adoption, using learnings to drive simplicity, scale and efficiency.

Collaboration

• Articulate your team’s role in making our strategy happen, prioritizing and aligning resources with current and future needs.
• Actively collaborate to break silos and hold your team accountable to do the same.
• Develop others to make the most of their talents and coach them to take ownership to get things done.
• Create an inclusive environment ensuring the safety and wellbeing of others.
• Live our Purpose and demonstrate the highest Standard of integrity.

Qualifications

• Bachelor’s degree in data science, Computer Science, Information Systems, Statistics, Mathematics, Finance, Engineering or related discipline.
• Minimum 6 years’ experience in audit analytics, business intelligence, data analytics or technology assurance.
• Experience developing enterprise dashboards.
• Experience implementing enterprise technology platforms.
• Experience with workflow automation.
• Experience managing audit technologies.
• Experience implementing AI solutions.
• Experience using Power BI, SQL, Python, R or equivalent analytics tools.
• Experience applying AI and analytics within assurance environments.
• Knowledge of enterprise risk management and internal control frameworks.
• Professional Certifications of (CIA), (CISA), Microsoft Power BI, Tableau or equivalent Certified Data Analyst certifications; Python/R certifications and /or CRISC or CISM advantageous.
• Strong analytical, stakeholder management, and report-writing skills.
• Experience in agile delivery environments and transformation programmes is an added advantage.
• Knowledge of continuous auditing and data-driven assurance methodologies is desirable.