Head of Risk (DeFi)

Location: New York or London, England; hybrid workplace

Company

hirify.global contributes to the Aave Protocol and develops products in the DeFi ecosystem.

What you will do

• Lead and build the Risk team, setting its direction, priorities, standards, and culture of ownership.
• Own and evolve risk-management frameworks, policies, governance processes, approval thresholds, and escalation procedures.
• Set review standards and independently challenge product-specific risk frameworks, quantitative models, external risk inputs, and product or engineering controls.
• Approve collateral onboarding decisions, material protocol-risk recommendations, product launches, strategy launches, and material changes.
• Govern external risk providers and data dependencies, including methodology, independence, conflicts, data quality, performance, and fallback arrangements.
• Review liquidation performance, monitor market-structure changes, respond to incidents, and present risk analyses to the DAO.

Requirements

• 5+ years of experience in risk management, with strong preference for DeFi or crypto-native experience.
• Proven experience leading and managing a risk team.
• Deep understanding of the Aave Protocol, including its markets, governance, parameters, and risk dynamics.
• Strong understanding of market structure, portfolio risk management, and stress-testing methodologies.
• Experience governing risk for composable DeFi products or pooled strategies, including external protocol, liquidity, oracle, counterparty, execution, and operational dependencies.
• Experience working with or managing external risk service providers.
• Strong accountability and ownership, including responsibility for outcomes and team standards.
• Excellent judgment under uncertainty and comfort making consequential decisions with imperfect information.
• Strong communication skills for governance proposals, risk reports, and stakeholder alignment.

Nice to have

• Previous experience working directly with DeFi governance processes.
• Background in traditional finance risk management, including portfolio, credit, or market risk.
• Familiarity with risk tooling and simulation platforms used in DeFi.

Culture & Benefits

• Hybrid work arrangement in New York or London, England.
• Risk function focused on accountability, independent challenge, explicit decision ownership, and clear escalation paths.
• Collaboration with quantitative, product, and engineering specialists and external risk providers.