Reporting to the Group Head of Resilience, the Head of Business Continuity is accountable for leading the design, implementation, and ongoing management of Alter Domus's global Business Continuity Management System (BCMS), ensuring the organization can effectively respond to disruptions, emergencies, and crises. This senior leadership role requires proven expertise in establishing and operating enterprise-wide BCMS frameworks across multiple jurisdictions and time zones within complex financial services environments.
You will safeguard AD's operational resilience, protecting key stakeholders, reputation, brand, and value-creating opportunities through a holistic management process that identifies potential threats and builds organizational capability for effective response and recovery.
Business Continuity Management System (BCMS) Leadership
- Define and maintain a comprehensive ISO 22301 compliant BCMS across the organization's global operations including governance frameworks, policies, and procedures.
- Lead strategic development of the BCMS, ensuring scalability and adaptability across multiple countries, business units, and regulatory jurisdictions.
- Establish and maintain Business Continuity Plans (BCPs) with documented procedures that guide the organization to respond, recover, resume, and restore to pre-defined operational levels following disruptions.
- Build and lead a high-performing Business Continuity team, setting clear objectives, developing talent, and fostering a culture of resilience across the organization.
Incident & Crisis Management
- Establish and maintain Crisis Management and Emergency Management frameworks, including crisis communication plans, emergency response procedures, and business-wide escalation matrices.
- Design and implement the command structure for incident and crisis management, establishing clear governance, escalation protocols, and decision-making frameworks aligned with organizational hierarchy.
- Coordinate cross-functional crisis response, ensuring appropriate representation and coverage from all critical functions (Operations, Technology, Cybersecurity, Legal, Communications, People Services, Facilities) throughout business continuity events.
- Expertly lead through incidents to minimize their impact on the organization's operations, ensuring rapid recovery of business services and continuity of critical functions.
- Design and deliver command-level training and simulation exercises to prepare for effective performance during high-pressure incidents.
Stakeholder Engagement & Governance
- Deliver exceptional executive and board-level engagement providing strategic insight, assessing material risks, and recommending additional resilience measures.
- Design and deliver comprehensive training and awareness programs at all organizational levels, embedding resilience competencies throughout the enterprise.
- Define roles and responsibilities for incident management and business continuity across teams and individuals, ensuring adequate coverage and succession planning.
- Partner with global business units, technology teams, risk management, and compliance functions to ensure integrated resilience capabilities.
Testing, Assurance & Continuous Improvement
- Develop and execute a robust testing and exercising program, including desktop exercises, simulations, and live tests to validate BCP effectiveness and identify improvement areas.
- Conduct regular reviews and assessments of the BCMS following material business changes, mergers/acquisitions, regulatory changes, or significant incidents.
- Oversee business impact analyses (BIA) and risk assessments across global operations to inform resilience strategies and recovery time objectives (RTOs).
- Monitor and report on BCMS metrics, KPIs, and KRIs to demonstrate resilience maturity and drive continuous improvement.
Cultural & Strategic Leadership
- Drive transformational change in resilience culture, delivering clear communications and strategic direction to embed business continuity as a core business competency.
- Promote and build the Alter Domus brand and culture both internally and externally, acting as an ambassador and role model to embed the Alter Domus Values and our Employer Value Proposition.
- Drive a culture of compliance and risk control to mitigate financial, operational and reputational risks.
- Ensure adherence to the highest Environmental, Sustainability and Governance (ESG) standards.
PROFILE
Required Qualifications & Experience
- Minimum 8-10 years of progressive experience in Business Continuity Management, with at least 5 years in senior leadership roles responsible for BCMS strategy and delivery.
- Proven track record of designing, building, and managing enterprise-wide BCMS programs from inception to maturity in complex, multi-site organizations.
- Subject matter expert in incident management, crisis management, and business continuity with strong technology, cyber recovery, and vendor-risk knowledge.
- Extensive experience in driving resilience for financial services organizations, particularly client services and/or fund administration businesses.
- Demonstrated motivation to build upon the role and develop operational resilience to meet the expectations of our clients and regulators alike.
- Strong knowledge of global financial services regulations including regulatory expectations for operational resilience (e.g., DORA, FCA/PRA operational resilience requirements, MAS TRM, SEC regulations).
Preferred Additional Experience
- Experience with operational resilience frameworks and integration with enterprise risk management, technology resilience, and third-party risk programs
- Knowledge of disaster recovery, IT service continuity, crisis communications, and emergency management in 24/7 operational environments
- Experience in fund administration, private equity, real estate, or alternative investment environments
- Track record of successful regulatory examinations or audit management related to business continuity
- Professional certifications such as CBCP, MBCI, CBCI, ISO 22301 Lead Implementer/Auditor, or equivalent
LEADERSHIP & BEHAVIOURAL COMPETENCIES
- You will demonstrate superior business insight and commercial acumen combined with strong technical expertise, analytical problem-solving skills
- Hands-on leader capable of taking on a wide range of tasks with humility and flexibility.
- You will possess strong interpersonal skills influencing and building trust quickly, navigating complexity and ambiguity with confidence and negotiating with tenacity and focus. You will be decisive and persuasive to achieve the results and adept at engaging with colleagues and high-profile clients.
- You will have a proven track-record of working autonomously in a matrixed organisation and demonstrate strong partnering skills, using them to build internal networks to achieve your objectives.
- You will have an intellectual curiosity and a global mind-set, allowing you to partner effectively across your region and beyond with agility and flexibility. You will challenge the current status quo to improve things, acting as a change agent to drive the business forward.
- You will have high energy and passion to drive the business and positively influence others, you will avoid complacency and strive for the business to succeed, acting quickly to tackle any issues
- You will be adept at managing competing demands on your time, actively prioritising and remaining calm under pressure while navigating complexity and challenges with confidence and resilience.
- Possess personal learning agility and an ability to adopt and champion new skills and ways of working to role model and inspire others.
- You will demonstrate a strong commitment to high integrity and ethics
KEY RELATIONSHIPS
- Regional Executives, Leaders, Directors and Senior Managers
- IT, Marketing, Facilities, Operations and Human Resources
