Vice President, Risk Development

Address:

Engineer the backbone of real‑time credit decisioning for global trading. Your team will deliver ultra‑reliable, low‑latency Java services where milliseconds matter and correctness is non‑negotiable. You’ll lead from the front-setting technical direction, coaching engineers, and partnering with traders, quants, and risk to turn ideas into production systems that scale under load.

What You’ll Lead

• Low‑Latency Architecture - Own solution design for high‑throughput, highly available components; drive concurrency best practices, JVM tuning, and rigorous performance profiling to meet strict SLOs.
• Data & Model Integration - Oversee data preparation, validation, and model lifecycle management in line with established standards, with a focus on correctness, auditability, and repeatability.
• Hands‑On Technical Leadership - Lead design reviews, code reviews, and build quality bars across the SDLC; remove blockers and raise the team’s engineering game with a Java‑first approach.
• Platform Reliability - Evolve and support a mission‑critical automated trading platform (observability, incident response, root‑cause analysis) with an eye to resiliency, failover, and graceful degradation.
• People & Culture - Set clear goals, coach, and develop top talent; foster an inclusive, high‑trust environment aligned to our values; reward outcomes and elevate performance.
• Enterprise Collaboration - Partner across trading, quant, risk, operations, and platform engineering to plan roadmaps, manage dependencies, and communicate progress with clarity.
• Governance & Change - Ensure engineering practices meet control requirements (testing, documentation, release discipline, model governance); implement change as market conditions and business priorities shift.
• And as needed - Take on broader responsibilities that advance the platform and the business.

What You’ll Build & Improve

• Java microservices that power real‑time credit checks and trade‑flow decisioning.
• Event‑driven integrations with market data, pricing, and risk engines; APIs for trading UIs and dealer workflows.
• Performance toolkits-benchmarks, load tests, and reliability playbooks-to keep systems fast and stable in production.

Qualifications

Core Experience

• 7+ years in software engineering with significant enterprise Java focus; experience leading engineers or managing a dev team in a front‑office or near‑front‑office context.
• Track record delivering low‑latency, distributed systems supporting trading or risk workflows; comfort operating in high‑stakes, trader‑facing environments.
• Education: Post‑secondary degree in Computer Science or related field (or equivalent experience). Combination of technical leadership, delivery excellence, and domain knowledge expected.

Advanced Proficiency

• Java (primary language) - low latency, multi‑threading/concurrency, collections, JVM performance tuning, memory management, and profiling.
• Computer Science & Data Structures - strong fundamentals, clean code and API design, and testability.
• Risk Analytics & Financial Markets - understanding of pricing, market microstructure, and trade lifecycle.
• Automation & Delivery - CI/CD, automated testing, release discipline, and operational runbooks.
• Communication & Leadership - crisp written/oral communication; ability to influence across functions.
• Collaboration & Ambiguity - excels in cross‑group execution, making sound decisions with incomplete information.
• Data‑Driven Decisions - uses metrics, SLIs/SLOs, and evidence to guide priorities and trade‑offs.

Intermediate Proficiency

• Adaptability
• Learning Agility
• Relationship Building - thrive in a fast market and complex stakeholder landscape.

Required Technical Stack (Java‑First)

• Programming: Java (primary), Spring/Spring Boot, REST; event‑driven and microservice patterns.
• Performance: Concurrency, lock contention analysis, GC tuning, async/reactive patterns; load and latency testing.
• Messaging & Streaming: Kafka/Solace (or equivalent), pub/sub, back‑pressure and replay strategies.
• Data: Oracle/PostgreSQL; schema design for high throughput; familiarity with Redis/Hazelcast (or equivalent).
• Observability: Metrics, logs, tracing (Prometheus/Grafana/ELK/Splunk); SLI/SLO management and on‑call readiness.
• DevOps & Cloud: Git, Jenkins/Azure DevOps CI/CD; Docker/Kubernetes; experience with Azure preferred.
• Security & Controls: Secrets management, least‑privilege access, auditability, model governance alignment.

The above represents BMO Financial Group’s pay range and type.

Salaries will vary based on factors such as location, skills, experience, education, and qualifications for the role, and may include a commission structure. Salaries for part-time roles will be pro-rated based on number of hours regularly worked. For commission roles, the salary listed above represents BMO Financial Group’s expected target for the first year in this position.

BMO Financial Group’s total compensation package will vary based on the pay type of the position and may include performance-based incentives, discretionary bonuses, as well as other perks and rewards. BMO also offers health insurance, tuition reimbursement, accident and life insurance, and retirement savings plans. To view more details of our benefits, please visit: https://jobs.bmo.com/global/en/Total-Rewards

About Us

At BMO we are driven by a shared Purpose: Boldly Grow the Good in business and life. It calls on us to create lasting, positive change for our customers, our communities and our people. By working together, innovating and pushing boundaries, we transform lives and businesses, and power economic growth around the world.

As a member of the BMO team you are valued, respected and heard, and you have more ways to grow and make an impact. We strive to help you make an impact from day one - for yourself and our customers. We’ll support you with the tools and resources you need to reach new milestones, as you help our customers reach theirs. From in-depth training and coaching, to manager support and network-building opportunities, we’ll help you gain valuable experience, and broaden your skillset.

To find out more visit us at https://jobs.bmo.com/ca/en.

BMO is committed to an inclusive, equitable and accessible workplace. By learning from each other’s differences, we gain strength through our people and our perspectives. Accommodations are available on request for candidates taking part in all aspects of the selection process. To request accommodation, please contact your recruiter.

Note to Recruiters: BMO does not accept unsolicited resumes from any source other than directly from a candidate. Any unsolicited resumes sent to BMO, directly or indirectly, will be considered BMO property. BMO will not pay a fee for any placement resulting from the receipt of an unsolicited resume. A recruiting agency must first have a valid, written and fully executed agency agreement contract for service to submit resumes.