Chief Risk Officer — Direct-To-Consumer Organisation

The mandate

The organisation is undertaking a material gross-margin recovery across a portfolio of direct-to-consumer brands. Commercial teams are changing promotion rules, return policies, shipping thresholds, subscription offers and supplier arrangements. Each action may improve reported unit economics, yet it can also create customer, regulatory or control exposure if implemented without a complete view. Tighter returns can disadvantage legitimate customers; aggressive fraud rules can reject valuable orders; lower-cost formulations or packaging can alter claims and complaint patterns; and promotion restrictions can be circumvented through poorly governed codes or affiliate channels.

The Chief Risk Officer will provide independent oversight of that recovery while helping management distinguish acceptable commercial risk from hidden value leakage. The remit includes enterprise risk, compliance coordination, fraud and abuse risk, third-party assurance, product and claims risk oversight, internal-control monitoring and board reporting. Operational executives retain first-line ownership, legal counsel interprets law, product-quality leaders control safety systems and internal audit maintains its independent assurance role. The CRO must ensure those accountabilities connect and that residual exposure is consciously accepted at the correct level.

This planned replacement requires a different risk posture from the previous phase. The business no longer needs a register expanded by every possible issue. It needs a smaller set of material exposures tied to customer journeys and margin decisions, supported by reliable indicators and clear escalation. The CRO must be independent enough to stop an unsafe practice but practical enough to propose alternatives that preserve commercial intent.

Scope and operating context

The role is based onsite in New York, reporting to the Group Chief Executive and the relevant board committee. It influences approximately 1,125 employees and material partners across the United States and an international operating region. Direct capabilities will include enterprise risk, compliance operations, fraud-risk governance, third-party risk and control monitoring, supported by specialists embedded in finance, technology, customer, product, supply and regional teams.

The commercial model creates a dense risk surface. Payments flow through multiple providers; discounts may originate with brands, affiliates, creators or customer-service agents; returns pass through warehouses and resale or disposal channels; and subscription journeys involve renewal, cancellation and refund obligations. External agencies and platforms can change acquisition quality rapidly. Risk analysis must follow transactions and customer outcomes across these boundaries rather than stop at functional ownership.

Margin information also requires careful interpretation. A reduction in refunds may reflect better product fit, a more restrictive policy or frustrated customers who gave up. Lower chargebacks can be produced by accepting less business, while supplier savings may increase future complaint or recall exposure. The CRO will ensure management reports pair financial movement with control and customer evidence.

First-year agenda

During the first ninety days, the CRO will reconstruct the principal risk pathways affecting margin. They will trace promotion creation and redemption, order acceptance, payment disputes, fulfilment, returns, refunds, product complaints, affiliate remuneration and supplier change. The review will identify who can alter rules, which data reveal unintended consequences and where manual access or weak reconciliation enables leakage. Findings will be prioritised by value and harm, not the number of control observations.

The executive will then agree a risk appetite for the recovery programme with management and the board. It should specify non-negotiable boundaries for product safety, claims, consumer treatment, privacy and financial integrity, alongside decision tolerances for fraud friction, promotion experimentation, supplier concentration and returns disposition. Thresholds must have owners, escalation times and pre-agreed actions; a colour-coded status without a decision will not be sufficient.

Fraud and commercial abuse need a joined response. The CRO will bring together payments, digital product, marketing, customer service and finance to address coupon stacking, account creation, refund abuse, reseller activity, affiliate manipulation and insider access. Controls should adapt to behaviour and economic consequence. They must be tested for false positives and disparate customer impact, with qualified review where automation materially affects an order or account.

Product and supplier changes within the margin programme will receive risk gating proportional to consequence. The CRO will not duplicate scientific or quality approval, but will verify that changes have named technical ownership, validated claims, traceable evidence, complaint monitoring and clear escalation. Savings cannot enter forecasts before required assurance and implementation conditions are understood.

By year-end, the business should have a board-approved risk view tied to the margin plan, materially better visibility of leakage and customer harm, and faster closure of the highest-consequence control gaps. Management should be able to explain not only how much margin an initiative produces, but which residual risks accompany it and who accepted them.

Leadership responsibilities

The CRO will chair the executive risk forum and maintain direct access to the responsible board committee. Reporting will separate exposure, control effectiveness, incident movement and decisions required. Where evidence is uncertain, the range and assumption will be explicit. The executive must resist pressure to convert a disputed control into a green status for reporting convenience.

The role will strengthen first-line ownership rather than centralise every decision. Commercial and operating leaders will receive clear control outcomes and usable monitoring, while the CRO's team tests whether those controls function. Repeated exceptions will trigger root-cause and incentive review, not an endless sequence of approvals.

For material incidents, the CRO will ensure preservation of evidence, appropriate customer remedy, regulatory or partner coordination and board visibility. Lessons must change rules, access, product design or governance. The purpose is not to eliminate every loss; it is to prevent known patterns from persisting because their ownership spans functions.

Measures of success

The board will review promotion leakage, fraud loss and prevented value, false-decline rates, chargebacks, returns and refund patterns, material complaints, supplier-assurance findings and timeliness of control remediation. Measures will be segmented by brand, channel and customer cohort so a portfolio average cannot hide concentrated harm. Risk-adjusted margin will be more important than nominal savings.

Governance progress will include clearer first-line ownership, fewer overdue high-consequence issues, faster escalation, reliable evidence for accepted risks and closure of repeat audit themes. The CRO will also be assessed on team capability, succession and constructive challenge from business leaders. A quiet reporting period without evidence of detection quality will not be treated as proof of control.

Candidate profile

Candidates should bring 22–28 years across enterprise risk, compliance, fraud, controls or operational leadership in direct-to-consumer, payments, retail, consumer goods, marketplaces or a similarly transaction-rich environment. They must have operated with direct board access and managed material issues that crossed digital, physical and third-party processes.

The board wants evidence of linking risk to commercial economics. Candidates should describe how they distinguished genuine improvement from friction or deferred harm, changed a promotion or returns control after customer evidence, and governed automated fraud decisions. Experience with product claims, supplier change or regulated consumer obligations would strengthen the profile.

The successful CRO will combine independence with proportion. They must be willing to interrupt a profitable practice when evidence of harm is credible, but they should also help management design a safer route rather than rely on prohibition. Precise writing, data fluency and calm judgement during visible incidents are essential.

Compensation and appointment terms

The expected base range is USD 360,000–480,000, with annual incentive and long-term participation reflecting independent oversight and sustained enterprise outcomes. Final terms will take account of relevant scale, current arrangements and the agreed role perimeter. Necessary mobility support and responsible treatment of forfeited awards will be evaluated case by case.

Confidentiality

The organisation remains confidential because the appointment intersects with active margin actions, control findings and board succession. Detailed risk information will be released gradually after identity, conflict and confidentiality checks. Applicants must not include customer-level data, suspicious-activity records, protected control findings or identifiable incidents from another employer.