Team Lead - CDD Direct Customer Onboarding EMEA

Team Lead - CDD Direct Customer Onboarding EMEA

This is Adyen

Adyen provides payments, data, and financial products in a single solution for customers like Meta, Uber, H&M, and Microsoft - making us the financial technology platform of choice. At Adyen, everything we do is engineered for ambition.

For our teams, we create an environment with opportunities for our people to succeed, backed by the culture and support to ensure they are enabled to truly own their careers. We are motivated individuals who tackle unique technical challenges at scale and solve them as a team. Together, we deliver innovative and ethical solutions that help businesses achieve their ambitions faster.

About the role

We are looking for a CDD Direct Customer Onboarding Team Lead to join our Customer Due Diligence (CDD) department as part of our regional growth. You will be based in Amsterdam working closely with Sales, Account Management, Compliance and Product.

In this role you will be responsible for reviewing potential and existing merchants from a risk, regulatory and compliance perspective. As a highly regulated company we need to adhere to various rules and regulations and make sure we grow our business with a healthy portfolio of merchants. Part of this role is also to facilitate our growth by scaling internal processes and focus on continuous optimisation and automation.

Our highly motivated and ambitious CDD team is in need of an excellent people manager to drive initiatives and improvements; the team is extremely focused on speed and quality, as well as customer experience. You will be part of a global team working with regional counterparts.

What you’ll do

• Lead and develop a team responsible for onboarding and ongoing risk assessments of new and existing merchants, ensuring compliance and handling escalations efficiently.
• Set clear expectations, monitor KPIs, SLAs and quality to ensure timely, high-quality delivery across the onboarding lifecycle.
• Manage individual and team performance through 1:1s, coaching, and reviews, supporting continuous development and accountability.
• Drive a performance culture focused on speed, quality, and customer experience while balancing regulatory and commercial needs.
• Identify skill gaps and create structured development plans to support growth and team scalability.
• Lead process improvement initiatives, challenge existing procedures collaborating with Compliance, Product, Sales, and Account Management.
• Use data to inform decisions, prioritize initiatives, and measure impact on efficiency, risk quality, and customer experience.
• Collaborate with regional and global teams to share best practices and drive alignment while respecting regional nuances.
• Foster a motivated, engaged, and safe team environment, encouraging ownership, accountability, and continuous improvement.

Who you are

• You have 2 to 5 years of formal people management experience in the risk, operations or compliance environments.
• You have a firm grasp and understanding of AML, KYC, PCI, Scheme rules and internal controls.
• You are extremely detail oriented, organized and have the ability to multitask effectively.
• You are people oriented and know your way around growing individual contributors.
• You are able to work independently, while at the same time being a strong collaborator, working and connecting with colleagues and developing ideas to improve effective teamwork / client onboarding.
• You take initiative, ownership and are committed to challenging the status quo in a critical, professional and effective manner.
• You are a self-starter who enjoys a fast-paced environment and is able to execute ideas / initiatives effectively.
• You have strong analytical and stakeholder management skills while believing that efficiency is key to operational excellence.
• You are a data-driven person who works well and understands with ease, making use of data to drive changes and decision making.
• You are someone with great foresight who thinks strategically when executing initiatives and conducting your planning.

This role is based out of our Amsterdam office. We are an office-first company and value in-person collaboration; we do not offer remote-only roles.