Operational Setup & Hiring for Regulated Entities

We start from your licence scope, business plan and risk profile and design the organisation around them — not a generic template. That means a clear org structure, defined reporting lines, decision rights and segregation of duties, sized to the activity you are actually authorised to perform.

The output is a target operating model that maps every regulatory obligation and core process to an owner: who runs payments operations, who owns the AML programme, who signs off risk decisions, and how those functions interact. We right-size it to your stage, so an early-stage EMI is not carrying the headcount of a tier-one bank, while still meeting the substance and control expectations of its regulator.

Regulators authorise people as much as entities. We identify the key function holders your regime requires — typically a head of compliance, an MLRO/AML officer, risk, finance and senior management or board roles — and define each mandate, its responsibilities, reporting line and required competencies.

For each role we prepare the supporting documentation supervisors expect: role descriptions, responsibility maps, and the fit-and-proper evidence that demonstrates the individual is competent, experienced and of good standing. Where notification or regulatory approval of an appointment is required, we structure the role and its file so it is ready for that assessment.

A credible regulated entity separates the people who run the business from the people who independently challenge it. We build the second line — compliance and risk management — as a genuinely independent function with its own mandate, escalation rights and direct access to senior management or the board.

We implement a three-lines-of-defence operating model that fits your size: clear first-line ownership of controls, an empowered second line that monitors and challenges, and a route to independent assurance. This is the structure supervisors look for as evidence of real, ongoing oversight rather than control on paper.

Most newly licensed entities hold a shelf of policies drafted for the application that no one has yet turned into daily practice. We close that gap — converting your AML, risk, safeguarding, conduct and operational policies into the procedures, controls, checklists and system configurations that staff actually use.

For each policy we define the operational steps, the control points, the records to be kept and the person accountable. The aim is a straight line from a regulatory requirement, through a written policy, to a repeatable process with an audit trail — so that what you committed to in the licence file is demonstrably happening in the business.

Few regulated entities run everything in-house, and supervisors accept that — provided outsourced and critical functions remain under genuine control. We help you decide what to build, what to outsource and what to keep close, then put the oversight framework around it.

That covers selecting and onboarding providers, structuring outsourcing arrangements with the contractual and exit terms regulators expect, classifying critical or important functions, and standing up the monitoring, KPIs and review cadence that keep accountability with your entity. Outsourcing a task is permitted; outsourcing responsibility is not — and we set the arrangement up accordingly.

The hardest part of standing up a regulated entity is usually people. We recruit and place qualified candidates across compliance, risk and operations — drawing on a network of professionals who already understand financial regulation, the relevant regime and the practical demands of a small, scrutinised firm.

We scope the role, define the competency and fit-and-proper criteria, source and assess candidates, and support the appointment through to placement — including the documentation needed for any regulatory notification or approval. Where a permanent hire is premature, we can place interim or fractional function holders so the entity is properly staffed from day one and the role is filled by someone who can credibly perform it under supervision.