Head of Financial Operations, Japan at Block in Tokyo

Job description

Block is one company built from many blocks, all united by the same purpose of economic empowerment. Our products and services, including Square, Cash App, Afterpay, TIDAL, Bitkey, and Proto, help millions of people around the world access, manage, and move money with more flexibility and control. We believe everyone should be able to participate and thrive in the economy, and we build tools that make commerce and financial services more accessible. Block’s Financial Operations team is responsible for the movement of money through our bank partners, card networks, payment partners, and internal platforms. The team’s mission is to ensure our customers’ experience taking payments, completing sales, settling funds, and getting paid is reliable, efficient, compliant, and cost effective. To deliver on that mission, Block operates within a complex and highly regulated ecosystem of financial institutions, payment networks, industry partners, regulatory requirements, and internal systems. Financial Operations plays an integral role in shaping the infrastructure, controls, partner relationships, and operational capabilities required to support Square’s long term growth in Japan. As Head of Financial Operations, Japan, you will lead Square’s financial operations strategy in the market. You will own critical payment and banking partner relationships, strengthen operational resilience and controls, and ensure Square can scale reliably in Japan. This Tokyo based hybrid role requires deep payments expertise, strong commercial judgment, and the ability to influence senior internal and external stakeholders. The Role In this role, you will translate Square Japan’s Financial Operations strategy into measurable outcomes. You will work across payments, product, operations, partnerships, and regulatory engagement to improve performance, support new capabilities, and help Square grow in a complex and highly regulated market. You Will Lead the execution of Square Japan’s Financial Operations priorities, turning regional and global strategy into clear market plans and outcomes. Own operational performance for incoming and outgoing payments, including reliability, settlement, incident management, controls, cost efficiency, and seller experience. Build and manage senior relationships with banks, acquirers, card networks, payment providers, industry bodies, regulators, and other strategic partners. Lead commercial and operational negotiations with payment and banking partners to support Square’s growth, product roadmap, risk requirements, and cost objectives. Represent Square Japan in partner, industry, regulatory, and public forums where Financial Operations expertise is required. Partner with Product, Engineering, Risk, Compliance, Legal, Policy, Finance, Marketing, and Operations to launch new capabilities and resolve market specific challenges. Identify opportunities to improve authorization performance, settlement reliability, reconciliation, payment costs, dispute outcomes, vendor performance, and operational controls. Monitor regulatory, network, partner, and industry changes in Japan and lead coordinated responses across internal teams. Establish governance, reporting, operating rhythms, and escalation paths that improve decision making, transparency, and accountability. You Have 15+ years of experience in fintech, payments, banking, card networks, acquiring, issuing, payment operations, or related financial services roles. Deep expertise in Japan’s payments ecosystem, including card networks, acquirers, issuers, processors, banks, regulators, government bodies, and industry associations. A strong track record building and influencing senior relationships with partners, financial institutions, regulators, industry bodies, and market stakeholders. Strong commercial judgment, including experience negotiating complex agreements and balancing cost, risk, compliance, customer experience, product outcomes, and growth. Experience representing a compan