Senior Credit Manager (Path to Head of Credit)

About Direct Lending

Direct Lending is a profitable, regulated Malaysian fintech providing simple, responsible, Shariah-compliant financing to bank-credit underserved Malaysians for everyday essentials — car repairs, motor takaful, and medical bills — and to the merchants that serve them.

We've been profitable for nine consecutive years, hold a KPKT moneylending licence, and are working toward IPO readiness by 2030. Our loan book has grown 6x in the last two and a half years. We have disbursed to more than 60,000 customers across a network of 3,000+ merchants. Credit quality has held — under 3% of the portfolio is over 60 days overdue. We underwrite fast, thin-document, and digitally, at volume — and our credit discipline is the reason the model works.

The Role

This is a role with a clear path built into it. You'll come in owning the credit team and the day-to-day credit decision, and grow — with direct coaching from the CEO/founder — into full ownership of our risk monitoring and portfolio analytics. As you take that on, the role becomes Head of Credit.

You'll own the credit team, credit policy execution and updates, and approval authority on merchant financing and higher-risk loans. You'll be close to the team day to day — reviewing decisions, coaching underwriters, and catching problems on the ground before they show up in the numbers. Our CEO/founder currently owns the risk monitoring framework — the vintage analysis, early-warning models, and portfolio analytics — and will coach you into it so it becomes yours.

This is a hands-on role. You'll be in the loan tape, in the decisions, and in the room with your team — not directing from a distance.

What You Get

• A defined path to Head of Credit, with direct coaching from the CEO/founder
• A hands-on seat in a profitable lender scaling toward IPO — you'll see the whole book, not a slice, with direct access to the data, the team, and the founder from day one
• Real ownership and real growth, not a holding-pattern management role

What You'll Own from Day One

• The credit team (8) — leading, reviewing, coaching, and developing them
• Credit approval authority on merchant financing and higher-risk loans — the judgment calls the model doesn't auto-decide
• Credit policy execution and updates — applying and maintaining our underwriting policy day to day
• Early warning on the ground — spotting when something in the book or the team's decisions isn't right, and connecting it back to our risk framework

What You'll Grow Into

• Portfolio analytics — vintage curves, roll rates, first-payment-default and cohort monitoring
• The risk monitoring and early-warning framework — how it's built, why each threshold sits where it does, and how to read the signals independently
• Full credit policy ownership — not just executing policy, but setting it, backed by the data

As you take these on and run the full risk picture independently, the role becomes Head of Credit, with compensation moving to that band.

What We're Looking For

• 8-12 years in credit, with genuine credit judgment — you've made real approval decisions and owned the calls, not just processed a queue
• Experience leading and coaching a credit or underwriting team
• Strong on credit policy and underwriting fundamentals — scorecards, policy rules, affordability assessment
• Comfortable being hands-on in a lean environment — in the loan tape and the decisions yourself
• Analytically capable and genuinely hungry to grow into portfolio analytics and risk monitoring — this is the core of the growth path, so the appetite and the aptitude to learn it matter as much as what you've already done
• Willing to be coached, and to hold a position when you think something's wrong

You'll probably enjoy this if

• You've hit the ceiling of a pure underwriting or credit-ops role and want to grow into portfolio risk and policy ownership
• You want a genuine path to Head of Credit, with the coaching to get there
• You'd rather be hands-on and close to the book than manage from a distance

You'll probably hate this if

• You want to run credit through a large team and support structure beneath you
• You want a fixed remit that doesn't stretch you
• You're not interested in the analytics and monitoring side

How to Apply

Message me directly, with a short note answering this:

What part of credit do you most want to get better at in the next two years, and why

We read these. The honest answer matters more than the polished one.

Only shortlisted candidates will be contacted.