This is not a Surat-first hire. This is a national search for a technically strong, pedigree-backed operator who has built or scaled systems inside a product, engineering, or fintech environment — and is ready to own the operational architecture of a regulated brokerage from the ground up.
Who We Are Looking For
The Ideal Candidate
We are looking for someone who sits at the rare intersection of technical fluency and operational depth. You have likely worked in product operations, technical program management, or systems/platform operations inside a fintech, SaaS, or capital markets firm. You understand how software systems work — not just how to use them — and you can translate that understanding into operational architecture that scales.
You are not a pure engineer. You are not a pure ops manager. You are the person who builds the bridge between the two — and owns the systems that result.
College & Academic Pedigree
Given the technical depth this role demands, we are specifically targeting candidates from institutions with strong engineering, technology, or quantitative finance programmes:
Target Institutions (Engineering / Tech)
- IITs, NITs, BITs Pilani — CS, ECE, or Industrial Engineering backgrounds
- DAIICT Gandhinagar — strong product and systems thinking culture
- Nirma University, SVNIT Surat — engineering graduates with ops/product exposure
- IIIT Hyderabad / Bangalore — strong systems and backend orientation
- Top private engineering colleges with a track record of fintech/startup placements
Target Institutions (Business / Finance)
- IIMs, NMIMS, SPJIMR — MBA with operations, strategy, or tech management focus
- SP Jain (Mumbai/Dubai) — fintech and operations specialisation
- FLAME, Ashoka — analytical, systems-thinking undergraduate programmes
- Chartered Engineer or CS professional with a strong technical operations record
- International degrees (CFA + engineering combination is a strong signal)
Target Background & Experience
Ideal Prior Roles
- Technical Program Manager (TPM) at a fintech or SaaS company
- Product Operations or RevOps at a Series A–C startup
- Platform / Systems Operations at a brokerage, exchange, or financial infrastructure firm
- Backend engineer or solutions architect who transitioned into operations leadership
- Business Analyst or Systems Analyst with hands-on implementation experience
- Operations lead at a company that scaled from 0 to meaningful volume
Ideal Prior Companies
- Zerodha, Groww, Upstox, Angel One — operations or product teams
- Razorpay, Cashfree, BillDesk — platform or technical operations
- Zoho, Freshworks — operations, platform, or solutions engineering
- NSE / BSE / CDSL technology or operations arms
- Consulting firms: McKinsey, BCG, Deloitte — tech or fintech practice
- Any well-funded Indian fintech with a strong engineering culture
About The Role
Stellaredge is building a technology-first brokerage from scratch. Most brokerage firms bolt technology onto legacy operations. We are doing the opposite — designing the operational architecture first, then scaling it. This role is the most consequential non-engineering hire we will make.
You will own the complete operational systems layer: how workflows are designed, how they connect to the technology stack, how they are monitored, and how they scale. You will be the firm's institutional knowledge base for operational architecture — the person who can explain, at any level of abstraction, exactly how Stellaredge works and why it works that way.
Core Responsibilities
- Design and own the end-to-end operational architecture of the firm — workflows, integrations, data flows, and escalation paths across all departments
- Build and maintain a comprehensive operational playbook: SOPs, process maps, runbooks, and exception-handling frameworks
- Work directly with the engineering team to define system requirements, integration specifications, and automation pipelines — acting as the product owner for internal operational tooling
- Implement and own the observability layer: dashboards, operational metrics, alert systems, and health checks across all operational functions
- Lead the identification and prioritisation of manual processes for automation — write detailed specifications that engineers can act on
- Design the operational onboarding and training infrastructure so that new hires can be productive within their first two weeks
- Conduct regular operational audits, identify systemic risks, and drive resolution with clear documentation and accountable timelines
- Act as the primary bridge between operations, compliance, finance, and engineering — ensuring each team's requirements are translated accurately into systems
Technical Skills Required
Must Have
- Ability to read, understand, and write technical specifications — API docs, system design documents, integration requirements
- Proficiency with workflow and process design tools: Miro, Lucidchart, Notion, Confluence, or equivalent
- Data fluency — SQL or equivalent for querying operational databases; ability to build dashboards in Metabase, Looker, or similar
- Experience with no-code / low-code automation tools: Zapier, Make (Integromat), n8n, Retool
- Strong documentation discipline — you write for an audience, not just for yourself
Strong Advantage
- Familiarity with capital markets infrastructure: order management systems, depository workflows, settlement cycles
- Experience with event-driven systems, message queues, or operational data pipelines
- Prior work with SEBI-regulated entities — understanding of compliance and audit-readiness requirements
- Basic scripting ability (Python or similar) to prototype automations or analyse operational data
- Experience with incident management frameworks (PagerDuty, OpsGenie) or SRE-adjacent operational thinking
Non-Technical Requirements
- Exceptional written communication — every specification, SOP, and process document you write will be acted on by engineers, compliance officers, and operations teams
- Strong stakeholder management — you will work across every department in the firm
- Ownership mindset — you are not a consultant who delivers a report and moves on; you own the outcomes of the systems you design
- Comfort with ambiguity — this is an early-stage environment; you will often be defining the problem before solving it
- 2–5 years of directly relevant experience; the quality and impact of that experience matters far more than the number of years
Why This Role At Stellaredge
This is a rare opportunity to own the operational architecture of an entire regulated financial firm — not a team, not a product, not a single workflow, but the whole system. Most operations architects at large firms spend years waiting for the scope this role starts with on day one.
What Makes This Role Compelling
- Full ownership of operational architecture from day one — no legacy system to work around
- Direct access to founders — your decisions get implemented, not reviewed by three layers of management
- Real technical depth required — this is not a glorified PM role
- Visible impact: every system you build will be a foundational part of how Stellaredge scales
- Build in a regulated environment — the constraint of SEBI compliance makes systems thinking genuinely hard and genuinely valuable
- Fast path to Head of Operations / CTO-adjacent role as the firm grows
Be Honest With Yourself Before Applying
- Compensation at this stage is competitive for an early-stage firm but below large-broker or top-tier tech company rates
- Surat is the primary base — relocation is required; hybrid is possible after the first 6 months
- This is a zero-to-one environment — if you need established processes and a large team around you, this is not the right fit
- You will wear multiple hats in year one — the role is broad by design, not by accident
- There is no playbook yet — you are writing it
What We Will Evaluate You On
Strong Signals (Prioritise These Candidates)
- Has owned a system end-to-end — not just contributed to one; can describe the before and after clearly
- Can read an API document and identify operational implications without engineering support
- Has worked inside a regulated environment (financial services, healthcare, or similar) — understands what compliance-by-design means
- Pedigree institution AND real operational track record — both matter, neither alone is sufficient
- Has shipped automation that others depend on — even a simple one
- Asks sharp, specific questions about Stellaredge's current tech stack and operational gaps during the interview
- Can sketch a system diagram under pressure — on a whiteboard or shared screen — without preparation
Red Flags (Pass on These Candidates)
- Good college, no substance — degree without demonstrable systems work
- Calls themselves a 'product person' but has never written a technical specification or owned an integration
- Cannot explain a specific system they designed: what problem it solved, how it was built, what broke, and what they changed
- Only worked in large teams where individual contribution is opaque — cannot clearly describe their personal scope
- Views 'operations' as below their technical level — this role requires respect for operational craft
- Unwilling to relocate to Surat or be on-site during year one
Interview Process
This is a senior, technical hire. The process is rigorous and moves fast for the right candidate.
- Round 1 — Async technical + systems screening: 3 written questions covering system design thinking, operational problem-solving, and a past project deep-dive (48-hour turnaround; quality of writing is part of the evaluation)
- Round 2 — 60-min video interview with Founder: background, systems depth, technical fluency, and culture alignment — expect to walk through one past system you built in detail
- Round 3 — Technical case exercise (take-home, 3–5 days): design the operational architecture for a specific Stellaredge workflow — systems diagram, integration spec, and monitoring approach required
- Round 4 — In-person or video presentation of case exercise to Founder and Engineering Lead, followed by Q&A
- Round 5 — Culture and alignment conversation — informal, 30 minutes; two-way check