BUSINESS RELATIONSHIP ASSOCIATE

Job Summary
The Business Relationship Associate (BRA) is responsible for building and managing relationships with Small and Medium Enterprise (SME) customers by owning the end-to-end customer journey, from acquisition and onboarding through transactions, deposits, and quality lending.

The BRA serves as the primary liaison between Affinity and SME customers, ensuring that businesses receive financial solutions that meet their operational needs while protecting the integrity of the bank’s portfolio. This role balances customer growth and portfolio discipline, ensuring loans issued are both valuable to the customer and sustainable for the business.

Working closely with Risk, Credit, Marketing, Product, Finance, and Operations, the BRA identifies opportunities to deepen customer relationships, drive product adoption, and grow deposits and lending while maintaining strong credit quality and customer experience.

This role is designed for an early-career professional who is energized by business development, customer relationship management, and financial analysis within a fast-growing fintech environment.

A successful Business Relationship Associate will:

• Build a growing portfolio of active SME customers
• Drive deposit growth and product usage
• Maintain strong, trusted customer relationships
• Generate quality loan opportunities
• Maintain a healthy, well-performing SME portfolio
• Act as a credible advisor to SME business owners

Our Mission
We are building an Africa where dreams are achievable through access to affordable financing. Our mission begins with building Ghana's first fully digital banking institution, and expanding across Africa, to offer affordable deposits, loans, and instant account opening, all through a seamless app experience. By providing free bank accounts with no monthly fees and interest on all products, Affinity drives innovation and economic growth through meaningful financial inclusion. Our goal is to reach a million customers by 2030.

Responsibilities
Customer Experience

• Understand the customer, both their operations and the sectors they operate to provide relevant tailored financial solutions.
• Drive customers to adopt digital platforms to reduce customer friction and service latency.
• Accurately and efficiently process customer mandates/ documentation requirements.
• Demonstrate customer obsession, by ensuring the customer is central to everything.
• Develops and maintains good relationship with all clients.

Sales Growth

• Develop and implement a customer-calling schedule to visit all customers in the portfolio.
• Develop and manage a pipeline of new customers to join Affinity.
• Offer lending solutions to customers based on their need.
• Ensure that products/solutions offered to customers are fit for their needs and the customers understand the workings of the products as well as pricing. Avoid mis selling.
• Ensure customers are effectively onboarded and retained through their life cycle with Affinity.

Credit Risk Management

• Plan and implement annual credit reviews for the portfolio.
• Support customers in the completion of credit application information requirements.
• Notify customers regarding the approval/ decline of credit facilities.
• Monitor of daily customer activities (leveraging on tools provided) to ensure that client facilities are managed within the parameters set by Risk. Exercising discretion regarding account conduct based on a close knowledge and understanding of customer activities.
• Provide first-level defence against deterioration of loan portfolio.
• Ensure all covenants/conditions are met by customer before disbursement and on an ongoing basis.

Compliance and Regulatory

• Ensure that all KYC and AML requirements and documents are accurate and documents (prior to account opening and on an ongoing basis) adequate for all customers in portfolio.
• Use customer information proactively in the prevention of fraud.

Requirements

Key Skills

• Strong selling and relationship management skills
• Critical thinker with excellent analytical skills
•  An ardent and creative problem-solver
• Excellent planning skills to ensure effective planning of the loan portfolio.
• Customer-oriented with an ability to empathise with customers in every situation.
• A strong network to boost quality loan growth in the shortest possible time.
• Strong commercial awareness to ensure portfolio is delivering value to the organisation.
• Pays attention to details.
• Very decisive and taking ownership.
• Curious mind with a strong desire to learn and adapt to situations.
• Digitally-savvy and a strong desire for driving financial inclusion through digital technology.
• A good understanding of analysing financial statements and credit risk management.
• Strong quantitative thinking skills

Educational and Professional Training

• Minimum of a Bachelor Degree in any area from a recognised and accredited institution
• At least two (2) years experience in relationship management in the SME segment
• At least one (1) year experience in a credit /risk environment
• University Degree: First Degree Business