Director, Credit Risk & ML Strategy

Nelnet; Draper (UT); Hybrid; USD 170,000 - 230,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Hybrid work option

Medical, dental, vision

Job summary

Nelnet is seeking an experienced Engineering or Data Science leader with production ML expertise to advance credit policy, risk analytics, and model governance. You will drive end-to-end modeling across consumer assets, ensure regulatory compliance, and collaborate across Product, Data, Technology, and Compliance.

You will own end-to-end development and deployment of credit models, monitor performance, and provide insights for decision-making in a regulated bank environment.

Qualifications

• 8+ years in consumer lending, preferably at a bank or regulated depository institution.
• Experience with credit policy management, pricing strategies and experimentation design.
• Hands-on ML and statistical modeling with tree-based methods and scorecards.
• Familiarity with governance processes, audits, and regulatory exams.

Responsibilities

• Own credit policy and underwriting strategy, including debt-to-income, loan amount, term, and risk-based pricing tiers.
• Apply tree-based methods and traditional scorecards to identify high-risk populations and profitability.
• Develop end-to-end consumer credit models (PD/LGD, loss forecasting, collections propensity) and deploy in production.
• Monitor portfolio health with vintage curves, roll rates, and KRIs; trigger actions as needed.
• Maintain governance/documentation, model inventory, and compliance with ECOA/Regulation B and fair lending rules.
• Collaborate with Product, Data, Technology, Finance, and Compliance; present to senior leadership and audit/exam teams.

Skills

Credit policy

Risk analysis

Predictive analytics

Governance

SQL

Python

Machine learning

Communication

Education

Bachelor's in Engineering or Data Science or Statistics or Mathematics or Economics

Tools

SQL

Python

R

SAS

XGBoost/LightGBM

Job description

Nelnet is seeking an experienced Engineering or Data Science leader with production ML expertise to advance credit policy, risk analytics, and model governance. You will drive end-to-end modeling across consumer assets, ensure regulatory compliance, and collaborate across Product, Data, Technology, and Compliance.

You will own end-to-end development and deployment of credit models, monitor performance, and provide insights for decision-making in a regulated bank environment.