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Senior Director, Threat Operations

San Francisco Bay Area

Discord is used by over 200 million people every month for many different reasons, but there’s one thing that nearly everyone does on our platform: play video games. Over 90% of our users play games, spending a combined 1.5 billion hours playing thousands of unique titles on Discord each month. Discord plays a uniquely important role in the future of gaming. We are focused on making it easier and more fun for people to talk and hang out before, during, and after playing games.

Discord’s Trust & Safety team is responsible for protecting users and maintaining platform integrity by detecting, investigating, preventing, and responding to harmful content, abusive behavior, and policy violations.

We are seeking an experienced Senior Director of Threat Operations to lead a team responsible for policy enforcement and threat disruption, detecting, analyzing, and preventing serious threats to Discord and its users. The organization includes teams focused on high harm areas (counter-extremism, cybercrime, minor safety, self-harm, and exploitative content and behavior), and cross-functional safety initiatives. As Discord grows, you'll grow this function, both by designing better ways to get the work done, and by supporting a team of motivated experts. Reporting to our VP, Trust & Safety, you'll champion your team of operations and safety experts to identify, remove, and prevent threats to Discord and its users (including violations of our Community Guidelines), partner with product and engineering to integrate and develop new tools, work with internal teams to implement operational procedures, act as the front line for escalations from users and internal teams, and represent our overall Trust & Safety efforts. You're an experienced and dynamic senior leader responsible for developing and executing strategies to ensure platform integrity and user safety while developing an empowered and healthy team. You'll also do many things we haven't even thought of yet.

What you'll be doing

  • Develop and implement a comprehensive, multi-year strategy for building and setting direction for the team (comprised of the Minor Safety and Exploitative Content, Counter-Extremism, and Cybercrime teams) as they identify and investigate dangerous threat groups, cybercrime actors, violent extremism, teen safety threats, self-harm promotion, and other exploitative content and behavior
  • Drive operational excellence and analytical rigor across operations that enables the team to identify risks and establish performance metrics for measuring effectiveness, outcomes, and business impact
  • Collaborate with enablement teams to ensure consistent, accurate, and timely enforcement by internal and outsourced teams 
  • Communicate complex Trust & Safety concepts and represent your team's efforts to C-suite leadership, internal stakeholders, regulators, civil society, and external partners with exceptional executive presence and communication skills
  • Drive continuous improvement in processes, agent tooling, and team performance to optimize operational efficiency and effectiveness, including partnering with product teams to influence and develop technology and machine-learning solutions that enhance enforcement consistency and accuracy
  • Move effortlessly from the technical details to the big picture to identify critical areas for the team’s attention, lead cross-functional initiatives to find solutions, and drive implementation of these improvements across multiple organizations
  • Love managing people - be a champion and advocate for your function and team, ensuring their growth and wellness needs are met and empowering them to do their best work while developing future leaders
  • Partner closely with cross-functional teams, including product policy, legal, product, engineering, and communications, to align operations with company goals and inform product and policy roadmaps through data driven insights and recommendations

What you should have

  • 10+ years of experience building and managing sophisticated Trust & Safety functions, preferably at technology companies, with 5+ years in senior leadership roles
  • Proven track record of managing teams in hyper-growth environments with complex organizational structures and global operations
  • Advanced subject matter expertise in technology platform policy and enforcement functions
  • Demonstrated thought leadership and strategic thinking in operations through industry publications, conference presentations, or recognized contributions to operational excellence - and ability to develop 3-5 year operational roadmaps, anticipate industry trends, and position the organization for future challenges
  • Technical fluency in enforcement operations tooling and emerging technologies with ability to evaluate and implement cutting-edge solutions
  • Exceptional cross-functional influence with proven ability to drive alignment and outcomes across product managers, engineers, lawyers, finance, data science, and content moderation teams at the VP and C-suite level
  • Executive communication expertise including experience briefing C-suite executives, board members, and publicly representing work to regulators, civil society, and strategic partners at industry forums
  • Strategic partnership experience at enterprise scale, including contract negotiation, performance management, and multi-vendor orchestration
  • Change management expertise with experience leading organizational transformations and process optimization initiatives
  • Intellectual curiosity and ability to jump into unfamiliar areas, synthesize complex information quickly, and drive innovation while maintaining operational excellence

The preferred location for this role is the San Francisco Bay Area (Alameda, Contra Costa, Marin, Napa, San Francisco, San Mateo, Santa Clara, Solano, and Sonoma counties). Relocation assistance may be available

The US base salary range for this full-time position is $268,000 to $300,000 + equity + benefits. Our salary ranges are determined by role and level. Within the range, individual pay is determined by additional factors, including job-related skills, experience, and relevant education or training. Please note that the compensation details listed in US role postings reflect the base salary only, and do not include equity, or benefits.

Why Discord? 

Discord plays a uniquely important role in the future of gaming. We're a multiplatform, multigenerational and multiplayer platform that helps people deepen their friendships around games and shared interests. We believe games give us a way to have fun with our favorite people, whether listening to music together or grinding in competitive matches for diamond rank. Join us in our mission! Your future is just a click away!

Discord is committed to inclusion and providing reasonable accommodations during the interview process. We want you to feel set up for success, so if you are in need of reasonable accommodations, please let your recruiter know.

Please see our Applicant and Candidate Privacy Policy for details regarding Discord’s collection and usage of personal information relating to the application and recruitment process by clicking HERE.

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