Payment Operations & Data Analysis

Job Title: Stripe Payment Operations Analyst - Principal Subject Matter
Expert (SME)
Job Type: Freelance Contractual
Geography: Remote / Flexible
About the Leadership Role
In this leadership role, you will not be executing daily production tasks for a single software
product or company, nor is this a direct course author role. Instead, you will be the visionary
driving our curriculum. The Principal Subject Matter Expert (SME) acts as a
technical/operational enabler, SME orchestrator, and program-level advisor. You will support
Instructional Designers (IDs), junior SMEs, and delivery teams in translating complex industry
architectures, tools, and best practices into effective, scalable, and practical learning
experiences.
Course Focus
This course is designed to train entry-level professionals on the end-to-end financial
stewardship of digital payments within the Stripe ecosystem, focusing heavily on reconciliation,
dispute management, fraud prevention, and operational reporting.
Core Course Tracks (The Scope)
● Financial Control & Compliance (Audit, GAAP Accrual Accounting, Billing Configuration)
● Payment Processing & Dispute Handling (Stripe Payment Lifecycle, Chargebacks,
Customer Issue Resolution)
● Fraud Prevention & Risk Management (Stripe Radar, Adaptive 3DS, AI Risk Scoring)
● Data Analysis & Operational Reporting (KPI Dashboards, Trend Identification,
Stakeholder Reporting)
● Data Management & Advanced Tooling (Excel/Spreadsheet Modeling, Stripe Sigma/API
Logs, Webhook Troubleshooting)
Domain-Specific Responsibilities & Quality Assurance
● Technical/Operational Translation: Explain and translate complex concepts, tools, and
workflows for the specific learning tracks, including:
○ Navigating the Stripe Dashboard to trace complex payment objects
(PaymentIntents, Charges, Customers, Balance Transactions) and explaining the
differences between authorization, capture, and settlement.
○ Setting up and validating Stripe Billing logic, including tax configurations,
proration rules, trial handling, and automated dunning cycles for revenue
recognition inputs.
○ Developing hands-on spreadsheet models using advanced Excel functions
(VLOOKUP, XLOOKUP, INDEX-MATCH, Pivot Tables) to reconcile Stripe payout
reports against bank deposits and adjust for FX or timing variances.

○ Configuring Stripe fraud and compliance controls, including interpreting issuer
decline codes, adjusting retry logic, and aligning workflows with PCI and
AML/KYC obligations.
○ Creating actionable operational dashboards (Tableau/Power BI) and standard
operating procedures (SOPs) based on exported Stripe CSV data to report on
authorization funnels and dispute drivers.
○ Demonstrate and guide the use of Stripe sandbox and test environment tooling
— including Test Clocks, CLI event triggering, and simulated billing cycles — to
support instructional demonstrations and junior SME execution.
○ Track payment processor and banking partner SLAs, document vendor incidents
(decline rate spikes, settlement delays), and coordinate remediation discussions
to validate curriculum accuracy and real-world relevance.
○ Validate and guide curriculum content covering customer payment incident triage
— including stuck refunds, dispute escalations, and cross-functional handoff
SOPs across support, finance, and engineering.

● Portfolio & Artifact Review: Review and approve the core portfolio artifacts to ensure
consistency, quality, and real-world accuracy. Artifacts include:
○ Stripe Payment Flow/Architecture Case Study
○ Transaction/Payment Reconciliation Workbook
○ Dispute Management Playbook
○ Payment Operations Metrics Dashboard
○ Payment Operations Documentation / SOP
○ Stripe Radar Rule Set

Experience Requirements
● Stripe Depth: 3+ years of direct, hands-on Stripe ecosystem experience (Dashboard,
Billing, Radar, Reports, and Sigma).
● Overall Experience: 5+ years overall in Payment Operations, Financial Operations, or
FinTech.
Required Domain Skills (Hard Skills)
● Financial Reconciliation: Advanced ability to sync Stripe payouts with general ledgers
and perform month-end close procedures.
● Accrual Accounting & Revenue Recognition: Working knowledge of GAAP/IFRS
accrual accounting — specifically mapping Stripe invoice, proration, and subscription
data to journal entries and revenue recognition schedules.
● Dispute & Fraud Management: Deep expertise in tracing failed transactions, managing
the full chargeback lifecycle independently, configuring risk parameters (Radar rules,
3DS), and the ability to interpret and operationalize ML/AI risk model outputs (fraud
scores, decline probability) into manual review queues and sampling strategies.
● Data Modeling & Operational Analytics: Advanced Excel proficiency including
XLOOKUP, INDEX-MATCH, dynamic Pivot Tables, and scenario-based financial
modeling for Stripe payout reconciliation and FX variance analysis. Experience cleaning
and standardizing Stripe CSV exports — including currency normalization, descriptor

text cleanup, and spreadsheet-based row count and sum validation checks — and ability
to build operational KPI dashboards in Tableau or Power BI using Stripe CSV exports or
Sigma queries.
● Webhook & API Management: Hands-on experience with Stripe CLI, webhook
endpoint configuration, event-driven debugging, and latency diagnostics (including
JSON payload inspection and delivery time analysis).
Certifications
● Mandatory / Strongly Preferred: Stripe Fundamentals, Stripe Professional Billing
Architect, or Stripe Professional Payments Architect.
● Preferred / Bonus: Certified Fraud Examiner (CFE), Certified Treasury Professional
(CTP), or Accredited Payments Risk Professional (APRP).
Key Responsibilities: Core SME Orchestration & Enablement
● Instructional Design Enablement: Advise Instructional Designers on critical curriculum
decisions, including selecting the most effective industry tooling for practical demos and
determining the appropriate depth vs. breadth of content to ensure alignment with the
target learner's role-based outcomes.
● SME Coaching & Orchestration: Lead and mentor a team of junior SMEs who are
developing individual course modules. Define the overarching demonstration strategy
(hands-on execution vs. conceptual explanation), establish the baseline for all
screencasts, and guide practitioners on how to physically execute deliverables.
● SME Sourcing & Hiring Support: Partner with the Hurix Digital talent acquisition team
to source, evaluate, and place talent. Design evaluation rubrics that test hands-on Stripe
dashboard navigation, Excel modeling depth, dispute evidence construction, and ability
to explain GAAP-aligned reconciliation — not just conceptual familiarity. Differentiate
hands-on practitioners from theoretical applicants during interviews.
● Program Problem Solving: Act as a senior escalation point to resolve delivery
constraints, tooling limitations, or sandbox failures. Proactively recommend alternative
demonstration approaches and monitor the industry ecosystem for software updates to
adapt content without derailing production timelines.
General Qualifications & Competencies
● Curriculum & Enablement Experience: Prior experience in corporate training,
technical writing, developer advocacy, or serving as an SME for curriculum
development/onboarding programs.
● Leadership & Mentorship: Demonstrated ability to lead, review, and orchestrate the
work of junior developers/analysts in a remote or distributed team environment.
● Communication & Translation: Exceptional ability to translate complex architectures,
workflows, or logic into clear, digestible frameworks for non-technical stakeholders (IDs,
Project Managers).
● Curriculum Strategy: Strong grasp of adult learning principles and curriculum scoping
for specific professional personas.
● Agile Problem Solving: Proactive in resolving ecosystem updates, software limitations,
and production bottlenecks to keep delivery on track.