Seeking guidance on transitioning into trading operations (coming from operations + finance-adjacent charity sector)

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1

Hi everyone,

I’m exploring opportunities in trading operations / trade support / back office roles, and I wanted to reach out to this community for advice, connections and guidance.

My background is slightly unconventional: for the last few years, I’ve been working as an Operations Coordinator in a finance-adjacent environment. I managed day-to-day operations for several large-scale sustainability and finance education initiatives under the King Charles III Charitable Fund. My work involved:

  • Coordinating complex, multi-stakeholder projects with accounting bodies, senior finance leaders and students.

  • Managing cross-functional workflows, KPIs, reporting and data accuracy.

  • Liaising with 50+ partner organisations, delivering events, and improving operational processes.

  • Running targeted communication and outreach campaigns (increasing engagement by 20–30%).

  • Managing project budgets, analysing performance, and supporting strategic decision-making.

Before that, I led teams and operations in marketing and NGOs, gaining experience in process improvement, stakeholder management, CRM systems (Salesforce, Dynamics, HubSpot), and digital operations.

I’m now focused on making the move into Trading Operations. I’m aiming for roles such as trade support, operations analyst, middle office, clearing, settlements, or risk operations - ideally with exposure to prop trading, hedge funds, fintech brokers, or electronic trading platforms.

What I’d love to learn from people already in the industry

  • How do candidates from non-traditional backgrounds break into trading ops or back office roles?
    Especially those coming from project operations, data, stakeholder-heavy roles in adjacent fields like mine.

  • What skills or technical areas should I double down on to make myself a strong candidate?
    (I already work with data, KPIs, CRMs, Excel, project to,ols etc., and I’m actively studying markets and trade lifecycles).

  • Does prior experience in the charity/sustainability sector - but with exposure to finance stakeholders - hold value when transitioning?
    If yes, how do people usually position this?

  • Are there any meet-ups, in-person groups or networking events in London where ops professionals hang out?

  • Would anyone here be open to mentorship or occasional guidance?
    I’m very committed to breaking into trading ops and would hugely appreciate insights from someone with real front-to-back office exposure.

If anyone here is willing to connect, share their journey, offer suggestions, or point me in the right direction - I’d be very grateful. Happy to chat, share my CV, or meet for a coffee.

I really appreciate any help you can provide.

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I have worked within multiple operations in the industry while gaining experienced in the financial sectors for years. Transitioning to Trades requires using your transferrable skills, workflow process and procedures, building intellect on trade products, clearing, settlement, reconcilement, regulatory reporting, trade lifecycle and stages, find out about derivatives, fixed income, FX, equities the clearinghouse mitigation of risk hedging etc. the inner workings through networking, read up on front office and back-office functions, compliance. explore working on projects in the trade departments closely related to the products. Review process optimization and BPO get familiar with Treasury Ops Build a Transition Roadmap keep the basics in mind. Attend a few webinars, in-person meetings get your name in the trade groups network find out about the challenges while looking for the opportunities.

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