Director of Payroll
We are partnering with a well-established organization to identify an experienced Director of Payroll to lead a complex, high-volume payroll function.
This is a highly visible leadership opportunity for someone who combines strategic payroll leadership with strong technical expertise and a hands-on operating style. The Director will be responsible for ensuring accurate and timely payroll execution, strengthening processes and controls, developing the payroll team, and driving continued improvement across the function.
The ideal candidate has led payroll in a large, complex organization and is comfortable operating in an environment with multiple states, multiple employee populations, and sophisticated payroll requirements.
Responsibilities
- Provide leadership and oversight for the organization's end-to-end payroll function.
- Ensure accurate, timely and compliant payroll processing across a large, geographically dispersed employee population.
- Lead, develop and support payroll leadership and staff while establishing clear expectations around ownership, accuracy, responsiveness and execution.
- Oversee complex payroll matters involving wages, deductions, taxes, benefits, garnishments, variable compensation and other payroll-related transactions.
- Maintain strong payroll controls, reconciliations, approval processes and audit readiness.
- Ensure compliance with applicable federal, state and local payroll and wage requirements.
- Serve as a senior escalation point for complex payroll issues and ensure issues are resolved accurately and efficiently.
- Partner closely with HR, Finance, Accounting, Operations, IT and other business leaders on payroll-related matters.
- Establish meaningful payroll metrics and reporting to identify trends, risks, recurring issues and opportunities for improvement.
- Strengthen payroll processes, documentation, controls and cross-training to create a scalable and sustainable operating model.
- Provide leadership around payroll and timekeeping systems, integrations, testing, configuration and process enhancements.
- Identify root causes of recurring payroll issues and implement sustainable solutions rather than relying on short-term fixes.
- Support organizational growth and change through continued enhancement of payroll processes, systems and team capabilities.
Desired Skills and Experience
- Bachelor's degree in Accounting, Finance, Business, Human Resources or a related field preferred; equivalent relevant experience will be considered.
- 10+ years of progressive payroll experience with significant payroll leadership responsibility.
- Experience leading payroll for a large, complex and geographically dispersed employee population.
- Strong multi-state payroll knowledge required.
- Experience working with complex hourly payroll environments strongly preferred.
- Exposure to union payroll and other complex wage requirements is highly desirable.
- Strong understanding of payroll compliance, controls, reconciliations, taxation and audit requirements.
- Demonstrated ability to evaluate payroll data, exceptions and reconciliations and work directly in the details when necessary.
- Experience improving payroll processes, controls, systems and team performance.
- Strong systems aptitude and advanced Excel capabilities.
- CPP certification is a plus. We are seeking a payroll leader who is hands-on, decisive and highly accountable. This person should be comfortable setting strategy while remaining close enough to the operation to identify issues early, understand their root causes and ensure they are resolved. The successful candidate will bring a strong combination of technical payroll expertise, people leadership, operational discipline and continuous-improvement mindset.
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