The Senior HR Shared Services Specialist is responsible for resolving complex, high impact inquiries and transactions across multiple tiers within the HR Shared Services (HRSS) organization. Serving as a subject matter expert (SME) this role is accountable for the governance and continuous improvement of the HRSS Service Catalog, Knowledge Base, and Communications Calendar, ensuring accurate and consistent administration of HR processes while delivering exceptional employee experience throughout the entire employee lifecycle from hire to retire.

As a senior member of the HRSS team, this position functions as the primary escalation point for sensitive cases, providing expert guidance and timely resolution of employee and business requests. This role leads root cause analysis (RCA), identifies trends, drives processes standardization to reduce recurring demand, unnecessary escalations and improves operational efficiency, self-service, automation and service quality.

In addition, the Senior HR Shared Services Specialist handles benefits billing processes, partners closely with HR Centers of Excellence, Payroll, Benefits, Talent Acquisition, L&D, Employee Relations, and other cross-functional stakeholders to ensure regulatory and company compliance to support seamless service delivery.

Key Responsibilities

Employee Lifecycle Management

• Manage end-to-end employee lifecycle processes, including new hire pre-boarding, onboarding and offboarding transactions.

• Provide support and guidance to employees, managers, and HR Business Partners across Tiers.

• Resolve complex employee inquiries including medical, dental, vision, life, disability, FMLA, COBRA, 401(k), and related programs while meeting service-level agreements (SLAs).

• Keep ownership of employee cases throughout escalation, serving as the primary point of contact until resolution.

• Lead HR Shared Services projects from planning through implementation, ensuring milestones, timelines, and deliverables are achieved.

Governance, Compliance & COE Partnership

• Ensure adherence to federal and state laws, company policies, and data privacy requirements.

• Prepare structured escalation summaries for different COEs when policy interpretation, compliance determinations, plan design decisions, exception and approvals are required.

• Hands-on follow-up and communication during case escalation using all available channels.

• Own internal and external audits maintaining confidentiality of sensitive employee information.

Employee Experience & Case Management

• Deliver timely, professional and empathetic service to employees and managers to ensure exceptional employee experience.

• Identify root causes, trends and system behavior to recommend process and knowledge improvements.

• Support a consistent enablement-based service philosophy aligned with our internal values, mission and vision.

Knowledge Management & Team Enablement

• Act as a Knowledge Base Administrator and as a subject matter resource for processes within the HR Operations Team and own articles, QRGs and SOPs documentation.

• Train and guide Analysts, Specialists and Sr. Specialists on employee lifecycle inquiries and documentation standards.

• Prepare and keep BCP plans, back-up reports, HRSS Service Catalog, and cross-training strategy to reduce single-point dependency within the team.

HR Systems, Data management & Reporting

• Maintain and audit employee data within Workday, ServiceNow, eGain, and other HRIS and benefits platforms.

• Perform data validation and quality reviews to ensure accuracy and compliance.

• Support system testing, upgrades, and process enhancements including testing of benefits-related system and enhancements (e.g., Workday updates, configuration changes, process improvements).

• Handles periodic reporting requirements related to HR Operations and benefits billing.

• Identify system enhancement opportunities to improve workflow efficiency and case deflection.
  

Minimum Qualifications

• High School Diploma from an accredited institution.

• 4+ years of experience in HR operations, employee lifecycle, and HR Shared Services with significant exposure to health and welfare programs preferred.

• Strong knowledge of HR processes, employment regulations, and data management.

• Experience handling complex cross functional cases, employee benefits inquiries and escalations.

• HRIS systems knowledge (Workday preferred).

• Excellent problem-solving, written and verbal communication skills, customer support and creative issue resolution.

• Demonstrated ability to manage multiple priorities in a fast-paced, high-volume environment.

• Ability to work at 100 Church Street every Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday.

Preferred

• Bachelor’s degree in Human Resources, Business Administration, or related field.

• Experience supporting HR transformation execution projects, process optimization and service center environments.

• Background in benefits administration, healthcare or similarly regulated environment.

• Knowledge supporting open enrollment cycles, including planning, execution, vendor coordination and employee support.

• Experience implementing and improving CRM, case routing, demand reduction and knowledge base documentation.

Hiring Range*:

• Greater New York City Area (NY, NJ, CT residents): $83,100 - $120,360

• All Other Locations (within approved locations): $73,400 - $109,225

As a candidate for this position, your salary and related elements of compensation will be contingent upon your work experience, education, licenses and certifications, and any other factors Healthfirst deems pertinent to the hiring decision.

In addition to your salary, Healthfirst offers employees a full range of benefits such as, medical, dental and vision coverage, incentive and recognition programs, life insurance, and 401k contributions (all benefits are subject to eligibility requirements). Healthfirst believes in providing a competitive compensation and benefits package wherever its employees work and live.

*The hiring range is defined as the lowest and highest salaries that Healthfirst in “good faith” would pay to a new hire, or for a job promotion, or transfer into this role.