SUMMARY
The
Director of Payroll is responsible for overseeing the end-to-end payroll operations for the organization, ensuring timely, accurate, and compliant payroll processing. This role serves as a key leadership bridge between Payroll Managers and the Vice President of Payroll, translating payroll strategy into operational execution. The Director provides leadership, governance, and process discipline across payroll operations while driving continuous improvement, compliance, and service excellence.
Essential Duties and Responsibilities include the following. Other duties and tasks may be assigned.
- Lead and oversee U.S. payroll operations to ensure accurate and timely processing of all payrolls.
- Direct and support Payroll Managers in the execution of day-to-day payroll processing, audits, and issue resolution.
- Establish, maintain, and enhance payroll operational controls, procedures, and standard documentation.
- Partner with the VP, Payroll to execute payroll strategy, system optimization, and process improvements.
- Ensure compliance with all federal, state, and local payroll laws and regulations, including wage and hour rules, garnishments, and reporting requirements.
- Oversee payroll tax processes in coordination with Payroll Managers, ensuring accurate reconciliations, timely filings, and year-end activities (W-2s and related reporting).
- Review payroll results, exception reports, and reconciliations to identify trends, mitigate risk, and resolve discrepancies.
- Provide leadership for off-cycle payrolls, special compensation, incentives, and retroactive pay adjustments.
- Collaborate closely with HR, Accounting, Finance, and third-party vendors to ensure data integrity, system alignment, and service quality.
- Serve as an escalation point for complex payroll issues, audits, and employee or leadership inquiries.
- Support HRIS and payroll system implementations, upgrades, and integrations, including testing and change management.
- Monitor service delivery and performance metrics to ensure payroll service level expectations are met.
- Stay current on payroll legislation and regulatory changes and advise leadership on potential impacts.
- Own wage and hour compliance across all payrolls, ensuring accurate application of federal, state, and local wage laws, overtime rules, pay practices, and recordkeeping requirements.
- Lead payroll tax compliance oversight, including review and validation of tax calculations, filings, reconciliations, amendments, and year-end reporting to ensure accuracy and timeliness.
- Serve as the primary payroll lead for internal audits, external audits, and regulatory reviews, ensuring audit readiness, prompt issue resolution, and sustained control effectiveness.
- Establish and enforce robust internal controls and monitoring mechanisms to prevent, detect, and remediate payroll errors, compliance gaps, and financial risk.
- Investigate and resolve complex payroll discrepancies, wage claims, tax notices, and agency inquiries, escalating material risks to senior leadership as appropriate.
- Other duties as assigned
Leadership and People Management
- Provide direct leadership to Payroll Managers and indirect leadership to Payroll Specialists.
- Coach and develop payroll leadership talent through performance management, feedback, and succession planning.
- Promote a culture of accountability, continuous improvement, and customer service within the payroll function.
- Partner with VP, Payroll on organizational design, staffing decisions, and workload planning.
Qualifications/Requirements:
To perform this job successfully, an individual must be able to perform each essential duty satisfactorily.
Requirements include:
- Bachelor's degree preferred in finance, accounting, business, HR, or a related analytical discipline; equivalent experience may be considered.
- CPP or FPC certification strongly preferred.
- 5--7 years of progressively responsible payroll experience, including multi-level leadership experience.
- Strong working knowledge of payroll operations, payroll tax, compliance, and internal controls.
- Experience with enterprise payroll and HRIS systems.
- Advanced proficiency in Microsoft Excel and reporting tools (e.g., Pivot Tables, VLOOKUP).
- Demonstrated ability to lead teams, manage competing priorities, and drive operational excellence.
