About the RoleWe are seeking a Payroll Manager to own payroll operations and controls for a fast-growing engineering and manufacturing environment. This role will be responsible for accurate, timely, and compliant payroll processing while building scalable processes, reconciliations, reporting, and controls to support continued company growth. The ideal candidate is a hands-on payroll expert who can operate in the details while also identifying risk, improving controls, and partnering cross-functionally.
Payroll Operations- Own end-to-end payroll processing for exempt and non-exempt employees across a multi-state workforce. We may potentially grow to an international workforce, so this is a great opportunity for you to grow, too!
- Manage our payroll calendar, payroll inputs, approvals, exception handling, and submission process.
- Partner with managers to ensure timecards, missed punches, corrections, and approvals are completed accurately and on time.
- Process recurring and ad hoc payroll changes, including bonuses, commissions, referral bonuses, relocation payments, retro pay, final pay, corrections, reimbursements, and other variable earnings.
- Process garnishments, tax levies, wage orders, and related employee or agency correspondence.
- Ensure payroll records, documentation, approvals, and audit trails are complete and accurate.
- Support year-end payroll activities, including W-2 review, taxable fringe benefits, imputed income, corrections, and amendments.
- Act as first point-of-contact for employee-related inquiries regarding their pay.
Payroll Compliance & Controls- Ensure payroll practices comply with applicable federal, state, and local payroll, tax, and wage and hour requirements, with particular focus on California compliance.
- Own multi-state payroll tax compliance processes, including new state registrations, agency setup, quarterly filings, notices, withholding, SUI, local tax, and ongoing compliance tracking.
- Build and maintain payroll controls, SOPs, checklists, reconciliations, and documentation to support accuracy, compliance, and audit readiness across payroll, workers' compensation, retirement plans, benefits, tax, and financial reporting.
- Maintain recurring audits of payroll configurations, taxable earnings, payroll-impacting deductions, taxable fringe benefits, and imputed income to ensure accurate payroll treatment throughout the year.
- Partner with Accounting and Finance on payroll close activities, including payroll journal entries, accrual support, variance analysis, payroll liability tracking, and reconciliations across payroll registers, cash, taxes, benefit deductions, retirement contributions, vendor data, invoices, and other payroll-related accounts.
- Partner with People Ops, Legal, Accounting, Finance, payroll vendors, and tax agencies to resolve payroll-related audits, employee inquiries, agency notices, registration issues, and compliance matters.
- Coordinate Apex pay with State-supplemented pay (i.e., SDI) and Apex-sponsored benefit pay (i.e., Short-Term Disability).
Systems, Reporting & Process Improvement- Partner with People Ops on payroll system configuration, pay rules, workflows, integrations, reporting, and system changes in Rippling.
- Support payroll-related testing for system updates, new policies, new earning/deduction codes, new states, and process changes.
- Build and maintain scalable payroll reporting, dashboards, and operational metrics, including recurring reporting on payroll spend, headcount-related payroll trends, overtime, premium pay, corrections, off-cycle payments, and variance explanations.
- Build and maintain scalable payroll SOPs, manager-facing timekeeping expectations, controls documentation, and recurring operating rhythms.
- Serve as the internal payroll SME and escalation point across People, Accounting, Finance, and business teams.
What We're Looking For- 5+ years of progressive payroll experience, preferably in a high-growth, multi-state environment.
- Strong experience processing payroll for exempt and non-exempt employees.
- Deep working knowledge of California wage and hour requirements, including overtime, meal/rest premiums, final pay, sick time, wage statements, and regular rate of pay considerations.
- Experience with multi-state payroll tax registrations, filings, agency notices, and payroll tax compliance.
- Strong understanding of payroll accounting, reconciliations, payroll liabilities, accruals, and month-end close partnership.
- Experience auditing payroll-impacting deductions, retirement contributions, imputed income, taxable fringe benefits, or similar payroll-adjacent items.
- Strong analytical skills and comfort working with payroll data, reports, reconciliations, and exception analysis.
- High attention to detail, sound judgment, and ability to handle confidential information with discretion.
- Ability to operate independently while partnering effectively across People, Accounting, Finance, Legal, and business teams.
- Experience building payroll processes, SOPs, controls, and scalable operating rhythms.
- Experience with modern HRIS/payroll systems; Rippling experience is a plus.
- CPP or FPC certification is a plus.
Preferred Qualifications- Experience in manufacturing, aerospace, defense, hardware, or another environment with both exempt and non-exempt populations.
- Experience supporting payroll during rapid headcount growth.
- Familiarity with commission, bonus, relocation, referral, and other variable compensation processing.
- Experience with payroll audits, workers' compensation audits, 401(k) audits, benefits audits, or financial statement support.
- Experience partnering with external payroll vendors, tax agencies, benefits brokers, auditors, and accounting teams.
[Not Posted] What Success Looks LikeIn the first 3-6 months, this person will:
- Own accurate and timely payroll processing with minimal escalations.
- Establish a clear payroll calendar, checklist, and approval process.
- Improve visibility into payroll exceptions, corrections, timecard readiness, tax notices, and recurring risks.
- Begin recurring audits of earning codes, deduction codes, benefit deductions, payroll tax setup, and imputed income.
- Build a working partnership with Accounting on payroll close, reconciliations, and reporting.
- Create a tracker for multi-state tax registrations, filings, agency notices, and compliance obligations.
In the first 6-12 months, this person will:
- Build a scalable payroll control environment.
- Reduce payroll corrections, off-cycle payments, and manual work.
- Improve payroll reporting and audit readiness.
- Own payroll tax compliance with clear documentation and vendor accountability.
- Establish recurring deduction, reconciliation, and imputed income controls.
- Become the company's internal payroll SME and escalation point across People, Accounting, Finance, and business teams.
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Ready to join a team where your contributions matter and your future is bright? Let's build something extraordinary together.
