Job Description: Global Payroll Tower Lead – EMEA

Role/Designation: Global Payroll Tower Lead
Location: Chennai
Experience: 8–15 Years
Band: BPO 5
Job ID: 436491
Work Mode: 100% Work From Office (5 days a week)
Employment Type: Full-Time

Role Summary

We are seeking an experienced Global Payroll Tower Lead to manage and oversee end-to-end multi-country payroll operations across the EMEA region. The role is responsible for payroll governance, statutory compliance, vendor management, client engagement, payroll integrations, and continuous process improvement.

The ideal candidate will have strong EMEA payroll expertise, hands-on experience with Workday payroll integrations (Workday Connector, PECI, and PICOF), and experience managing payroll transitions, implementations, and transformation projects. The candidate should also demonstrate excellent stakeholder management, analytical, and leadership skills.

Key Responsibilities

1. Global Payroll Operations

• Lead monthly payroll processing across multiple EMEA countries, ensuring accuracy, timeliness, and compliance with statutory requirements.

• Oversee payroll activities, including salary calculations, deductions, taxes, social security contributions, pensions, and payments.

• Ensure effective coordination of pre-payroll and post-payroll activities.

• Monitor payroll accuracy, turnaround times, and operational performance.

2. Payroll Governance & Compliance

• Establish and maintain payroll governance frameworks, internal controls, and audit-ready documentation.

• Ensure compliance with local EMEA payroll regulations, statutory requirements, tax rules, and social security obligations.

• Manage GDPR requirements and employee payroll data privacy.

• Identify compliance risks and implement appropriate mitigation measures.

3. Workday Payroll Integrations

• Manage and optimize payroll integrations between Workday and external payroll providers.

• Demonstrate hands-on knowledge of:

  • Workday Payroll Connector

  • PECI (Payroll Effective Change Interface)

  • PICOF (Payroll Interface Change Output File)

• Monitor integration data flows, validations, errors, and exceptions.

• Coordinate issue resolution and ensure accurate employee and payroll data transmission.

4. ServiceNow (SNOW) Management

• Manage payroll-related service requests, incidents, and employee queries through ServiceNow.

• Oversee incident triage, case management, and knowledge base documentation.

• Monitor SLAs, identify recurring issues, and drive service improvements.

5. Vendor & Client Management

• Manage external payroll vendors and service providers across multiple countries.

• Establish vendor governance, monitor service performance, and ensure contractual and operational commitments are met.

• Build strong relationships with client stakeholders, HR, Finance, Compliance teams, and country leaders.

• Provide regular operational updates, dashboards, and executive-level reports.

6. Payroll Controls & Reconciliation

• Oversee gross-to-net payroll reconciliations and payroll-related financial postings.

• Ensure accurate payroll approvals, payment files, and finance coordination.

• Monitor pre-payroll and post-payroll controls to minimize errors and discrepancies.

• Ensure timely resolution of payroll variances and reconciliation issues.

7. Transitions, Implementations & Change Management

• Lead payroll transitions, new-country implementations, and country go-live activities.

• Manage payroll transformation and process improvement projects.

• Oversee parallel payroll testing, validation, cutover, and implementation activities.

• Coordinate Knowledge Transfer (KT), Due Diligence (DD), and transition documentation.

• Ensure smooth handover and stabilization of newly implemented payroll operations.

8. Reporting & Analytics

• Develop and maintain payroll performance reports, dashboards, and operational metrics.

• Track payroll accuracy, processing observations, variances, and SLA performance.

• Conduct root cause analysis (RCA) and recommend corrective actions.

• Use advanced Excel and data analysis tools to identify trends and improvement opportunities.

Required Qualifications & Experience

• Bachelor's degree in Finance, Human Resources, Business Administration, or an equivalent discipline.

• 8–15 years of overall professional experience, with substantial experience in multi-country payroll operations.

• Strong EMEA payroll experience, with at least 5 years of focused exposure to EMEA countries as specified in the detailed requirements.

• Proven experience in payroll governance, compliance, vendor management, and client/stakeholder management.

• Hands-on experience with Workday payroll integrations, including Workday Connector, PECI, and PICOF.

• Experience using ServiceNow (SNOW) for payroll case and incident management.

• Strong understanding of EMEA statutory payroll regulations, taxation, social contributions, pensions, GDPR, and payroll calendars.

• Experience in payroll transitions, implementations, parallel testing, and country go-live activities.

• Excellent written and verbal communication skills.

• Strong leadership, problem-solving, negotiation, and decision-making abilities.

Key Skills & Technical Competencies

• Global and Multi-Country Payroll Operations

• EMEA Payroll Processing and Compliance

• Workday HCM & Payroll

• Workday Payroll Connector

• PECI and PICOF Integrations

• ServiceNow (SNOW) Case Management

• Payroll Governance, Controls & Audits

• Payroll Reconciliation and GL Mapping

• Vendor and Client Management

• Payroll Transitions and Implementations

• Project Management and Change Management

• Parallel Testing and Cutover Management

• Knowledge Transfer (KT) and Due Diligence (DD)

• Advanced MS Excel, Power Query, Pivot Tables, VLOOKUP, and INDEX-MATCH

• Payroll Reporting and Data Analytics

• Process Documentation and SOP Development

• Stakeholder and Executive Communication

• SFTP and Payroll File Encryption

Preferred Skills:

• Payroll certifications such as CIPP or APA.

• Knowledge of Power BI or Tableau.

• Familiarity with Jira and Confluence.

Work Arrangement

• Work Location: Chennai, Tamil Nadu.

• Work Mode: 100% Work From Office.

• Working Days: 5 days a week.

• Candidates should be comfortable working onsite and managing global payroll operations across EMEA time zones.

Important Hiring Information

• Ex-TCS employees are not eligible to apply.

• PAN and Date of Birth (DOB) are required for candidate profile creation and must be collected through the authorized recruitment process.

Candidate Screening Priority: Candidates should have strong multi-country payroll experience, at least 5 years of EMEA payroll exposure, and hands-on expertise in Workday Connector, PECI, and PICOF integrations.