Director, Payroll Applications & Technology

Job Description

Job Description

Director, Payroll Applications & Technology
Pay Rate: $95–$100/hour
Location: Culver City, CA
W-2 assignment budgeted through 3/26/2027

About the Company
A leading global entertainment and media organization with operations spanning film, television, content production, distribution, and digital entertainment. The organization operates a complex, large-scale environment supporting diverse employee populations and business operations across North America.

Position Overview
We are seeking an experienced Director, Payroll Applications & Technology to lead the strategy, reliability, modernization, and support of the technology ecosystem supporting North American payroll.

This position combines strategic technology leadership with hands-on payroll systems expertise. The Director will own the technical roadmap for payroll and workforce management applications, lead technical teams and vendor partners, oversee complex implementations and enhancements, and provide senior-level leadership during critical payroll production issues.

The ideal candidate brings extensive experience with enterprise payroll and workforce management systems, strong knowledge of end-to-end payroll processes, and the technical depth to troubleshoot complex application, integration, data, and configuration issues.

Key Responsibilities

• Own the technology strategy, technical health, operating model, and multiyear roadmap for payroll and workforce management applications, including Infor WFM and UKG Payroll.
• Lead modernization initiatives focused on improving system reliability, automation, scalability, controls, analytics, and the overall payroll user experience.
• Establish and maintain technical standards across system configuration, integrations, reporting, automation, security, and controls.
• Oversee integrations and data flows between payroll systems and enterprise platforms including Workday, SAP Finance, banking, tax, and time & attendance systems.
• Provide senior technical leadership for complex payroll production issues involving applications, integrations, calculations, timekeeping, access, data, and financial postings.
• Lead root-cause analysis and permanent resolution of critical incidents through data analysis, configuration and log reviews, interface tracing, testing, and business validation.
• Ensure temporary workarounds are controlled and replaced with sustainable long-term solutions.
• Provide leadership during critical payroll cycles, system releases, implementations, cutovers, go-lives, and stabilization periods.
• Lead, mentor, and develop payroll technology resources while establishing strong standards around ownership, responsiveness, documentation, and technical rigor.
• Build internal capabilities through coaching, cross-training, support playbooks, diagnostic standards, knowledge management, and succession planning.
• Manage technology vendors, contractors, managed service providers, budgets, contracts, statements of work, service levels, and overall vendor performance.
• Partner closely with Payroll Operations, HR Technology, Finance, Information Security, Audit, integration teams, and other key stakeholders.
• Provide clear executive-level communication regarding system health, incidents, priorities, project progress, risks, dependencies, and required decisions.
• Maintain current technical documentation, testing evidence, change controls, runbooks, support procedures, and audit-ready materials.
• Ensure payroll technology solutions comply with payroll and tax requirements, collective bargaining agreements, SOX, information security, data privacy, and audit controls.

Qualifications

• 10+ years of progressive experience in payroll systems, HRIS, workforce management, payroll technology, or related enterprise applications.
• Demonstrated experience leading business-critical payroll technology environments and technical teams.
• Hands-on experience configuring, administering, implementing, or troubleshooting enterprise payroll or workforce management platforms.
• Strong understanding of end-to-end payroll

Please submit your resume in Word or PDF format to be considered.

#ZR \nCompany Description

The TPS Group, is a Certified Woman and Disabled Owned Diverse recruiting and staffing firm that is a trusted recruiting partner to top companies.

Company Description

The TPS Group, is a Certified Woman and Disabled Owned Diverse recruiting and staffing firm that is a trusted recruiting partner to top companies.