HR & Payroll Manager

HR Manager

Location: Bronx & Long Island City, NY
Employment Type: Full-Time, Exempt
Salary Range: $90,000–$110,000 annually
Experience: 3–5 years
Language: Bilingual English/Spanish preferred

Join Us in Building What’s Next

We’re looking for a hands-on, solutions-oriented HR Manager who is excited about the opportunity to make an impact, build strong partnerships, and help shape how we support our people at the Kommissary as the organization continues to grow.

Supporting a multi-unit operation, this role will partner closely with employees, managers, and leadership across our locations to create a consistent, responsive, and engaging employee experience.

This is more than a traditional HR administration role. We’re looking for someone who wants to become a trusted partner to our employees, managers, and leadership team—someone who can bring structure to the day-to-day while also helping us strengthen our People practices for the future.

You’ll have meaningful ownership of the employee experience, from hiring and onboarding through payroll, employee relations, development, and offboarding. You’ll also play an important role in strengthening our HR processes, identifying opportunities for improvement, and creating consistency across multiple locations.

If you enjoy rolling up your sleeves, solving problems, building relationships, creating organization, and seeing your ideas turn into better ways of working, this could be a great opportunity for you.

What You’ll Own

Payroll & HR Operations

Payroll is an important part of this role, and we’re looking for someone who is comfortable owning the process from beginning to end.

You will:

• Independently process payroll accurately and on time.
• Review timecards, hours, pay rates, deductions, PTO, sick time, and payroll changes before processing.
• Identify and resolve discrepancies proactively.
• Maintain accurate employee and payroll information across multiple locations.
• Coordinate payroll changes associated with new hires, promotions, compensation changes, leaves, benefits, and separations.
• Partner closely with Finance and leadership to strengthen payroll processes and controls.
• Serve as a knowledgeable and responsive resource for employee payroll questions.

Multi-Unit Employee Experience

You’ll help create a consistent and supportive employee experience across our locations while recognizing the unique needs of each team.

You’ll support the full employee lifecycle, including:

• Recruiting and hiring coordination.
• Offers and pre-employment requirements.
• New-hire onboarding.
• Employee records and HRIS administration.
• Benefits and leave coordination.
• Employee relations and manager support.
• Performance and corrective-action documentation.
• Promotions, transfers, and compensation changes.
• Terminations and offboarding.

Our goal is for employees and managers across every location to know they have a trusted People partner who understands the business, is accessible when support is needed, and follows through.

Compliance & I-9 Ownership

You’ll help us maintain strong, sustainable HR practices by:

• Owning the ongoing Form I-9 process for new hires.
• Ensuring documentation is completed accurately and timely.
• Maintaining organized and compliant I-9 records.
• Monitoring reverifications and required follow-up.
• Supporting ongoing I-9 compliance following any separate historical audit or remediation project.
• Identifying potential HR or documentation gaps and partnering with leadership on solutions.
• Helping maintain compliance with applicable federal, state, and local employment requirements.

Employee Relations & Manager Partnership

We want this person to be visible, approachable, and connected to our teams across locations.

You’ll:

• Build strong relationships with employees, managers, and leadership.
• Serve as a trusted resource for everyday HR questions and concerns.
• Coach managers through employee situations and help strengthen their people-management capabilities.
• Support employee relations matters, investigations, attendance and performance concerns, and corrective action.
• Help managers balance accountability with a positive employee experience.
• Approach employee concerns with professionalism, discretion, consistency, and empathy.
• Spend time with our teams and develop an understanding of the day-to-day realities of a fast-moving, multi-unit operation.

Help Us Build Better

One of the most exciting parts of this opportunity is that you won't simply inherit a finished HR function—you’ll have the opportunity to help shape it.

We want someone who sees an opportunity and thinks, “How can we make this better?”

You’ll have the opportunity to:

• Create more efficient HR workflows and processes.
• Build greater consistency across locations.
• Develop useful checklists, templates, and standard operating procedures.
• Improve the accuracy and organization of employee records.
• Identify manual processes that can be simplified.
• Strengthen communication between HR, Payroll, Finance, Operations, managers, and employees.
• Bring ideas forward and partner with leadership to turn those ideas into action.

How You’ll Work

We’re looking for someone who is comfortable with ownership and autonomy.

You’ll be trusted to understand the priorities, identify what needs attention, develop solutions, and follow through.

At the same time, independence doesn’t mean working alone. This role is built around partnership. You’ll collaborate with leadership and operational teams while having the autonomy to move the day-to-day People work forward.

We want a partner who can say:

“I see the issue. Here’s what I learned, here’s what I recommend, and here’s how I can help us get it done.”

What You Bring

• 3–5 years of progressive Human Resources experience, ideally within HR Operations, HR Generalist, or HR Manager roles.
• Hands-on payroll processing experience required.
• Experience supporting a multi-unit or multi-location workforce strongly preferred.
• Experience supporting employees throughout the full employment lifecycle.
• Working knowledge of Form I-9 requirements and employment documentation.
• Experience with HRIS, payroll, and timekeeping systems. Paylocity knowledge a plus.
• Working knowledge of federal, state, and local employment practices.
• Strong organizational skills and attention to detail.
• Confidence managing multiple priorities and following issues through completion.
• Sound judgment and the ability to handle confidential employee information appropriately.
• Strong interpersonal, written, and verbal communication skills.
• A collaborative, service-minded approach to HR.
• Experience supporting high-volume hourly populations in food production, hospitality, manufacturing, distribution, or similar environments strongly preferred.
• Bilingual English/Spanish strongly preferred, with the ability to communicate effectively with Spanish-speaking employees.

Compensation & Benefits

We believe strong partnerships start with investing in our people. This role offers:

• Paid Time Off (PTO).
• 401(k) retirement plan.
• Commuter benefits.

What Success Looks Like

Success in this role isn't simply processing payroll or completing HR transactions.

It means becoming a trusted and dependable People partner who employees across our locations feel comfortable approaching, managers rely on for guidance, and leadership trusts to move important work forward.

Over time, we want this person to help us build an HR function that is organized, responsive, compliant, and increasingly scalable across our multi-unit operation—while never losing sight of the people behind the processes.

If you're energized by the opportunity to own the work, build meaningful relationships, support teams across multiple locations, improve how things operate, and help create what comes next, we'd love to meet you.

Kommissary is proud to be an Equal Opportunity Employer and an E-Verify participating employer .

We are committed to providing equal employment opportunities to qualified individuals and maintaining fair, inclusive, and compliant employment practices throughout the employee experience.

As we continue to grow, we welcome talented individuals from diverse backgrounds who are ready to contribute, grow, and make an impact with us.