Director of Payroll Operations & Compliance

Responsibilities

• Provide companywide leadership for payroll operations and compliance across the United States and Canada.
• Create standardized payroll calendars, SOPs, checklists, controls, documentation, and escalation protocols.
• Guide complex payroll matters involving union agreements, prevailing wage, certified payroll, fringe benefits, deductions, trust fund reporting, right-to-work requirements, and job costing.
• Serve as the go-to escalation point for payroll compliance questions, branch payroll challenges, and union interpretation issues.
• Parenthetical with Corporate Payroll, HR, Finance, Legal, Labor Relations, Operations, IT, and regional leaders to improve payroll accuracy, reporting, controls, and visibility.
• Audit branch payroll practices to identify risks, close gaps, and improve consistency.
• Support payroll readiness for new branches, new jurisdictions, M&A activity, integrations, and business transformation.
• Lead payroll governance initiatives that reduce risk, increase efficiency, and build a stronger operating model for the future.
• Help shape payroll technology improvements, automation, workflow optimization, dashboards, and operational KPIs.

Qualifications

• Bachelor’s degree in Accounting, Finance, HR, Business Administration, or a related field.
• 15-20+ years of progressive payroll leadership experience.
• Significant experience with complex multi-state payroll operations.
• U.S. and Canadian payroll experience strongly preferred.
• Background in construction, engineering, infrastructure, industrial, project-based, or craft labor environments.
• Deep knowledge of union payroll, collective bargaining agreements, prevailing wage, certified payroll, fringe benefits, deductions, trust fund reporting, labor costing, and job costing.
• Strong understanding of federal, state, provincial, and local wage and hour rules, payroll tax compliance, and labor compliance obligations.
• Proven success standardizing payroll practices across decentralized, multi-branch, or multi-region organizations.
• Experience influencing payroll teams and branch administrators, even without direct reporting authority.
• Strong communication, training, change management, problem-solving, and stakeholder management skills.

Even Better If You Have

• CPP, PCP, CPM, or equivalent payroll certification.
• Construction industry experience with large craft labor populations.
• Experience with shared services, payroll centers of excellence, or functional payroll governance models.
• Payroll transformation, technology implementation, automation, or process redesign experience.
• M&A, integration, new market expansion, or business transformation experience.
• Familiarity with Davis-Bacon requirements.
• Experience building payroll dashboards, compliance metrics, labor reconciliation reports, and operational KPIs.