Sr Director, Total Rewards

Purpose and Scope

The Director of Total Rewards is a strategic and operational enterprise leader responsible for architecting, optimizing, and governing the company's total rewards strategy and infrastructure. This role serves as the enterprise workforce investment strategist and executive advisor, shaping compensation, benefits, executive rewards, and recognition programs as key levers to drive performance, engagement, retention, and long-term value creation.

Essential Duties and Responsibilities

• Develop and execute a total rewards strategy aligned with company business objectives, culture, and market competitiveness, utilizing a Total Rewards Value approach balancing salary, short-term incentives, long-term incentives, and benefits.

• Serve as strategic advisor to the Executive Leadership Team, influencing executive incentive design, governance decisions, and board-level reward discussions.

• Architect scalable compensation and benefits infrastructure capable of supporting growth, workforce complexity, and acquisition integration.

• Lead workforce cost modeling, financial scenario planning, and ROI-driven reward strategy to optimize investment while maintaining competitive positioning.

• Design structured annual and multi-year work plans that reflect seasonal workload cycles (merit planning, bonus cycles, open enrollment, executive compensation reviews, integration activity).

• Clearly define required team structure, capabilities, and external partnerships needed to execute effectively at enterprise scale.

• Own and evolve the enterprise compensation philosophy, job architecture framework, and pay transparency strategy.

• Design and administer competitive compensation structures, including base, incentive, and executive compensation programs aligned to performance and business outcomes.

• Lead executive compensation planning, governance, and reporting in partnership with senior leadership and, where applicable, the Board.

• Ensure accurate modeling, financial forecasting, testing, and governance of compensation programs.

• Lead annual salary planning processes including merit, promotions, short-term and long-term incentives.

• Ensure pay equity, regulatory compliance, and alignment with company values and performance expectations.

• Develop leader capability to conduct effective pay and performance conversations.

• Design and deploy enterprise-wide compensation and total rewards training for leaders and HR partners.

• Equip leaders with tools, frameworks, and guidance to confidently manage pay conversations and reinforce performance-driven culture.

• Own the total rewards communication and change management strategy to ensure employees understand the full value of their compensation and benefits.

• Align communication strategies to drive engagement, transparency, and trust across workforce segments.

• Lead a workforce-segmented benefits strategy addressing the needs of multi-generational, manufacturing, field service technician, professional, and executive populations.

• Oversee design and administration of benefit programs to ensure effectiveness, competitiveness, compliance, engagement, and cost discipline.

• Redesign legacy programs to improve utilization, engagement, and measurable return on investment.

• Build and evolve a culture-aligned recognition strategy tied to business outcomes and performance reinforcement.

• Maintain strong vendor oversight, contract negotiation, and performance accountability.

• Evaluate total rewards processes to identify breakdowns, redundancies, and risk exposure.

• Implement structured audit checkpoints across payroll, bonus calculations, executive compensation, and benefit administration.

• Lead system optimization efforts (Workday and related platforms), ensuring accurate data flow, reporting integrity, and automation of process controls.

• Develop KPIs and dashboards to monitor accuracy, timeliness, compliance, cost efficiency, and workforce investment effectiveness.

• Establish documentation and standard operating procedures to ensure repeatability and consistency.

• Reduce error rates through automation, redesign, and accountability mechanisms.

• Lead total rewards due diligence during acquisition activity.

• Develop integration roadmaps for harmonizing compensation structures, incentive plans, benefits programs, payroll processes, and systems.

• Assess legacy processes and implement standardized Rite-Hite governance and controls.

• Drive enterprise reward transformation initiatives, including modernization, transparency strategy implementation, and system enhancements.

• Ensure smooth transition for employees while protecting compliance, financial accuracy, and workforce engagement.

• Ensure compliance with all applicable compensation, payroll, and benefits regulations.

• Maintain governance structures that support internal and external audits.

• Partner with Legal, Finance, HRIS/Payroll, and HR leadership to mitigate risk exposure.

• Ensure documentation and controls withstand regulatory and financial scrutiny.

• Monitor total rewards investment effectiveness through financial modeling, benchmarking, and performance analytics.

Education and Experience

• Bachelor’s degree in Finance, or related field; Master’s degree preferred.
• Minimum of 10 years of progressive experience in Total Rewards leadership, and executive compensation.
• Demonstrated experience leading total rewards workstreams during mergers and acquisitions.
• Proven track record of automating manual processes and implementing control frameworks.
• Experience administering and optimizing Workday or similar HRIS platforms required.
• Experience in a complex, multi-entity or global organization preferred.
• Certified Compensation Professional (CCP) strongly preferred.

Knowledge / Skill Requirements

• Deep expertise in executive compensation design and governance.
• Strong financial acumen and modeling capabilities.
• Demonstrated ability to build audit frameworks and reduce error rates in payroll and compensation administration.
• Exceptional operational discipline and project management skills.
• Ability to plan and manage cyclical/seasonal workload fluctuations.
• Strong systems orientation with a continuous improvement mindset.
• Clear, confident communication skills with executive leadership.
• Ability to design team resource plans that support business growth.