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