The Payslip team attended the recent PayrollOrg Congress payroll conference in Denver in the United States- quite a scenic and memorable location for the brightest minds in global payroll around the world to gather!
It was a fantastic week and we particularly enjoyed chatting and interacting with various different global payroll professionals across a range of different industries. Everybody had unique insights and yet at the same time they all shared common challenges and complexities.
In a busy week, we had lots of passionate and committed payroll thought leaders and professionals visit our booth and discuss their global payroll system challenges and payroll processing pain points. There is so much happening in the world of global payroll management, and we really enjoyed the opportunity to meet and network with fantastic global payroll professionals, industry peers, analysts and experts.
Our CEO, Fidelma McGuirk and Payroll Evangelist, Mary Holland CPP, both had sessions at the event where we had the opportunity to discuss how our global payroll control platform fits with the future of global payroll delivery and management. Mary delivered a session on A standardization playbook for global payroll expansion-covering how to create a template for adding new countries and vendors during periods of growth.
Fidelma delivered a joint keynote speech with Nathan North (Director of Strategic Initiatives, PayrollOrg) on Implementing a Mobility Program-In the Post-Covid World 2.0.
In this article, we will discuss some of the key recurring themes that circulated throughout the week.
Automation is transforming payroll
This was not news to us as we have been advocating the use of automation in payroll delivery and management for years. And we were excited to learn that so many global payroll professionals are interested in learning about just how much time automation can save them in every payrun.
There was no fear of this powerful technology from global payroll professionals we spoke to who discussed being overwhelmed by the sheer volume of manual data entry tasks that are a part of day-to-day delivery in payroll processing. There was a clear acknowledgement that Excel spreadsheets were not designed for managing global payroll and how disheartening it is to have so much time taken up by manual data entry and an almost complete reliance on this tool from the 1990s.
Automation is transforming payroll because it is creating space and time in every payrun, enabling global payroll professionals to focus on higher priority tasks such as reporting and analysis work. It is also improving accuracy because it limits or entirely eliminates the likelihood of human error. This helps from a risk mitigation perspective and also naturally lends itself to better and more accurate compliance too.
Automating any recurring or repetitive tasks in payroll processing saves hours and even days if you are manually processing data for a lot of payroll countries. It can bulk file upload thousands off rows of payroll data that previously required manual Excel spreadsheet data entry and analysis. Now all of this tedious work can be taken over by innovative automation that automatically uploads, then checks and validates data in seconds so that it is fit for purpose and produces accurate payroll calculations.
Payslip solve this time-consuming problem with purpose-built automation. Our automation removes the need for Excel spreadsheets and can result in a 95% reduction in manual processes in as little as 2 months.
One client of ours benefits from 5,712 hours saved a year across 28 countries with automated multi-source pre-payroll inputs replacing manual data entry in their process.
Automated production of multi-currency and multi-country General Ledger and Bank File reporting also saves considerable finance time and direct fees (up to 2k) to local payroll providers
On the Payslip global payroll control platform, we automate everything from data workflows and validations, through to integrations and essential last mile reporting. The result is more speed in processing, much greater efficiency levels and pinpoint accuracy in global payroll data. You can learn more about the ground-breaking automations that payslip have introduced here.
Protecting data is a major priority
Data breaches and cyber security issues are never far from the global news headlines these days and many global payroll professionals spoke to us about how they are coming under increasing pressure to better protect hugely sensitive payroll data.
This is coming from the top level at global organisations where C-suite executives are keen to ensure proper and effective data security measures inside their companies.
Global payroll contains sensitive and personal information, so it should come as no surprise that this kind of information is a target. It needs to be managed inside a secure cloud platform which adheres to the highest industry standards when it comes to information protection, privacy and data security.
This is an issue that is becoming everybody's responsibility and global payroll professionals are concerned that their current process for delivering payroll across their countries is not coming anywhere near to the levels of data protection that they need to achieve. Excel spreadsheets and e-mail data transfer are notoriously risky and should no longer be used in global payroll processing in 2023.
The Payslip platform has industry-leading levels of security and information protection built into every layer and we use a wide range of technologies and practices to defend personal data from unauthorized access.
Future proofing payroll
Another hot topic at the conference -what's the best way to go about future proofing payroll processes? There are a lot of vendors and options out there and many people we spoke to were keen to gather as much information as possible so that they could make an informed decision on what is the best way to deliver payroll at their organisations for the next decade.
They want to know the right mix of global payroll model and technology platforms that can give them total autonomy along with full visibility and control over all their payroll countries. We spoke about how the hybrid model is becoming more and more popular now as it gives global employers the control they need. This is a model where you choose whatever number of service providers and local country payroll vendors you need to process payroll and then manage it all via a global payroll control platform.
This approach comes with several advantages:
- you choose and control all of your local vendors
- you consolidate all of the data from your vendors and service providers in a single location
- you use this data to deliver detailed and comprehensive reporting and analytics
- you manage vendors and service providers in one location, a tech platform
- you apply a global framework management structure to all of your payroll countries
What you want from any payroll future proofing methodology is something that enables you to manage all of the payroll countries that you have now in a fast, accurate and effective way while also enabling you to create a playbook or template for onboarding new payroll countries during periods of growth. You end up with something that works for you in the here and now while also enabling you to plan for future changes inside the organisation. This is global payroll delivery on your terms, where you are always in control.
Payslip is designed to fully support global companies who choose to follow the hybrid delivery model for multi-country payroll. The diversity within each country can be accommodated and supported, while having one standardized and automated global management solution.
Managing compliance
Similar to data security and information protection issues outlined above, global payroll compliance is a huge priority inside organisations. We spoke to many payroll professionals who have concerns about their struggle to see exactly what is required in terms of mandatory compliance returns across all of their individual payroll countries.
It is a fluid compliance environment in a constantly changing regulatory landscape. What would really help these professionals is a digitised compliance calendar that shows all of the key compliance dates in all of the countries. This would give them a sense of control as well as preparation time when it comes to global payroll compliance. They need to be aware of what is required in each country and have some kind of advanced notice around what they need to do.
It is a pressurised situation as non-compliance or compliance failures can result in significant financial penalties as well as reputational damage. It is an area of labour law that is simply non-negotiable and global companies with multiple different payroll countries need to be confident that they are adhering to local labour laws and regulations at all times. It is clear that technology that enables them to see what is happening across their countries and respond in a compliant way has become an essential must-have.
For more information about our Global Payroll Control Platform contact us today.