Payroll Project Lead | National Payroll Centralisation ASX

Arete Executive; Sydney; On-site; AUD 180,000 - 240,000; Full time

Job summary

Arete Executive is seeking a Senior Payroll Project Lead to drive the national payroll centralisation across Australia. Based in Sydney, you will lead a hands-on payroll role, expand from 2,500+ to 5,000+ employees, and manage a major HRIS rollout with a growing payroll team.

You will train site leaders to improve timekeeping inputs, implement robust pay coding across states, and ensure compliance with Single Touch Payroll and audit requirements for an ASX-listed group.

Qualifications

• Extensive experience managing payroll in high-volume, unionised environments.
• Led HRIS/payroll system implementations or consolidations across multiple states.
• Trained site leaders to improve timekeeping inputs and reduce errors.

Responsibilities

• Lead national payroll centralisation from NSW to 5,000+ employees.
• Oversee current HRIS/payroll integration projects and platform configurations.
• Mentor payroll team and ensure proactive communication with operational stakeholders.

Skills

Payroll management

HRIS rollout

Audit & compliance

Tools

Workday

ADP

Preceda

Job description

Payroll Project Lead | National Payroll Centralisation ASX

Payroll Project Lead | National Payroll Centralisation

• Help take payroll from 2,500 to 5,000+ employees
• Hands-on role in a major HRIS rollout
• A growing progressive remit

About the Company and Opportunity

Our client is part of an ASX-listed group with $2B+ in revenue that delivers essential services across Australia. The business has a strong base of long-term revenue and is growing steadily. Its culture is down to earth and humble.
This is a newly created senior payroll role, set up to help the business move from a single state payroll to a national one. The NSW payroll processes pay for 2,500+ employees across multiple sites, for a unionised workforce covered by enterprise agreements. One state has recently moved across, another follows in January, and the rest are planned to centralise by the end of 2027, which will take the payroll to 5,000+ employees. You will report to the People and Culture Manager NSW and work alongside a growing payroll team of eight.
The first focus is accuracy at the source. Payroll is processing hundreds of amendments per site each month, driven mostly by incorrect timekeeping and roster inputs. You will get out to the sites and train operations managers and site leaders to get those inputs right, so that new contract work and roster changes flow cleanly into payroll. That will cut rework and overtime and let the team move from fixing errors to managing payroll proactively. Alongside this, you will deliver the current system integration projects and mentor senior members of the team. You will also make sure the operational leaders and employee representatives hear about payroll issues early, so that preventable disputes are avoided.
The second focus is the platform for national scale. A new HRIS is being rolled out across HR and payroll, and each state’s pay data may not be coded consistently. You will review configuration, pay coding and enterprise agreement interpretation, make sure your recommendations are adopted, and build a repeatable playbook so each state lands cleanly. Compliance obligations are also rising, with same day super now in force alongside Single Touch Payroll, and the function has to meet the audit requirements of an ASX-listed parent. As each state transitions, you will take on more responsibility for payroll operations and outcomes.

About You

You are an experienced payroll manager who has done this before in a complex, high-volume, unionised environment. You have run payroll under enterprise agreements and kept operational and union stakeholders informed early enough to head off disputes. You have implemented a new HRIS or payroll system, or consolidated several payrolls into one, and you have reviewed configuration and pay coding, found the inconsistencies and fixed them. You have trained operational leaders on timekeeping and inputs in a way that measurably reduced errors and rework. You have delivered same day super and Single Touch Payroll compliance and met audit requirements in an ASX-listed or parent company structure or similar. You have built and mentored a payroll team through growth or change, and you work independently at payroll manager level with minimal direction. You will be based on site with the team in Sydney’s South West. Experience with Workday, ADP, Preceda or a similar platform is highly regarded.

What’s on Offer

This is a rare chance to join a growing ASX-listed business as it builds a national payroll, and to shape that payroll yourself. Your responsibility and seniority will grow quickly. You will join a down to earth culture where people are backed and given room to make an impact. For an ambitious payroll leader, it is a career-defining move, in a stable, growing business in an essential service.

NOTE: You must have unrestricted working rights in Australia to apply.

Arete champions diversity and inclusion and welcomes applications from candidates of all backgrounds and particularly encourages women to apply.