Workday HRIS Lead Specialist

ICON Clinical Research; Dublin; On-site; EUR 90,000 - 120,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Health insurance

Retirement planning

Employee Assistance Programme

Job summary

ICON plc in Dublin is seeking a Workday HRIS Lead Specialist to drive strategy, implementation, and governance of HR technology solutions. This Office Hybrid role will support our HR technology strategy and enhance the employee experience.

You will manage day-to-day HRIS activities, lead a functional team across HCM, Recruiting, and Absence, and oversee security reviews, governance, and SOW management with approximately 5% travel.

Qualifications

• Bachelor's degree in information systems, HR, business administration or related field.
• Extensive experience in HR technology management including implementation and oversight of major HR platforms.

Responsibilities

• Oversee day-to-day HR activities and support the HRIS team.
• Act as escalation point for Workday L2/L3 issues across HCM, Recruiting, Compensation, Absence and Integrations.
• Provide governance and risk management for high-impact HR issues affecting hiring, pay or executives.
• Lead configuration direction and change requests across HRIS domains (HCM, Recruiting, Compensation, Absence).
• Coordinate SOWs, vendor approvals, and DocuSign routing; liaise with Procurement and Legal.
• Manage release management activities and post-release stabilization.
• Conduct security/data reviews and access governance with cross-functional teams.
• Support BAU cycles like performance reviews, compensation, and benefits enrollment.

Skills

HR technology management

Workday

SAP

Oracle

Leadership

Cross-functional collaboration

Travel willingness

Education

Bachelor's degree in information systems or related field

Tools

Workday

SAP

Oracle

Job description

Workday HRIS Lead Specialist - Office Hybrid in Dublin, Ireland

ICON plc is a world-leading healthcare intelligence and clinical research organization. We’re proud to foster an inclusive environment driving innovation and excellence, and we welcome you to join us on our mission to shape the future of clinical development.

As a HR Technology Lead at ICON, you will oversee the strategy, implementation, and optimization of HR technology solutions to support our organizational goals and enhance the employee experience.

What You Will Do:

You will manage day-to-day human resources activities, supporting your team to deliver quality outcomes.

Workday HRIS Operations & Governance

• Act as escalation point for complex Workday L2/L3 cases across HCM, Recruiting, Compensation, Absence and Integrations
• Manage direct escalations from Tier 1 analysts and HR/TA stakeholders on urgent or sensitive cases
• Provide decisioning and risk management for high-impact issues affecting hiring, pay or executive populations
• Oversee HRIS backlog prioritisation and recurring refinement forums
• Ensure documentation and governance controls are in place

Functional Team Leadership & Configuration Direction

• Provide day-to-day leadership and support to the functional HRIS team across HCM, Recruiting, Compensation and Absence
• Act as first point of contact for complex functional or technical queries where analysts require confirmation or direction
• Support the team in assessing requirements, options and impacts before configuration changes are made
• Guide next steps on configuration for Change Requests (CRs) and project work, including tenant strategy (sandbox vs preview vs production)
• Help shape and validate configuration approaches to ensure they align to global design, governance standards and downstream impacts
• Remove blockers by advising on sequencing, dependencies, testing approach and stakeholder alignment

Supplier, Contract & SOW Management

• Coordinate SOW preparation, internal approvals and VP signature routing via DocuSign
• Liaise with Procurement and Legal to ensure commercial and contractual compliance
• Maintain oversight of active AMS and project SOWs

Release Management

• release impact assessment
• change gating/evidence
• deployment coordination
• post-release stabilization

Annual Process Governance & Traceability

• Responsible for BAU delivery (e.g. performance review, compensation cycles and benefit enrollment events)

Workday security/data reviews & access governance

• Working with cross functional teams to ensure all security related requirements are fully analysed and appropriate checks and balances applied.
• Facilitating weekly team and quarterly SLT governance forums.

Your Profile:

You will have solid human resources experience, with the ability to manage competing priorities and develop your team.

Required qualifications and experience:

• Bachelor's degree in information systems, human resources, business administration, or a related field, or equivalent experience.
• Extensive experience in HR technology management, including implementation and oversight of major HR platforms e.g., Workday, SAP, Oracle.
• Strong strategic thinking skills with a proven ability to align technology with business goals.
• Excellent communication and leadership abilities, with experience managing teams and cross‑functional projects.
• A commitment to continuous improvement, innovation, and delivering a high‑quality employee experience through technology.
• Willingness to travel as required (approximately 5%)

What ICON can offer you:

Our success depends on the quality of our people. That’s why we’ve made it a priority to build a diverse culture that rewards high performance and nurtures talent.

In addition to your competitive salary, ICON offers a range of additional benefits. Our benefits are designed to be competitive within each country and are focused on well‑being and work life balance opportunities for you and your family.

Our benefits examples include:

• Various annual leave entitlements
• A range of health insurance offerings to suit you and your family’s needs.
• Competitive retirement planning offerings to maximize savings and plan with confidence for the years ahead.
• Global Employee Assistance Programme, LifeWorks, offering 24‑hour access to a global network of over 80,000 independent specialized professionals who are there to support you and your family’s well‑being.
• Life assurance
• Flexible country‑specific optional benefits, including childcare vouchers, bike purchase schemes, discounted gym memberships, subsidized travel passes, health assessments, among others.

At ICON, inclusion & belonging are fundamental to our culture and values. We’re dedicated to providing an inclusive and accessible environment for all candidates. ICON is committed to providing a workplace free of discrimination and harassment. All qualified applicants will receive equal consideration for employment without regard to race, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, national origin, disability or protected veteran status.

If, because of a medical condition or disability, you need a reasonable accommodation for any part of the application process, or in order to perform the essential functions of a position, please let us know or submit a request here https://careers.iconplc.com/reasonable‑accommodations