Regional Pay and Benefits Manager

British High Commission Pretoria; Pretoria; On-site; ZAR 600,000 - 900,000; Full time

Job summary

British High Commission Pretoria seeks an experienced Payroll Lead to oversee regional pay and benefits services for Country Based Staff across Sub-Saharan Africa. This role combines team leadership with strong governance to ensure accurate, timely payroll processing and robust risk management.

You will line-manage Pay and Benefits Officers, forecast demand, monitor SLAs, maintain controls, and drive continuous improvement through stakeholder engagement and system enhancements.

Qualifications

• At least 5 years end-to-end payroll processing experience, including 2+ years in a supervisory role.
• Experience managing multiple payrolls, ideally across several countries in Africa.
• Strong analytical and numerical skills with proficient MS Office and advanced Excel.
• Excellent written and verbal communication with strong organisational skills.
• Ability to work with minimal supervision and maintain high levels of accuracy and prioritisation.

Responsibilities

• Lead and develop Regional Pay and Benefits Officers; set objectives and standards.
• Forecast demand, plan capacity and allocate workloads across regions.
• Maintain compliance, risk management and control frameworks for payroll services.
• Ensure delivery against SLAs and KPIs; monitor performance with reporting to leadership.
• Drive continuous improvement, data quality and standardisation with cross-functional teams.
• Engage with Posts, Finance, HR hubs and service providers to align policies and outputs.

Skills

Payroll processing

Team management

Excel – Advanced

Analytical skills

Communication skills

Discretion & confidentiality

Multi-country payroll

Education

Diploma/Degree in Accounting, Finance or HR

Tools

MS Excel

Payroll systems

Job description

Main purpose of job:

To lead and assure consistent, accurate and timeous regional pay and benefits service delivery for Country Based Staff employed in 39 countries across Sub-Saharan Africa.

The jobholder will manage and develop a team of Pay and Benefits Officers, forecast demand, plan resources, distribute and prioritise workloads, maintain effective compliance and control arrangements, and provide quality assurance and engagement with diverse stakeholders across supported countries and HQ partners.

The role will retain sufficient payroll expertise to oversee risk, resolve escalations and assure outputs, with routine payroll calculations, data entry and processing undertaken by designated officers or processing partners.

Roles and responsibilities:

Team management, workload distribution and capability – 30%

• Line manage Regional Pay and Benefits Officers, setting clear objectives, service standards and individual accountabilities.
• Translate regional priorities and payroll calendars into balanced work plans, allocating cases, cyclical activity, projects and urgent requests according to risk, complexity, skills and available capacity.
• Monitor workloads and team wellbeing, rebalance work promptly, coordinate cross-cover and maintain resilience during absence, peak periods and competing deadlines.
• Occasional processing of payroll during staffing constraints and/or peak periods (if required).
• Hold regular individual and team reviews; provide coaching, feedback and performance support; identify learning needs and build technical and customer-service capability.
• Create an inclusive, collaborative and accountable team culture that supports sound judgement, continuous improvement and constructive challenge.
• Maintain a clear skills and coverage matrix and ensure that critical activities have trained backups and current handover arrangements.

Resource planning and service performance – 20%

• Forecast demand using service volumes, payroll cycles, enquiry trends, change activity and known regional priorities; prepare short- and medium-term capacity plans.
• Match resources to demand, identify capacity or capability gaps early and recommend mitigation, reprioritisation, temporary support or escalation.
• Own the team’s delivery against agreed SLAs, KPIs and service commitments, using management information to identify trends, bottlenecks and improvement opportunities.
• Maintain business continuity and contingency arrangements, including cross-regional support where appropriate, and test them periodically.
• Coordinate implementation plans for policy changes, pay awards, data exercises, system changes and onboarding or transition of pay and benefits services.
• Provide clear performance, resource and risk reporting to Hub leadership, with practical recovery plans where delivery is off track.

Compliance, controls and risk management – 20%

• Maintain an effective control framework for pay and benefits services, with defined responsibilities, approval levels, segregation of duties, evidence requirements and escalation routes.
• Ensure compliance with internal process guidelines, FCDO policies, country-specific employment terms and local labour law, statutory obligations, data protection and audit requirements.
• Maintain risk and incident records, review high-risk or unusual transactions and cases, and ensure corrective actions are assigned, monitored and closed.
• Oversee adherence to payroll calendars, cut-off dates and approval requirements in relation to payroll processing.
• Ensure confidential and sensitive employee and payroll information is handled securely and that access, retention and sharing arrangements are appropriate.
• Keep standard operating procedures, process maps, control records and business continuity documentation accurate and up to date.

Quality assurance and continuous improvement – 15%

• Design and operate proportionate quality assurance reviews, including risk-based sampling, exception checks, reconciliations and validation of data and supporting evidence.
• Set quality measures and monitor accuracy, timeliness, complaints, incidents and recurring errors; agree corrective and preventive actions.
• Use root-cause analysis to address control failures and service issues, sharing lessons and ensuring improvements are embedded.
• Increase efficiency and accuracy though collaboration with GTPC, Posts and service providers on development of automated solutions.
• Drive standardisation and simplification across supported Posts while recognising justified local legal or operational requirements.
• Lead or support process, system and service-transition improvements, assessing risks and ensuring controls remain effective through change.
• Promote accurate, complete and well-structured data for management information, workforce cost analysis, pay awards and decision-making.

Stakeholder engagement and specialist oversight – 15%

• Act as the senior operational contact for Posts, Corporate Services, Finance, local and global Regional HR Hub colleagues, central Pay and Policy teams, systems teams and transaction-processing partners.
• Maintain a structured stakeholder engagement plan, provide clear guidance and service updates, and manage expectations during peak periods, incidents, policy changes and service transitions.
• Chair or contribute to service reviews, ensuring that decisions, owners, actions and deadlines are recorded and followed through.
• Provide advice or escalation support on complex pay positioning, allowances, social security, benefits, pay awards, policy interpretation and sensitive employee cases.
• Oversee payroll calendars, control performance and service continuity; review high-risk exceptions and approve outputs where required in relation to routine payroll processing.
• Represent the Region HR Hub in global HR Hub forums, share good practice and support consistent global standards.

Undertake any other duties as reasonably assigned, consistent with the grade and purpose of the role.

Resources managed:

Line management of Regional Pay and Benefits Officers, with responsibility for workload allocation, performance and development

Essential qualifications, skills and experience

• At least 5 years’ end-to-end payroll processing experience, including at least 2 years’ experience managing a team.
• Experience managing multiple payrolls, ideally across multiple countries within Africa.
• Strong analytical and numerical skills, with confident use of MS Office applications and advanced Excel skills
• Excellent written and verbal communications, with strong organisational skills
• Confident working with people at all levels in a fast-paced environment
• Discretion and professionalism in handling confidential employee information
• Able to work with minimal supervision, with strong accountability attention to details and prioritisation skills.

Language requirements:

Language: English

Level of language required: Expert

Desirable qualifications, skills and experience

• Diploma/Degree in Accounting, Finance, Human Resources or related field
• Experience of multi-country payroll processing, payroll governance, local labour-law or statutory compliance, and stakeholder management in a shared services or regional environment.
• Experience of service transition, audit, payroll or HR systems, process improvement, pay awards or benchmarking exercises.
• Experience using data and management information to improve capacity, quality and customer outcomes.